@cstross Biden's answer when asked about McConnell's health at a press conference today would tend to support this. Much more in the mode of what one says of the incipient dead than an opposing politician, however collegial your habits.

McConnell had polio as a child. That does tend to use up your neurological redundancy and lead to rapid decline in age.

@cstross
While it's tempting to make "buffer underflow" jokes at his expense, you're clearly right. This sort of illness-hiding is straight out of the authoritarian regime playbook.

He and Dianne Feinstein should meet and agree to retire immediately, preserving party balance and getting the hell out of the way now that neither can effectively serve the Senate. Of course, they won't do anything so sensible.

@cstross

I am willing to bet dollars to doughnuts, that it has been happening a lot, considering his reaction as it is happening in public.

He needs help. And despite the fact I loathe the man, I wish that he would retire and get the help he needs, and have his family around him, Unfortunately, I think it will only be his kids. Sadly, I don't think Elaine actually loves or cares about Mitch.

@cstross Him and Feinstein both...

Frankly speaking at this point the Senate could host one hell of a sequel of Weekend at Bernies

@cstross
Kentucky's citizenry is very white and very poor. Moneyed interests often overpower the common people who dissent. The people in power loathe releasing it, like anywhere else.
Plenty of elders are dealing with chronic illness, + people of all ages have disabilities.
It's a hard sell to be progressive + yet try to force mental fitness testing on elected officials.
I want him to leave, though.

#disability
#schaudenfreude
#ageism
#USPol
#turtles

@cstross I know this is neither here nor there, but it always bothered me that there's no term for a non-brain damaged aphasic event (aphasia literally is a sign of physical trauma to brain, though it doesn't have to be impact- stroke or similar counts as physical trauma in this context).

He certainly had an aphasic event, and it's his second one. I don't know what the cause is, but pretending this isn't real is going harm, period, in many ways.

@cstross

Mitch, Feinstein, Biden, Trump ... the USA is essentially a gerontocracy now.

How about electing some young blood? Not the kind Peter Thiel takes :)

@cstross He may not be having them much in private if they are absence seizures (which is what I think they are). They could be being triggered by the camera flashes since his fall and concussion.

He also may be very ill and not telling anyone. no way to know.

There are plenty of other good reasons why he should step down though, like his entire political career.

@cstross @spaf

During the aphasia he was still more eloquent than any candidate at their last debate.

I'm kind of hoping it will become a fashion with the Republicans. Their rhetoric would become more logical, eloquent, and show more empathy for people.

@cstross likely more, our gerontocracy does not serve us well.

In a vein similar to that of Sen Feinstein. Wonder if her staff would agree to stop telling her to hang on, if they could be sure about their own status. Which is one of the rumored reasons she won’t let go.

@cstross

This pretty much put the kibosh on adding any kind of term limits, for any reason, to state and national representatives & senators. It overturned existing laws in a couple dozen states.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Term_limits_in_the_United_States

@cstross

Heard a neurologist today, saying it looked more like a seizure than a stroke.

A stroke would be some kind of vascular event, usually with a brain bleed or at least cutoff of blood flow to part of the brain. McConnell didn't show the usual signs (e.g., no left-right asymmetry/paralysis).

But a seizure, something vaguely like petit mal where you just zone out for a while (among many, many other things), does seem to fit.

Also, head trauma can induce this sort of epileptiform problem:

https://www.epilepsy.com/causes/structural/traumatic-brain-injury-and-epilepsy

That's relevant because he's fallen several times this year, at least once inducing a concussion and cracking some ribs. Whacking your skull on concrete is a bad idea in general, but brain trauma leading to seizures is a particularly excellent reason not to do so.

I noticed today that he didn't lack speech entirely during the episode. When somebody asked him, "Did you hear the question, Senator?", he was able to say "Yes" to that. But he was otherwise locked up. A real neurologist might be able to make something of that.

And no doubt his personal doctors are doing so. The best the rest of us can do is guesswork.

The overall conclusion, though, is independent of guesswork details and quite clear: he's too old to be a senator.

Even if the Latin root of "senator" is "old man" (senex, senatoris). Roman senators would perhaps have preferrred "elders", but still "old guys in charge" fits the data pretty well.