Video: Could Donald Trump Pass a Sanity Test?

Keith Olbermann provides his decidedly amateur analysis.

Source: Vanity Fair

Short answer: probably not.

First, several important caveats. There is little worse and nothing cheesier than questioning the psychological stability of a public figure, especially a candidate for president, even in this case.

Except that in his year of campaigning, Donald Trump has called Lindsey Graham “a nut job,” Glenn Beck “a real nut job,” and Bernie Sanders “a wacko.” Trump has insisted Ben Carson’s got a “pathological disease,” and asked of Barack Obama: “Is our president insane?” He called Ted Cruz “unstable,” “unhinged,” “a little bit of a maniac,” and “crazy or very dishonest.” He also called the entire CNBC network “crazy.” He called Megyn Kelly “crazy”—at least six times.

Respectful reticence about aspersions and cliches and mental-health questions in a time in which mocking was seemingly slowly maturing into concern, died a long time ago in this presidential cycle—and it died at Donald Trump’s hands. Moreover, if the question is asked seriously and not gratuitously, just the examination might explain how Trump has seemingly survived dozens of moments that might each have been campaign-enders for almost anybody else. Why have we not asked if a given presidential candidate might be disqualified from office due to psychological reasons? Because we not only can’t see this forest for the trees, but each time we try, there are even more trees blocking our view. In the 24-hour news cycle, each successive John Yerkes Iselin moment is not registered cumulatively; it merely supplants the one from last week. Or yesterday. Or this morning.

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