Before any Trump supporters cry fowl for bringing up The Donald’s age (he’ll be 70 in June), please note that we’re not doing it to start rumors. After all, Bernie Sanders is older, as is Joe Biden. However, Trump has either been getting confused recently by the complex issues facing the country or he’s having senior moments. There’s no other way to explain why he keeps having to put out press releases recanting what he said.
The first thing that made us start wondering about his mental acuity was the nuclear triad question asked during a CNN debate. It wasn’t the first time that he’d heard the question. In fact, it was moderator Hugh Hewitt who had asked him originally on his radio program. Moreover, Hewitt literally laid out what the nuclear triad was while asking the question. All Trump had to do was select one of the choices that Hewitt said 8 seconds before. Instead, he went on a rant of practiced talking points. When Hewitt pressed him to pick one of the three legs of the nuclear triad, Trump’s response was, “With nuclear, the power, the devastation is very important to me.”
More recently, we’re seeing him confusing H-1B and H-2B visas, tech workers versus migrant workers, and claiming that he would supersede the Geneva Convention before saying that he wouldn’t, only to say that he would but sort of not a day later. He’s been caught forgetting what he said earlier in the campaign on multiple occasions and has even accused interviewers of lying about what he said even after they produce the tapes of him saying it. Ted Cruz highlighted one of his “senior moments” with regards to health care and even turned it into a campaign ad.
It’s not always a case of changing opinions months later. Sometimes, he changes his opinion within a couple of weeks, as was the case with invading Afghanistan:
There’s very good evidence that these aren’t senior moments. In fact, he seems to be pretty sharp when defending his flip-flops at the last Fox News debate. Megyn Kelly gave him a “gotcha” question and his answer was downright brilliant. Flexibility is important to Trump. He nailed it.
While it’s much more likely that he’s just being “flexible” rather than showing signs of mental aging, it should still be noted that he’ll be the oldest President to be inaugurated in history. Some point to Nancy Reagan running much of the day-to-day in the White House during Reagan’s second term. Will Melania be running the country in 2022?