On Memorial Day, Trump Asks People to Remember... He's Not Mentally Well

This has come up on this site, at least in passing, before. If you teach at the university level, and you have 50-1,000 students for a quarter or a semester, some of them are going to have mental health issues. It's just math. In some cases, the student volunteers information. In other cases, it's clear from their behavior that there's some underlying condition. And often, the university gives some information, in the form of instructions about special accommodations. But while we may have a general sense there is an issue, we rarely know what the specific diagnosis is. It's not legal to ask and, truth be told, we don't particularly want to know the details. In many cases, the student themselves probably doesn't know. There's still plenty of stigma attached to mental health issues, particularly in some cultures.

We write all of this because we understand well why mental health professionals do not presume to diagnose Donald Trump from a distance. And we also understand well that we have neither the information nor the expertise to diagnose Trump ourselves. But there is clearly something wrong with him (and has been for a long time, though it seems to us that he's getting worse). The 24 hours of Memorial Day provided plenty of reminders of this.

To get the holiday off to a "rousing" start, Trump fired up his barely functional social media platform (it was down for much of last night) and, shortly before 7:00 a.m., sent out this:

HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY TO ALL, INCLUDING THE SCUM THAT SPENT THE LAST FOUR YEARS TRYING TO DESTROY OUR COUNTRY THROUGH WARPED RADICAL LEFT MINDS, WHO ALLOWED 21,000,000 MILLION PEOPLE TO ILLEGALLY ENTER OUR COUNTRY, MANY OF THE BEING CRIMINALS AND THE MENTAO INSANE,THROUGH AN OPEN BORDER THAT ONLY AN INCOMPETENT PRESIDENT WOULD APPROVE, AND THROUGH JUDGES WHO ARE ON A MISSION TO KEEP MURDERERS, DRUG DEALERS, RAPISTS, GANG MEMBERS, AND RELEASED PRISONERS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD, IN OUR COUNTRY SO THEY CAN ROB, MURDERERS, AND RAPE AGAIN, PROTECTED BY THESE USA HATING JUDGES WHO SUFFER FROM AN IDEOLOGY THAT IS SICK, AND VERY DANGEROUS FOR OUR COUNTRY. HOPEFULLY THE UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT, AND OTHER GOOD AND COMPASSIONATE JUDGES THROUGHOUT THE LAND, WILL SAVE US FROM THE DECISIONS OF THE MONSTERS WHO WANT OUR COUNTRY TO GO TO HELL.

If he were anyone other than the President of the United States, this alone—the unhinged ranting and raving, and in ALL CAPS—might be enough by itself to justify a few days of involuntary commitment and observation. Even by the standards of the Internet, it's... pretty disturbing.

Trump followed that up by reposting this message from one of his supporters:

They stole the 2020 election and hijacked the country using a decrepit corpse as a frontman

They used an autopen to start wars, steal from our treasury, and pardon their friends

Arrest those responsible and charge them with TREASON

This is crazypants in a manner different from the ALL CAPS message, but it's still... disturbing. To STILL be obsessing about the 2020 election is nuts. To have such a deep and abiding hatred of Biden is nuts. And to take cheap shots at a man who may well be dying from cancer is some blend of low-class and deeply concerning. We'll have more on this subject tomorrow and the next day, by the way.

And it did not end there. Before participating in a wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington, Trump delivered a 17-minute speech. This is as close as it gets to a slam dunk in politics. Say a few things about military heroes and sacrifice and honor, and you're done. A president could literally give the exact same speech every year, nobody would notice, and everyone would love it, because the beats you need to hit are obvious, and they are the beats that listeners want you to hit. But Trump couldn't do it. He started out normal, but he just had to throw away the script and go on an extended harangue about "his predecessor" and the incompetence therein. And this follows, by two days, the bizarro and meandering West Point commencement address where Trump talked about Al Capone (yet again), the downsides to trophy wives, and his golf game, among many other topics.

We dislike writing an item like this, but we dislike ignoring evidence even more. None of this is normal, none of it is healthy, and again, if it were ANYONE else, the talk would be about how the person is unwell and needs help. Well, just because it's Trump, we don't think the rules are different. He's clearly unwell, and he needs help. (Z)

The Harvard-Trump War Continues

On Thursday of last week, the Trump administration announced that it was yanking the approval that allows Harvard University to enroll international students. When we wrote the news up on Friday, we guessed that Harvard's lawyers would have their challenge filed early Friday morning. Beyond the fact that a lawyer at that level can crank out a 75-page filing in their sleep... well, at this point, Harvard must have anticipated the various lines of attack, and pre-prepared filings where they just have to fill in a few blanks.

Our prediction—which, to be clear, was a lay-up—was on the mark. Harvard filed its request for an injunction early Friday, and Judge Allison D. Burroughs, of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, granted a temporary restraining order about an hour later.

At this point, let's pause to address a couple of factual matters. First of all, the TRO should have been, and was, an easy call. One of the main considerations for a judge, in these circumstances, is the harm that will be done by granting (or not granting) a TRO while a case is litigated. If Harvard does not get their TRO, and then ends up winning the case, the university will still be badly damaged. If Harvard DOES get their TRO, and then the Trump administration ends up winning the case, the Trump administration will not be damaged by the delay. This was an easy enough decision that we, despite not having law degrees or being federal judges, could have made it. That said, the fact that Burroughs acted so quickly, almost certainly before she actually had time to read Harvard's 72-page filing, can't exactly be interpreted as a good sign for the administration.

We also had some questions/comments from readers about this subject. The questions were about the student body at Harvard, and exactly how many of them would be affected. The school has about 22,000 students, and about a third of those are undergrads, while the other two-thirds are grads. The number of foreign students has been pegged at around 6,800, which would be around 30% of the student body. This is plausible, though most of those foreign-born students are certainly grad students. Also, we don't know this for sure, but it's possible that the 6,800 includes some sizable number of postdocs who are not included in the 22,000 enrolled students. Postdocs exist in a liminal space between "student" and "faculty," though they are more faculty than they are students, and they don't pay tuition.

That brings us to a comment we got from several different readers. In our item, we said the Trump administration's timing was not very smart, as it has given the school abundant time to file lawsuits, and also to make special accommodations (say, a satellite campus outside the United States). The comment we got was along these lines: "Maybe the Trump administration's timing is better than you suggest, because this will give students time to decide not to attend Harvard, and to transfer elsewhere."

There may be some merit to this observation, but... not too much, we think, for three reasons. The first is that the process of applying for admissions, funding, etc. is over for academic year 2025-26; for many people, the choice is "go to Harvard, or don't go anywhere." The second is that if someone is an undergrad, it's fairly plausible to re-deploy to another school. But most of the students at Harvard, and most of the foreign students, are grad students. It depends on the discipline but, on the whole, it's not too easy to move to a different institution, because your research is based at the institution where you commenced it. Third, and finally, anyone who gets admitted to Harvard, or who gets a post-doc at Harvard, has just been handed one of the world's great calling cards. Most folks are not going to be willing to give that up, particularly since the school is very likely to prevail on the merits. If it becomes necessary, it's more likely that students would just take an unplanned gap year, or would try to work remotely for a year. For all of these reasons, we just don't see a big disruption for the (foreign) student body. Some disruption, maybe. But not a lot.

Moving along, Trump yesterday made two announcements. The first is that he is thinking about taking the $3 billion he is withholding from Harvard, and redistributing it to trade schools.

This is actually a really good example of how Trump plays... checkers? At first glance, this looks like a pretty savvy move. That is to say, take a bunch of money from eggheads, and give it to blue-collar workers (i.e., Trump's target demo). But, at second glance, there are two problems. The first is that Trump is never actually going to be able to deliver, because he's not going to be allowed to cancel already-executed contracts, even if he really really really wants to. The second is that if $3 billion for trade schools (a relative drop in the bucket) is a good idea, then how about $10 billion or maybe $50 billion? And yet, he didn't put that money into his budget proposal. Why not?

The second announcement from Trump, meanwhile, was that he wants the names of all the foreign students at Harvard RIGHT NOW. He went on his very depressing social media platform and thundered:

Why isn't Harvard saying that almost 31% of their students are from FOREIGN LANDS, and yet those countries, some not at all friendly to the United States, pay NOTHING toward their student's education, nor do they ever intend to. Nobody told us that! We want to know who those foreign students are, a reasonable request since we give Harvard BILLIONS OF DOLLARS, but Harvard isn't exactly forthcoming. We want those names and countries.

Whereas the first announcement was a pretty good illustration of Trump's low-skill political maneuvering, this one is a pretty good illustration of his incompetence or his dishonesty (readers can decide for themselves which it is). See, there is a federal database called the Student and Exchange Visitor Program, which is used to keep track of foreign student visas. And so, the federal government already has "names and countries" (and a bunch of other information). Kind of feels like tariffs-on-penguins time, to us, but maybe readers will see it differently.

And that's the latest. Trump believes this war on Harvard is producing lots of the right kind of headlines, so expect many, many more salvos to be fired back and forth. (Z)

CorruptionWatch 2025: Trump Pardons Guilty-as-Sin Southern Sheriff

We have absolutely no desire to write items like this one; but ignoring wildly corrupt behavior is even worse. And so it is that we pass along this news about Donald Trump giving a full and complete pardon to former Sheriff Scott Jenkins, who was about to begin serving a 10-year sentence.

Here's Trump's announcement of the pardon:

Sheriff Scott Jenkins, his wife Patricia, and their family have been dragged through HELL by a Corrupt and Weaponized Biden DOJ. In fact, during his trial, when Sheriff Jenkins tried to offer exculpatory evidence to support himself, the Biden Judge, Robert Ballou, refused to allow it, shut him down, and then went on a tirade. As we have seen, in Federal, City, and State Courts, Radical Left or Liberal Judges allow into evidence what they feel like, not what is mandated under the Constitution and Rules of Evidence. This Sheriff is a victim of an overzealous Biden Department of Justice, and doesn't deserve to spend a single day in jail. He is a wonderful person, who was persecuted by the Radical Left "monsters,"and "left for dead."This is why I, as President of the United States, see fit to end his unfair sentence, and grant Sheriff Jenkins a FULL and Unconditional Pardon. He will NOT be going to jail tomorrow, but instead will have a wonderful and productive life.

We are glad we don't have to serve as judges in a "Donald Trump's most unhinged social media post of the week" contest. It would be a very, very tough job.

Now that you've read Donald Trump's version of events, here are the actual facts. Jenkins was sheriff of Culpeper County, VA, from 2012 through 2023. He put the word out that positions as auxiliary sheriff's deputies could be had in his department in exchange for cold, hard cash. That job does not pay anything, but it does come with a spiffy uniform and a title that one can put on a résumé. It also gives the bearer of the title certain police powers, like the ability to write tickets. In all, Jenkins collected more than $60,000 in bribes.

Robert Ballou was indeed appointed to the bench by Joe Biden. Trump is also undoubtedly correct that the judge rejected some evidence that Jenkins and his lawyers thought should have been allowed. Judges, of course, make decisions about what evidence to admit all the time, and pretty much by definition, every decision they make is a "good call" according to one side of the case, and "totally wrong" according to the other side.

It also helps to know that among the people who paid bribes to Jenkins were two undercover F.B.I. agents, and both testified during the trial. It is similarly useful to know that three of the six people who paid actual bribes to Jenkins (as opposed to being undercover agents) have already pled guilty and have been sentenced to prison time. Finally, while Trump implies that this was a bench trial, it was actually a jury trial, and the jury was unanimous in finding Jenkins guilty on all 12 counts he faced. In short, we're not exactly talking the Dreyfus Affair or Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, here.

In the end, with Trump, everything is about "what's in it for me?" And here, it's pretty clear why Trump chose this corrupt sheriff, in particular, for a pardon:

• The Narrative: It's hardly a keen insight, but Trump wants people to believe that he is as pure as the driven snow, and that his various indictments (plus his convictions) are fake news. Every time he pardons someone, and then goes on a harangue about the weaponized justice system, it advances the narrative Trump is trying to peddle about his own criminal acts.
  
  
• The A**-Kissing: Criminal defendants who are (1) MAGA and (2) in a hopeless position have figured out that puckering up and planting one on Trump's considerable posterior is actually a pretty good Hail Mary pass. Jenkins, for his part, did several interviews with local TV outlets last month in which he said it sure would be swell if that great American Donald Trump would come to the rescue and help lil' ol' Scott Jenkins, victim of a corrupt and lawless justice system. Trump, who is in the running for most gullible person on earth, just eats that stuff up.
  
  
• The Message: As with most of the other pardons, Trump here sends the message that if people are MAGA and break the law, he'll have their backs. As we have noted, it may not be true, but Trump doesn't mind using people and then not delivering on his part of a bargain.
  
  
• The Base: Jenkins is not only MAGA, he's also a Second Amendment fanatic. In particular, when the Democratic-controlled legislature was thinking about restrictions on gun ownership, Jenkins announced he would deputize every person in Culpeper County, thus allowing them to play by "police" gun rules, as opposed to "civilian" gun rules. He has become a mini-celebrity in right-wing circles for this.

Who knows who the next pardon will go to? Maybe they'll have a reality show in which 12 convicted felons compete for amnesty. The only thing we are sure of is that, with that pardon, Trump will put someone on the street who should actually remain behind bars. (Z)

It Was 21 Years and 3 Days Ago Today...

As we reminded readers yesterday, we put together a quiz on the occasion of our 20th anniversary last year, and then never got around to revealing the answers and scores. We are going to rectify that right now, on the occasion of our 21st anniversary (+3 days). First, the answers:

1. Which statement about politics is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, the Republicans had the federal trifecta
      B. On May 24, 2004, Alberto Gonzales was Attorney General

The Answer: A. Gonzales did not commence his term as AG until nearly a year later, replacing John Ashcroft for George W. Bush's second term. (54.4% of readers got it right).

2. Which statement about the Supreme Court is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, three current justices were already on the Supreme Court (Thomas, Roberts, Alito)
      B. On May 24, 2004, only one current justice was already on the Supreme Court (Thomas)

The Answer: B. John Roberts and Samuel Alito were both nominated to the court in 2005. (70.2% of readers got it right).

3. Which statement about international affairs is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, Kim Jong-il was still leading North Korea
      B. On May 24, 2004, Kim Jong-il was dead, and had been succeeded by Kim Jong-un

The Answer: A. Kim Jong-il remained alive, and thus the leader of North Korea, until 2011. (87.7% of readers got it right).

4. Which statement about the news is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, The Washington Post's 1A headline was "Bush Seeks to Reassure Nation on Iraq"
      B. On May 24, 2004, The Washington Post's 1A headline was "Lehman Brothers File for Bankruptcy"

The Answer: A. Our wording was a little clumsy; we intended to ask about the news FOR May 24, 2004 (in other words, the news published in the Post on May 25, 2004):



In any event, Lehman Brothers did not file for bankruptcy until 2008, so that could not possibly have been the answer. (89.1% of readers got it right).

5. Which statement about the economy is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, the average gallon of milk cost $3.16
      B. On May 24, 2004, the average gallon of gas cost $3.16

The Answer: A. At that time, gas was selling for a little over $2.00/gallon. (49.2% of readers got it right).

6. Which statement about tech is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, Facebook was just a few months old
      B. On May 24, 2004, the iPhone was just a few months old

The Answer: A. Facebook was launched on February 4, 2004. The first iPhone was released in 2007. (74.6% of readers got it right).

7. Which statement about television is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, the highest-rated program in the U.S. was American Idol
      B. On May 24, 2004, the highest-rated program in the U.S. was Seinfeld

The Answer: A. Seinfeld left the air in 1998. (80.2% of readers got it right).

8. Which statement about film is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, The Passion of the Christ crossed the $350 million mark at the box office
      B. On May 24, 2004, Gladiator crossed the $200 million mark at the box office

The Answer: A. Gladiator was released, and crossed the $200-million mark, in 2000. (58.8% of readers got it right).

9. Which statement about music is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, Britney Spears, Madonna and Paul McCartney were all on tour
      B. On May 24, 2004, Michael Jackson, The Presidents of the United States of America and Johnny Cash were all on tour

The Answer: A. Britney Spears was on the The Onyx Hotel Tour, Madonna was on the Re-Invention World Tour, and Paul McCartney was doing tune-up shows in anticipation of the '04 Summer Tour, which commenced on May 25. (79.4% of readers got it right).

10. Which statement about sports is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, Oriole Cal Ripken's consecutive games streak was still underway
      B. On May 24, 2004, Oriole Cal Ripken had concluded his streak at 2,632 games

The Answer: B. The streak ended on September 19, 1998. (66.7% of readers got it right).

11. Which statement about books is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, the #1 book in the country was The Da Vinci Code
      B. On May 24, 2004, the #1 book in the country was Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

The Answer: A. The Da Vinci Code was the #1 book in 28 out of 52 weeks that year, including the week beginning May 24. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone was #1 in 1999, under its British title, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (72% of readers got it right).

12. Which statement about Electoral-Vote.com is true?

      A. On May 24, 2004, our map had Michigan going for George W. Bush and Iowa going for John Kerry
      B. On May 24, 2004, our map had Minnesota going for George W. Bush and Missouri going for John Kerry

The Answer: A. Michigan was "barely Bush" and Iowa was "barely Kerry," but nonetheless that is who we had winning those states on our first day of publication. Fun fact: Back then, we colored the map in by hand, using Photoshop. (70.3% of readers got it right).

Tiebreaker: How many bills had George W. Bush vetoed as of May 24, 2004?

The Answer: Zero. Bush ultimately vetoed 12 bills, but the first of those was not until July 19, 2006. (21.2% of readers got it right; the average guess was 8.8, the median was 15, and the high guess was 100).

We tried to pick questions that were doable, and... it would seem we succeeded. The average score was 8.51/12, and there were a remarkable 54 readers who got every question right AND hit the tiebreaker on the bullseye. Here they are:

A.A. in Los Angeles, CA A.G. in Sisters, OR A.M. in Mexico City, Mexico A.W. in Pittsburgh, PA B.R. in Paris, France C.E. in Rye, NY C.M.H. in West Chester, PA D.B. in St. Paul, MN D.D. in Portland, OR D.E. in Pacific Palisades CA D.K. in Plymouth Meeting, PA D.R. in Pittsburgh, PA D.V. in Princeton, NJ E.O. in San Francisco, CA G.J.B. in Rowland Heights, CA G.J.N. in Philadelphia, PA H.M. in San Dimas, CA J.B. in Rowland Heights, CA J.C. in Arlington Heights, IL J.D. in Wiesbaden, Germany J.E.L. II in Cincinnati, OH J.G. in Linden, NJ J.G. in Olympia, WA J.M. in Eagle Mills, NY J.M. in Middletown, NJ J.N.E. in Syracuse, NY J.P. in Albany, NH

J.S. in Seattle, WA J.W. in Northampton, MA K.E.L. in Richmond, VA L.G. in Thornton, CO M.F. in Naples, FL M.G. in Boulder, CO M.L. in West Hartford, CT M.P.C. in Indianapolis, IN M.S. in Missoula, MT N.S. in Parkland, FL P.D. in La Mesa, CA P.E.F. in Baltimore, MD P.F. in Brighton, MI R.C. in St. Paul, MN R.J.N. in Katy, TX R.K.J. in Portland, OR R.M.S. in Lebanon, CT R.N. in Baltimore, MD R.S. in Peoria, AZ R.S.W. in Bangor, ME S.B. in North Liberty, IA S.M. in Madison, WI S.S. in Haugesund, Norway T.B. in Leon County, FL T.C. in Danby, NY T.C. in Jersey City, NJ T.M. in Camp Hill, PA

And there you have it. The world is a different place than it was in 2004... and yet, not so different. (Z)

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