'Is Trump okay?' Confusion as 'exhausted' ex-president abruptly ends friendly interview

Bottom line, if he can’t handle the stresses of a campaign then he can’t handle the stresses of the Presidency and you can bet your life that they’re already plotting to remove him by way of the 25th amendment inside of a year. So this isn’t about Trump anymore, this is about preventing a Vance ~~Presidency~~ Dictatorship.

What stress as president? He just golfs and when pushed for a decision on something, just picks randomly from the options presented. He doesn't even bother understand what the options are. Remember the whole injecting bleach crap? That was him literally glancing at a slide and running with it, obviously with no prior briefing.
Not gonna happen. The 25th Amendment would require a majority of cabinet members to sign off, and Trump will pick them as total loyalists. Trump has control over the party, many of them view him as an infallible prophet. If they haven't turned against him so far, they're not gonna do it later. If Trump gets elected, we're all gonna be along for a ride on the crazy train with him until he dies.
- That assumes Trump is a good enough judge of character to be able to tell actual loyalists from sycophants, which I strongly doubt he can.
It doesn't matter to his supporters, he crossed the line a long time ago and kept his voters, nothing will change their minds at this point.
They said the same thing about Biden.

My point is it's hypocritical made up shit.
- Well I guess I won't vote for Biden OR Clinton this election!!
- Who?
- Permanently Deleted

He's suffering from frontotemporal dementia. This is relatively certain. The town hall was classic sundown syndrome. The fundamentalists know this and are going to have him removed from office shortly after the election (if he wins). The democrats would gladly take the opportunity to remove him, as would many republicans. Unfortunately that would put Vance in the oval office which should terrify anyone who doesn't want to larp a handmaid's tale.

As a European I find it utterly bewildering that people seriously consider voting for him. But alas I don't get a say in it.

Dude there's a whole cottage industry here that's dedicated to trying to understand why people vote for him, and the answers are as varied as they are stupid.
- But how else will podcasters, ring light, and audio equipment manufacturers make a living? Who will hear about FACTOR meals and $40 underwear with neon laser rainbow cats?
That shit was harrowing at the retirement home I worked at. I only worked during the day, so the worst thing I saw was falls. My fiancé's brother worked at night, though. The residents would get stir crazy at night. They'd try to "escape," and they'd be found laying in the nearby hospital's flower bead. This was in NON-assisted living. Trump definitely reminds me of those residents. They'd end up walking to the hospital because it was the only place they knew how to get to, but they didn't know why they were walking there. They just wanted to escape. A lot of them expected their old house/ kid's house.
- There are fake Bus Stations in front of some Nursery Homes with patients for dementia, because when they escape.... they wait for the Bus.
- My grandma did that. She escaped a dozen times, even behind a passcode door.
If you watched exclusively right-wing media, you would get heavily edited (and mercifully brief) presentations of Trump, along with hours of talking heads playing him up while demonizing Harris (and of course heavily edited presentations of the Democrat). The issue is not with their choice of Trump but with their choices of what media to consume - the latter choices lead quite logically and inevitably to the former choice.
The best explanation I've come up with after discussing politics at length with them is that they are gaslit. Pure and simple. They just have enough gullibility to see one tiny thing that coincides with something they were taught or otherwise believe. It also explains why they are being scammed so easily on truthsocial.

Trump just has that dirty salesman skill of creating a story with just enough validity or truth and twisting everything to his favor.
- There's a lot more that we can add to that. Washington politics are so amazingly dirty, they have been for decades, everyone knows it, and Trump is different from other people. He's actually even dirtier than most career politicians, but he feels different from them.
  
  You also have the problem that some government institutions are corrupt and big business is very corrupt. It's easier for people to imagine that conspiracy theories are true when they can openly see badness happening around them left unchecked. For example, if I watch on TV or YouTube and I see a court case where the prosecutor, lead detectives, and the judge are all incredibly biased and some of them are bad liars, then I know something is wrong with that courthouse. I might extrapolate and conclude that something is wrong with all courthouses. Which is to say, I've become more vulnerable to conspiracy theories because real bad behavior is left unchecked.
Damn, the behavioral variant describes him well. Impulsive, uninhibited, socially unacceptable, listless, and apathetic.
Careful with yer language there, pardner, lest you force us to export some freedom to your country. We've been spoilin' for a real fight for some time now. Our poors would love nothing better than a meaningful mission, food, housing, and healthcare, and we've got all this incredible murder tech that we don't get to use, all provided by Uncle Sam.

JD Vance is a flawless beauty with wonderful concepts of ideas, and I won't hear anything different, got it, Sharon?

Remember: the presidency ages people. How long would he be president?

Oddly, this is something that didn't seem to happen to Trump. We all know why of course, he didn't actually do the job of being President.

Because he doesn't actually do any work, and only worries about himself.

In contrast, presidents like Obama and Biden age quickly because they're actually working nonstop, and stressing out about world events.
- That’s why he’s aging so fast right now… he’s working really hard to try and stay out of prison!
Donald did no work. He only watched TV, golfed, held rallies. He spent more time on the toilet producing whatever it was that took so many flushes than he did on the job.

Donald aged quickly afterwards and especially after the start of his court cases for the numerous crimes.

I went and checked the source: https://bongino.com/ep-2353-live-with-president-donald-trump

He sits down at timestamp 33:34 and says that remark at timestamp 1:09:12. So he was there for 35 minutes.

The characterisation "a few minutes into their discussion" seems disingenuous.

Raw Story may be on the same side as us but they are still complete trash. Headline is often a straight-up lie.
35 minutes doesn't seem very long for an interview. Is expecting the presidential candidate to remain lucid and coherent for slightly more than a half hour too much to ask?
- No no, that's not what I'm saying. Just that there's no need to over dramatise the events in a way that makes your point shakier than it has to be.
This entire article is sensationalized. Bongino doesn't even really seem phased when trump says he's gotta go.
that's less than a job interview though
- Sure. It's also less than a train ride between Zürich and Bern.

Among the bizarre topics Trump discussed was his empathy for former producer Harvey Weinstein, saying that he was treated badly after being found guilty on one count of rape and two counts of sexual assault in New York.

He recognizes fellow travelers. Creep.

Where does the word travelers come from? I have it as an ear worm from a book or something
- Fellow travelers is a phrase used to denote someone who pushes or encourages an ideology or opinion without officially being part of the organization pushing it. It was originally applied to communist sympathizers but is used for other things commonly. A race science believer might be a fellow traveler with nazis but doesn't have to be a member of the nationalist socialist workers party.
- It was also the title of a show and can be found on Netflix.
- Canterbury tales maybe?
- According to The Free Dictionary, the term "originally applied to people in the early days of the Soviet Union who supported the Russian revolution and the Communist Party but were not members."
  
  Additional fun fact: the name given to the early Russian satellites, "Sputnik," has a meaning of “fellow traveler." It was mentioned on that dictionary page, but I ran it through Google Translate just to be sure. (See the third option under "More translations.")

According to Trump, Weinstein got “schlonged. ... He got hit as hard as you can get hit."

I uhh.. don’t think that’s what that word means..

Well, to his credit, he could be correct in that Weinstein got "schlonged" in prison.
I’ve never heard that word used like this, but I think he’s trying to say “boned” which equates to wronged. He (Trump) is wrong though. Weinstein got what he deserved.
When Trump was running the first time for the 2016 election he got a lot of attention for using that word. I remember an NPR host saying how he'd used it before in a similar context that Trump did (a political loss), but at the same time he was regretful about it. I don't remember the details but actually let me search...

Neal Conan. I'm fairly certain I remember him talking about it on the radio, was why this rang a bell for me. But apparently he even wrote an op Ed about it: https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-1223-conan-schlonged-20151223-story.html

Conan used it literally once in a political context and regretted it as you can read above. And he seems to have vaguely meant it in a way you might say "wow, they got fucked" as you might say about someone being cheated, or "fucked up" for beaten up. Like ruined in some way, not with a literal sexual meaning, just a vague association because of the word itself.

Not that this makes it any more couth or anything; feel how you want to feel about it. Clearly saying "they got fucked" still has that same vulgar sound, so we avoid it in polite conversation, so I imagined a word that sounds so vulgar would probably be avoided by a high profile politician, as given people feel weird about it. And it happened twice.

I just think it's interesting that it's come up again. Language is weird.
He was pounded in the ass.
- Sure. But when I see “hit as hard as he can” I’m imagining face tanking a Mike Tyson punch, not getting deep dicked.
Did he steal from Harry

I won't be sad when this shit stain is gone from public life.

I will be extremely sad if he leaves us with President Vance.
I just hope he doesn’t manage to run out the clock before facing consequences.

I wouldn’t bet on it, but I do hope for it.

I really hate that the only people reporting anything like this are sites like rawstory and dailybeast. Meanwhile, NYT and NPR are reporting on how Kamala is testy and Trump is friendly.

Oh yeah. Seems that she's "emotional", unlike Trump. Think that people are probably projecting their misogyny.
- I unfortunately think the majority of the country is more likely to vote for fascism than for a woman. I'm not holding my breath :( I need to find a way out

"Among the bizarre topics Trump discussed was his empathy for former producer Harvey Weinstein, saying that he was treated badly after being found guilty on one count of rape and two counts of sexual assault in New York."

From the clip it's hard to get context, but it sounds more like he was saying things that were too crazy for his handlers.

Article says "'They're going crazy,' Trump said, pointing off camera." Which I think further strengthens your argument.
- They were desperately trying to get him to not defend Weinstein. Probably trying to avoid him lighting the fuse on his own October surprise
This is a narcissistic and delusional old man who has never really participated in society as a normal human being. When he says "they", he literally thinks there is a shadow group of people doing this. The fact that someone rich got caught committing crimes and was found guilty by "normies" is all just a part of the shadow group's plan to allow such things to happen. He literally believes "they" could have stopped that from happening IF they wanted to, but decided not to.
I’m shocked you didn’t clip the quote where he claimed Weinstein got “schlonged.”

lol what the fuck. I’m on set and we’re rolling sound and I almost burst out laughing when I read that line
Thats how i took it too

Don't you think he looks tired

I feel like the Democrats ought to be pivoting towards attacking Vance at this point. The possibility of Trump kicking the bucket from natural causes and the GOP getting a sympathy (/conspiracy-theorist) bounce in the votes this late would be devastating, so they ought to be pulling out all the stops to anticipate and mitigate that before it happens.

Strategy? From the democrats? lmao

So I just watched the clip. Granted the clip was only a few seconds, and yes I believe he is old and senile. But.

The clip doesn't seem to give evidence of anything specific. He might have to pee for all we know.

It was a couple minutes in. His handlers are pulling him out of events when he starts talking nonsense. The shit they accused the Democrats of doing with Biden that never actually happened.
- He sits in that interview for like 30 minutes, and nothing about it seemed off to me. Just as scattered as he's always been.

I have never wanted a month to go by as much as I do right now

Americans are really starting to annoy me at this point

We are slowly destroying ourselves with global warming but all we're centring our attention on is on how 400 million people can't decide between a sane young politician or an elderly sociopath with fascist leanings to lead their country.

We're screwed as a species

Like it or not, the US presidential election has potentially dire worldwide consequences for global warming. If you think our attention is best spent on global warming -- and I would agree -- then paying attention to the election is that.
Yeah don't blame this shit on all of us, it's like 1/3rd of the population being morons.
- I get that ... but that third is a pretty loud obnoxious bunch and the other 2/3rds are either too quiet, don't speak up, don't vote or are just completely apathetic to everything happening around them.
  
  The problem is not the remaining 2/3rds saying or supporting one thing or another
  
  The problem is the 2/3rds just not participating and instead just stand around and watch the world burn.
Happening all over the planet, unfortunately.
Oh, do fuck off. If you can’t look away from the spectacle, that’s a personal problem. Our problems get magnified by the media but they’re the same problems everywhere.

Probably pooped his pants lol

Is Trump okay?

Is the sky red?

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- Seems like a rosy way to look at the world.

he just had to go lol

his ass was probably burning from sitting in his shitfilled diaper that long

Betteridge's law of headlines. No, he's not ok. And any sane, observant person has known this for a long time.

It's mid month, no more drugs until the 1st.

edit: the split reception on this extremely mild take about political news coverage is about all you need to know about the knife's edge lemmy.world is sitting on.

I had to go out and look for this video, because the link either doesn't have it or my adblock got it, but honestly this seems like a pretty normal interview for him. I'd say this is about on-par with his interviews with people like Aiden Ross or other podcasts he's probably unfamiliar with - he seems bored and a little unsure of his audience, but not, like, falling asleep or anything.

Idk. He seems maybe a little tired? But I wouldn't say he ended the interview that abruptly, and Bongino seems bummed but not confused like they say in the article.

I only mention it because i've seen a couple headlines like this in the last few days, and i'm getting the impression that it's not as much of a story as they're making it out to be. Maybe they're trying to goad him into another debate or more public appearances?

I don't know. He's not anywhere near the level Biden was at the peak of calls for him stepping down - and even then, most democrats still dismissed it as over-exaggerated. It certainly cheapens and makes me doubt other claims of ill-health or un-fitness.