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    Experts: There's still time -- and reason -- to invoke the 25th Amendment

    Bandy X. Lee and James R. Merikangas, DC Report
    November 21, 2020

    Thanks for your support!

    This article was paid for by reader donations to Raw Story Investigates.

    FILE PHOTO: Faith leaders place their hands on the shoulders of U.S. President Donald Trump as he takes part in a prayer for those affected by Hurricane Harvey in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, U.S., September 1, 2017. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/Files

    This article was paid for by Raw Story subscribers. Not a subscriber? Try us and go ad-free for $1. Prefer to give a one-time tip? Click here.

    Bandy X. Lee and James R. Merikangas, DC Report

    “What is the 25th Amendment for, if not designed for this exact reason?” is a question we have perpetually received regarding the current president.  We finally sought to answer it at our Nov. 14 online town hall.


    Indeed, since the announcement of election results, Donald Trump has refused to concede, has withheld critical information for the transition team, has fired and replaced top officials responsible for the nation’s security, and has contemplated a catastrophic war with Iran.  On top of this, he continues to ignore a surging pandemic that is now infecting almost 200,000 and killing 2000 Americans per day and collapsing medical systems he has refused to support.

    Every hour of every day that he delays and disrupts a peaceful transfer of power, he is obstructing the critical preparations that are necessary for proper vaccine distribution and is risking a massive loss of lives.  Could we have imagined, even a few months ago, keeping in charge a person who would kill a quarter-million Americans, and be poised to kill a half-million very soon?  We already dubbed him “killer-in-chief,” but the phrase almost fails to do justice to fully describe the magnitude of destruction he is inflicting on the nation and the world medically, politically, and mentally.

    Since Donald Trump’s election, mental health professionals have come forth in historically unprecedented ways to warn against entrusting the U.S. presidency to someone exhibiting dangerous mental impairments.

    Yet this is exactly what was predicted.  Since Donald Trump’s election, mental health professionals have come forth in historically unprecedented ways to warn against entrusting the U.S. presidency to someone exhibiting dangerous mental impairments.  We held an ethics conference with the most highly respected psychiatrists and then published The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 37 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President.  The latter became an unprecedented bestseller of its kind, and we donated all proceeds from the book to remove conflicts of interest.  Unfolding events over the past four years merely played out the multi-dimensional dangers we warned against, with almost impeccable precision.

    While it is not our place to opine on whether or not the 25th Amendment should be invoked—this goes beyond our expertise—we as mental health professionals can and should say if a president must be removed for public health and safety reasons, whatever the means.  Indeed, thousands of mental health professionals followed suit since the start of this presidency, and more than 800 petitioned Congress about the dangers.  Now, 100 senior mental health professionals have gone on video record to declare the current president too psychologically dangerous and mentally unfit to be in the presidency or candidacy for reelection.  We recently published more than 300 pages of our letters, petitions, and conference transcripts in an attempt to alert the authorities.  We also reconvened top experts in the fields of law, history, political science, economics, journalism, social psychology, climate science, and nuclear science at an emergency interdisciplinary conference.  This followed a meeting with the same speakers at the National Press Club in early 2019, to discuss the critical situation of a president’s unfitness in our dangerous world, with the full three hours broadcast on C-SPAN.  Finally, the continued lack of intervention brought on our town hall on the 25th Amendment.

    According to legal scholars, this is the expected approach.  Dr. Lee has had exchanges with the author of the 25th Amendment, Attorney and professor John Feerick, at a 50th-Anniversary conference on the Amendment and at student workshops at Fordham University Law School.  He discussed that the intention of the Amendment was that “the data would drive the process, and medical professionals are a source of data.”  Professor John Rogan, his close collaborator on the 25th Amendment, clarified on another occasion: “physicians have a supererogatory obligation to share specialized knowledge.  This is especially important when discussing psychiatric conditions, which may be hard to apprehend.”  The vice president, instead of being the driver of the process, would agree when “leaned upon” by the cabinet or the “other body” that Congress appoints to supplant the cabinet, compelled by the data.

    We are in just such a situation where the president’s dangerousness yields overwhelming data.  These data are consistent with the hundreds of years of scientific evidence and many thousands of hours of clinical experience we collectively brought to our warnings about the current president, in accordance with our “responsibility to society,” as outlined in the first paragraph of the preamble of our ethics code.  A peer-reviewed panel of independent experts has already performed a standardized assessment of mental capacity, when the right information became available, in which the president failed every criterion.  This means he would be unfit for any job, let alone president.  Our evaluation fully predicted that he would disastrously mismanage a pandemic, as our blow-by-blow account documents.

    A question that came up at our town hall was: “What is wrong with our Constitution?”  Why would it fail to protect the nation at the most basic level?  Representative and constitutional scholar Jamie Raskin’s (D-Md.) lecture (recorded at a previous gathering) to us on the 25th Amendment in 2019 gives an answer: we must make use of the provisions that are available.  His lecture is current again with his recent reintroduction of legislation for a commission to oversee presidential capacity, of which physicians and psychiatrists would comprise half.  Attorney and professor Richard Painter, former chief White House ethics counsel for the Bush/Cheney Administration and former chair of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) confirms that the 25th Amendment needs to be used, with an “other body” to replace the cabinet a critical component.

    Their legal assertions align with our therapeutic ones.  Politicians must do their part, as must mental health professionals.  Political bodies should consult with mental health experts, the purpose for which we even set up an independent expert panel, and mental health professionals should continue to inform the public of the dangers, until political bodies can succeed in removing them.  The public is a stakeholder, not to mention the president’s employer, now at the receiving end of unacceptable levels of abuse and potential, imminent victimization; mental health professionals do not have the luxury merely to stand by.  The Declaration of Geneva clarifies that we must prevent harm and injustice, especially when they are arising from a destructive government—and, if not now, when?

    James R. Merikangas, M.D., is a forensic neuropsychiatrist, co-founder of the American Neuropsychiatric Association, and former president of the American Academy of Clinical Psychiatrists.  His and Dr. Lee’s activities can be followed at worldmhc.org.

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    Republicans scrambling to figure out future elections now that Trump has lost them the suburbs: report

    Tom Boggioni
    February 27, 2021

    According to a report from Politico, Republican strategists faced with not the possibility of not having Donald Trump on the ticket -- and reeling from having lost the suburbs in the 2020 election due to him -- are trying to plot out ways to regain seats lost in the 2018 and 2020 elections.

    The report notes that the Trump years have led them to throw out old ways of getting votes which, in large part, has been focused on redistricting to create pockets that are Republican-friendly.

    As Politico's Ally Mutnick and Elena Schenider write, "Traditionally, state legislators and political mapmakers rely heavily on recent election results for clues about how communities will vote in the future — baselines they use to gerrymander advantageous districts for their party. But the whiplash in Trump-era elections make drawing conclusions from those results more complicated this year. And both parties' strategists know that if they make bad bets, drawing districts based on elections that were driven more by Trump's singular personality than by trends that will persist until 2030, those mistakes could swing control of the House against them over the next decade."

    According to Adam Kincaid, the executive director of the National Republican Redistricting Trust, "People on both sides are going to have to look at these things and try to figure out: Are there any things that we can point to that are predictive, and where do we see the party heading?"

    The report notes that losing the suburbs is a great concern to Republicans with one former GOP lawmaker using Florida as a prime example.

    According to Politico, "In South Florida, in particular, the 'Trump effect is a double-edged sword"' said former Republican Rep. Carlos Curbelo, who lost to Mucarsel-Powell in 2018. 'While it generated this trend where Republicans are doing better with working-class voters of all races and ethnicities, they're also losing support among higher-income and college-educated voters in the suburbs. It does make the challenge of drawing districts more daunting.'"

    Rep. Tom Cole (R-OK) agreed, saying Republicans can't push their luck by radically altering voting districts.

    "I've watched us get in trouble by stretching the rubber band too great," Cole explained. "If you're running into what you think might be a good election, and this could be a good election for us, don't get greedy. Don't. Because there are going to be some bad elections out there."

    You can read more here.

    Indian rooster kills owner with cockfight blade

    Agence France-Presse
    February 27, 2021

    A rooster fitted with a knife for an illegal cockfight in southern India has killed its owner, sparking a manhunt for the organizers of the event, police said Saturday.

    The bird had a knife attached to its leg ready to take on an opponent when it inflicted serious injuries to the man's groin as it tried to escape, officers said.

    The victim died from loss of blood before he could reach a hospital in the Karimnagar district of Telangana state earlier this week, local police officer B. Jeevan told AFP.

    The man was among 16 people organizing the cockfight in the village of Lothunur when the freak accident took place, Jeevan said.

    The rooster was briefly held at the local police station before it was sent to a poultry farm.

    "We are searching for the other 15 people involved in organizing the illegal fight," Jeevan said.

    They could face charges of manslaughter, illegal betting and hosting a cockfight.

    Cockfights are banned but still common in rural areas of Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Odisha states -- particularly around the Hindu festival of Sankranti.

    Specially-bred roosters have 7.5-centimetre (three-inch) knives or blades tethered to their legs and punters bet on who will win the gruesome fight.

    Thousands of roosters die each year in the battles which, despite the efforts of animal rights groups, attract large crowds.

    © 2021 AFP

    Five things to watch for at the Golden Globes

    Agence France-Presse
    February 27, 2021

    There will be no red carpet or star-studded audience this Sunday at the Golden Globes, but much remains at stake at the first major Hollywood awards show of the year.

    Millions of viewers are expected to tune in for the ceremony honoring the best in film and television, but what should you be watching for?

    Here is our quick guide to the event, which will take place in Beverly Hills, California and New York:

    - Netflix? And still... -

    This time last year, Netflix was the envy of Hollywood, placing copious bottles of champagne on ice ahead of the Globes.

    An overwhelming 34 nominations appeared certain to signal the streamer's official coming-of-age in Tinseltown with a deluge of wins.

    But the ceremony didn't follow the script, and Netflix ended the night with a paltry two wins.

    So will this be the year the giant entertainment disruptor truly marks its newfound dominance?

    With a staggering 42 nods across television and film categories this time, the odds look even more favorable. But after last year's near-washout, who knows?

    - Colman/Cohen: double double? -

    One of Netflix's rare wins last year was for Olivia Colman, whose star turn as Britain's Queen Elizabeth in "The Crown" proved irresistible to Globes voters.

    That wasn't entirely surprising -- Colman has never lost a Golden Globe, having converted previous nods for "The Favorite" in 2019 and "The Night Manager" in 2017.

    This year she can go one better, with dual nominations for another season of "The Crown," and best drama film contender "The Father."

    If she succeeds, she may not be the night's only double winner.

    A fellow Brit, Sacha Baron Cohen, is a strong contender for two very different film acting roles, with "Borat Subsequent Moviefilm" and "The Trial of the Chicago 7."

    - Eighth time lucky for Hopkins? -

    Colman's "The Father" co-star, the legendary Anthony Hopkins, is a serious awards contender every time he appears on the big screen.

    Surprisingly though, he has never won a competitive Golden Globe, despite being nominated on seven previous occasions dating back to 1979, and even earning a lifetime achievement award.

    When he won an Oscar in 1992 for his terrifying turn in "The Silence of the Lambs," Globes voters somehow plumped for Nick Nolte in "The Prince of Tides."

    If the Hollywood Foreign Press Association chooses to right that wrong this year, they will crown the 83-year-old Hopkins as their oldest ever best actor.

    Standing in Hopkins' way is Black Panther himself: the late Chadwick Boseman.

    - 'Minari': the new 'Parasite'? -

    In recent years, few Globes categories have stoked more controversy than best foreign language film.

    American immigrant stories such as "The Farewell" (2019) have repeatedly been barred from the "main" best film award categories because half or more of the script was not in English.

    Critics have pointed out that the rule did not seem to apply to previous heavyweight contenders such as Quentin Tarantino's multi-lingual "Inglourious Basterds."

    This year, "Minari" is the subject of much hand-wringing, with "Farewell" director Lulu Wang tweeting that she has "not seen a more American film" than the acclaimed Korean immigrant family drama.

    Of course, being in the foreign language section at last year's Globes did not harm South Korea's "Parasite," which went on to win the biggest prize of all -- the best picture Oscar.

    Can "Minari" repeat the trick?

    - The Globes go 'bi-coastal' -

    With the pandemic raging, and Los Angeles still under tight restrictions, this year's Globes were always likely to be a remote ceremony -- especially after the team behind September's Emmys pulled off a near-flawless award show from an empty theater.

    But organizers sprung a surprise by announcing that returning co-hosts Tina Fey and Amy Poehler will anchor a "bi-coastal" ceremony from New York and Los Angeles.

    The move should allow more high-profile guests to present awards in person -- including Big Apple-based Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones -- even if the nominees have to stay home.

    With the Oscars now planning to broadcast from multiple locations, the Academy will be watching closely to see if Fey and Poehler can strike up their usual rapport from opposite sides of the country.

    © 2021 AFP

     
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