Douglas Whaley

From the time he announced he was running for the presidency in 2016 (“Mexicans are rapists”) until last night’s news broadcast (and by that I mean last night whatever night that would be when you read this—they’re a predictable steady horror stream) Donald Trump has convincingly proven himself totally and completely incapable of possessing even minimal competency for his job. Of course we all suspected as much, even if we hoped we’d be wrong.  DJT was never anything other than a sometimes rich (and sometimes bankrupt) TV personality, whose history shows he has the attention span of a child, the ego of Mussolini [s ee http://www.salon.com/2016/03/11/trumps_not_hitler_hes_mussolini_how_gop_anti_intellectualism_created_a_modern_fascist_movement_in_america/ ], the morals of Caligula, and the self-control of an angry chimpanzee.  [Click to enlarge] When he first entered into the race I was rewriting my textbook “Problems and Materials on ...

Impeach Trump!  Impeach Trump!  Impeach Trump!  You hear it everywhere, and it grows daily.  But just how easy a process is that?  What are the rules?  What can history tell us about its efficacy?  Before we sling around a dangerous word like “impeachment” we’d better be very sure where that step could lead us and what the outcome might be. First let’s be clear that the word “impeached” does not mean “thrown out of office” as many people assume.  Three of our presidents have been impeached but none of them have been thrown out of office as a result.  The word “impeached” as used in our Constitution has the same meaning as “indicted” in criminal law.  Under Article 1 of the United States Constitution the House of Representatives has the sole power of impeachment, but this only means that the House must decide there are sufficient grounds for removal from office.  If so the same Article gives the Senate t...

Since its inception in the middle of the last century television has proven very addictive.  Many people can’t get through a day without major time being spent in front of the set.  Some of this viewing is purposeful, but much of it is just habit.  The average American watches over 35 hours of TV a week, a number that goes up to 50 hours once you reach 65 or older.  When you consider how many mindless commercials you must suffer through or ignore, the waste of time involved, if added totaled over your entire life, is mind-numbing.  What a shame!  Couldn’t this viewing mania be brought under control? Of course it can, but like any bad habit it will take some discipline and training.  But with that you can work a major change and end up with much more free time to do other things. The secret to taming your television addiction is the use of the digital video recorder or, more commonly, the DVR.  Most of my readers, I trust, already ...

Senator Barry Goldwater When the very conservative Senator Barry Goldwater ran for president against Lyndon Johnson in 1964, a time when liberalism was ascendant in this country, Fact Magazine published an article entitled “The Unconscious of a Conservative: A Special Issue on the Mind of Barry Goldwater.”  In it over two thousand psychiatrists responded to a poll and 1,200 of them said that the Senator was mentally unfit for office.  Goldwater sued for libel and was eventually awarded $75,000 in punitive damages. This ugly incident led the American Psychiatric Association to adopt §7.3 to its Code of Ethics stating: On occasion psychiatrists are asked for an opinion about an individual who is in the light of public attention or who has disclosed information about himself/herself through public media. In such circumstances, a psychiatrist may share with the public his or her expertise about psychiatric issues in general. However, it is unethical fo...