Trump Polls Drive Immigration Policy / August 30, 2016 by marilyn salenger

Donald Trump has made no secret of how much he loves polls. During the primary season he was often seen carrying them in his jacket pocket making for an easy read of his popularity to anyone who was listening. He was very adept at turning those numbers into the message of the day no matter what else was taking place. Polls to Trump are like TV show ratings, which we also know he loves. It made perfect Trump sense when he recently hired Republican pollster Kellyanne Conway as his third campaign manager. She drives the kind of train that he likes best. Numbers.

Does anyone really think that Trump just pulled immigration out of the hat to make it his major campaign issue? Don't bet on it. Trump's focus on immigration goes to the primary issue polls have shown is of most concern to his supporters, but not necessarily the rest of the country. He’s playing to his base.

A new Pew Research poll shows Americans rejecting many of Trump's views on immigration. Yet 66% of Trump registered voters consider immigration a "very big problem." The dichotomy between the two groups reflects some of the waffling the candidate has done in recent days on his signature and often inflammatory issue.

The same poll shows Trump supporters have mixed feelings about undocumented immigrants, but no crack in that big wall they want to have built. Seventy-nine percent of Trump supporters overwhelmingly favor construction of a wall along the U.S.- Mexico border. The split showed up once again when the majority of Americans surveyed rejected it.

As a country of immigrants, our immigration policies have always been complicated. Donald Trump is a man who likes quick fixes. But he’s learning that when it comes to opening and closing our borders it’s not so simple.

No Analyzing Trump From Afar, but ... / August 9, 2016 by marilyn salenger

The American Psychiatric Association made a surprise appearance in our presidential campaign slogfest. It makes perfect sense at this point. The Association has issued a reminder warning to psychiatrists across the country: "No psychoanalyzing Donald Trump." That's a pretty tough call.

The state of Donald Trump’s mental health has become part of the national conversation. It’s even become a Twitter hashtag: #trumpdiagnosis. A former Harvard Medical School dean tweeted that Trump had narcissistic personality disorder. A Northwestern University professor published a 9000 word psychological evaluation of Trump. The fact that the American Psychiatric Association felt the need to make their official "unethical" stamp public again last week brings up a rule that few of us knew existed.

It’s called The Goldwater Rule, and it prohibits psychiatrists from giving professional opinions about public figures they haven't personally evaluated. The rule grew out of Senator Barry Goldwater's 1964 presidential campaign. Goldwater was an out of the box right wing Republican politician, so much so the candidate bashing of that era got out of hand. It included a large group of generally surveyed psychiatrists who agreed that Goldwater was psychologically unfit to be president. Even though he hadn't visited any of their couches. After this election, they may feel the need to create an updated rule and re-brand it the “Trump Rule.”

For the rest of us not formally trained in the mental health field, it's gotten close to impossible not to analyze Donald Trump's behavior. It's the impact his words and behavior are having on others, here and around the world, that remains of most concern. Whether it's your friends or neighbors, almost everyone has some kind of analytic opinion of him. Including the president of the United States.

I've grown weary of hearing excuses for Trump's bad behavior. How he's just not politically correct. Or how his campaign is disruptive politics. He's not an establishment politician. Or he can't control himself. It's time for Donald Trump to take responsibility for his actions and be held accountable.

Speaking from the White House, President Obama finally got to the point where he made a remarkable statement about the Republican nominee after Trump attacked a Muslim Gold Star family whose son had been killed in the Iraq war. Describing his feelings as “unprecedented,” Obama said, “The Republican nominee is unfit to serve as president.”