As a neuropsychiatrist and brain-imaging expert, I want our elected leaders to be some of the “brain healthiest people” in the land. How do you know about the brain health of a presidential candidate unless you look? The brain is involved in everything humans do: how we think, how we feel, how we get along with others, how we negotiate, how we pay attention in meetings and how we turn away the advances of White House interns or decide to invade a country based on contradictory intelligence.
Three of the last four presidents have shown clear brain pathology. President Reagan’s Alzheimer’s disease was evident during his second term in office. Nonelected people were covering up his forgetfulness and directing the country’s business. Few people knew it, but we had a national crisis. Brain studies have been shown to predict Alzheimer’s five to nine years before people have their first symptoms.
President Clinton’s moral lapses and problems with bad judgment and excitement-seeking behavior — indicative of problems in the prefrontal cortex — eventually led to his impeachment and a poisonous political divisiveness in the U.S. The prefrontal cortex houses the brain’s supervisor, involved with conscience, forethought, planning, attention span and judgment.
One could argue that our current president’s struggles with language and emotional rigidity are symptoms of temporal lobe pathology. The temporal lobes, underneath your temples and behind your eyes, are involved with language, mood stability, reading social cues and emotional flexibility.
I’m sure he would disqualify Abraham Lincoln….
Another William beat me to it, but here’s what I said:
I hate to think what this doctor would say about Abraham Lincoln’s brain. A background of illegitimacy, mood swings, serious bouts of depression, strong interest in the occult … Gosh, just think how much better off we’d be if someone else had been in the in the White House from 1861-1865
Perhaps the solution to the health care crisis is indicated by this article. Rather than go through the inconvenience and expense of actually subjecting oneself to a direct medical exam, we could merely post short, soundbite, videos of ourselves on YouTube to be surveyed by a remote expert from the comfort of his study. The results could be posted on one’s MySpace page to be read by all.
Winston Churchill would similarly be disqualified. That speech impediment must have signified clear brain pathology.
Just when did Dr. Amen personally examine these individuals? What tests did he administer? And then, did they sign releases for him to share his diagnoses with the general public.
Amen, Dr. Amen! A full psychiatric workup, including a brain scan would help me decide between candidates in a close race. While you are at it, would you mind scheduling PB Jefferts-Schori for the same? I’ll volunteer too, if it doesn’t cost me any money; might as well take a look at the voting public while you are at it.
“Smooth talkers’ who are able to “make friends and influence people” can be just as pyschologically questionable as someone who exhibits a ‘personality quirk.’
Looking critically at ‘personality quirks’ can be misused in the same way a person’s superficial racial characteristics (such as skin tone) have been/are misused.
It’s kind of interesting he doesn’t address the question of whether religious belief in propositions which fly in the face of scientific evidence and logic is a brain pathology. Is ability to rationalize the irrational a good or bad thing?
And look at those whom our Lord selected to disciple and lead His church.
(Well, I’ll bet Judas would pass the test.)
😛
to make a diagnosis from third party anecdotes (the press reports) is quackery. and if he has first hand info, then he has breached patient confidentiality
This man has not examined a single of these presidents. It is criminally irresponsible to “diagnose” someone based on third and fourth hand observation of their actions.
I agree with these fine posts. But be assured, we are going down this path. I heard it on NPR the other day. It is already a hot topic in the law –brain scans for truth telling, etc, perhaps forced.
No soul or spirit, of course, just “brain function.” Anyone remember “social psychiatry” in the former Soviet Union?
It looks like phrenology has a 21st century friend. Now its just inside.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrenology
Peace,
I wonder if Dr Amen (Amen!) has ever studied how brain-healthy his own profession is. There is a widespread belief among the public, not unfounded, that psychiatrists themselves are a bunch of nut-jobs.
Surely the LA Times would not print it if it were not truth??
He assumes that any of them have brains.
I read a rebuttal of the charge that Reagan had Alzheimer’s symptoms while in office, but it was some time ago. As to Bush’s language deficiencies, granted; but my own husband, who is a brilliant engineer and business strategist, mangles words from time to time. Where does he get Bush’s alleged “emotional rigidity?” People who know him say he’s a very warm and pleasant guy in person. And I would really like to know if this neuropsychiatrist can give an answer based on scientific evidence as to whether sociopaths like Bill Clinton, who lie routinely and expect people to believe them, are brain-damaged or character-damaged. I had a wicked stepmother who exhibited the same behavior. Are these people responsible for their behavior, or not?
Katherine, well said! We all know that we are not perfect. From our first president forward. The story is told of a pastor and his wife who decided to form a perfect church. One by one his parishoners left until only he and his wife remained. Then they got divorced!
18–Off topic, but that’s like the sailor, a ship’s carpenter, who was cast up all alone on a desert island. Twenty years later he was rescued by a passing ship, and the captain marvelled that not only had the sailor built himself a sturdy house on the island, but there were also two churches, complete with pulpits, pews and steeples.
“What’s this?” asked the captain, pointing at the first church next to the man’s house. “Well, that’s the church I built when I first got here,” said the sailor.
“And why did you build a second one?” asked the captain, wondering why a single castaway needed two places of worship. “Oh, I disagreed with some of what was being taught in the first church and so I went and started another,” said the sailor.
Well, duh.
You have to be nutty to run for President.