Opening Video of ‘The More Dangerous State of the World and the Need for Fit Leadership’

A Small Preview of Yesterday’s Conference

I am certain you are curious as to what happened at our major National Press Club conference, “The More Dangerous State of the World and the Need for Fit Leadership”!  I tried to upload our opening video for you to watch simultaneously yesterday, but the hotel Internet was poor—eventually it uploaded, and here it is:

Our latest book, The More Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 40 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Warn Anew, was successfully published:

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My opening remarks at the conference are here:

Good afternoon.  Welcome to the conference, “The More Dangerous State of the World and the Need for Fit Leadership.”  I am Dr. Bandy Lee, president of the World Mental Health Coalition, the first and largest professional organization to address directly the problems of dangerous leadership.

This is not a political conference.  It is a medical one.  It is about the state of mental health in our country and the survival of our species.  It is also about the dangers of a man who has created what I have come to call, Trump Contagion.  We currently live in a very dangerous world, and the mix of psychological dangerousness and mental unfitness in a powerful office can only exponentially increase the dangers.  Hence, leading national security experts and renowned mental health experts have exceptionally convened here today, to speak about the safeguarding of American democracy and all humankind.  Politics have not been able to solve these critical quandaries of our time.  Discussions must occur across disciplines, especially ones grounded in expert knowledge that is neutral from political affiliations.

That is what we are doing today.  Seldom have such a group of distinguished experts of multiple fields convened together in the same place, in order to discuss matters of central importance.  Because of time constraints, and because our focus will be on summation and integration, and what the very gathering of great minds can generate, I have made the extraordinary request that panelists limit their speech to just five minutes.  Hence, you will hear very direct and intense statements, followed by a roundtable, and then audience questions and answers.

The conference itself was a resounding success!  The caliber of content, the energy it galvanized, and the audience it mobilized made clear that the conference was historic.  Fast-paced, intense and direct presentations were followed by exhilarating roundtable discussions and audience participation, culminating with passionate strategizing that came afterward during a private dinner among panelists.  We had a full house—more than any other Ballroom event in recent days, according to a regular journalist observer.  Hence, we have the material we need to educate the public, to generate discourse with the media, and hopefully to shift national awareness just enough to make a difference in the election in 37 days.  People do not know it because of the nature of mental phenomena (especially mental pathology), but mental health education is what the nation needs most in the midst of a mental health pandemic that is distorting and disabling all else.  This reality will not change.

Media coverage was less successful. C-Span decided the afternoon before that there were too many other events happening on the same day to cover us. Joy Reid had to cancel “because of Eric Adams and the hurricane,” but the producers promised to reschedule (we are still hopeful).  Congress members who were going to make an effort to attend eventually could not, but it was also the last day of session before the election, and so this was expected. Still, this is the beginning and not the end of our media campaign—as we will mobilize immediately to create smaller clips and short films of the conference and to begin our messaging with all the media.

*Full footage of the conference will be available as soon as we receive the recording from the National Press Club, and “The Weekend Show” will have a special feature on it the following week (not this Sunday). Stay tuned!