An Author’s Letter to the Editor of the New York Times
The Letters Section is Sometimes More Open to Our Views
One of our authors got a letter to the editor published in the New York Times! He mentions our National Press Club conference and identifies himself as part of The More Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 40 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Warn Anew:
To the Editor:
On Friday, the National Press Club hosted a conference focused on Donald Trump’s dangerousness and lack of fitness to serve as commander in chief. Policymakers, lawyers and mental health experts argued incontrovertibly that Mr. Trump is unfit. He displays poor judgment, impulsivity, extreme self-centeredness, a vulnerability to being manipulated and an attraction to autocrats. He also blatantly shows waning cognitive capacities. In a sane world, all of this would be disqualifying.
At the same time, Mr. Trump venomously attacks his opponent, Kamala Harris, by calling her “mentally disabled” and “mentally impaired.” By projecting onto her the reality of his circumstance, Mr. Trump is distorting reality for public consumption and manipulation.
I urge the public to listen to experts who are addressing an existential threat to our democracy and the world. These are not normal times. We should be voting based not only on policy issues (as is typically the case), but also on a recognition of what is at stake in this election.
Larry S. Sandberg
New York
The writer is clinical associate professor of psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical Center and contributing author to “The More Dangerous Case of Donald Trump.”
Many thanks go to Dr. Sandberg!
Announcement:
Dr. Bandy X. Lee will hold a live session on:
“A Review of the Major Conference, ‘The More Dangerous State of the World and the Need for Fit Leadership’”
Tomorrow, October 4, 2024, at 12 noon EDT/9 a.m. PDT on Zoom. A paid subscription is required to receive a link the morning before. Thank you!
Dr. Lee is a forensic and social psychiatrist and an expert on violence who became known to the public with her 2017 book, The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President. Through this instant New York Times bestseller and the expanded 2019 edition, The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 37 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President, the country has seen every one of their predictions come true. Now, we have successfully completed our major National Press Club conference on the theme of, “The Much More Dangerous Case of Donald Trump,” on September 27, 2024, of which the summary video can be found here. We have also successfully published our new book, The More Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 40 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Warn Anew, released simultaneously with the conference. This was all made possible thanks to your generosity—we would not have done it without you!—and now ask for your help once more to reach millions with our vital message from the conference. Hear all the updates and plans from the conference, for the first time with Dr. Lee, at the live session tomorrow!
Congratulations and many thanks to Dr. Sandberg for getting his letter to the editor published in the New York Times. :-) The Times was wise to publish this letter and they should be publishing many other letters from mental health experts, including and especially Dr. Bandy Lee.
For almost a decade, Americans have been subjected to an emotionally abusive man who chronically invalidates our perceptions through projection, misdirection, and denial. This chronic invalidation of our sense of reality causes the psychological effect we call "gaslighting." He even directly told us to disbelieve our eyes and ears, that what we see and hear is not reality.
Our own mental health depends on leaders who are honest, transparent, and not wrapped up in an unconscious attempt to get us to see them as infallible.
We shouldn't tolerate this kind of emotional abuse and I hope we continue to describe it so more people can understand why they resonate when Tim Walz calls Trump "weird." Everything he says invalidates our reality. These are not just lies...they are automatic, unconscious yet purposeful attempts to alter our perceptions, especially our perception of him. This ends up being a form of mind-control that is the root cause of what Dr. Lee calls, Trump Contagion. Your beliefs, perceptions, and attitudes get slowly replaced by his. Cult followers become pre-occupied with regulating the emotional state of the cult leader; providing the mirroring and echoing responses they intuitively know he needs. We could also liken this to Stockholm syndrome.
On the subject of mind-control, a new film on Hitler and Goebbles is coming out tomorrow:
Here is a link to the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HIqeLlET_LQ