'Throes of a final meltdown': Trump's recent 'incoherence' alarms political observers

With close to thirty days before American voters head to the polls to select a new president, there is a growing concern among political observers that Donald Trump's well-documented "incoherence" on the stump is accelerating.

In interviews with the Guardian's David Smith, critics of the former president are raising alarms that the former president's penchant for slurring and rambling during his now-frequent rallies indicate he is "in the throes of a final meltdown," as Smith put it.

According to American University history professor Allan Lichtman, “He’s definitely more undisciplined, unhinged and deranged. He’s always had these tendencies but, as he’s gotten older, they’ve become much greater. The Hannibal Lecter stuff or the shark versus electrocution stuff is just insane, just crazy and should be discussed on that basis."

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“But it’s a big mistake just to talk about Trump being unhinged or insane," he added. "You’ve got to talk about also how dangerous and retrograde what he’s saying is. We also ought to stress the extreme racism and misogyny.”

For evidence, the Guardian's Smith noted, "Trump, 78, increasingly slurs or stumbles over his words, raising fears over cognitive decline. He is slipping in polls against Kamala Harris and knows that defeat could lead to criminal trials and even prison," before adding that a recent Associated Press report stated, "Trump shifted from topic to topic so quickly that it was hard to keep track of what he meant at times."

Elaine Kamarck of the Brookings Institute suggested, "He has definitely lost a step, as they say. He is less coherent than he was certainly four years ago," and then added that his speaking style at his rallies has undergone a metamorphosis, telling the Guardian, "He reminds you of a sixth-grade boy having read something out loud at the front of the class who’s generally pissed off that he’s there and not on the soccer field.”

Former Republican and noted Trump critic Tara Setmayer warned, "We’re being tested and our democracy is on the line because what Donald Trump is saying is not just crazy batsh---ery. It’s dangerous. It’s authoritarian. It’s anti-democratic. It’s the ideology of hostility toward others. In Trump’s mind we’re not all equal and American voters need to make a decision about the type of country they want to live in and what kind of future they want to leave for their children.”

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