A series of President Donald Trump’s actions over the past 48 hours has a conservative doctor and journalist warning that he “seriously” questions the commander-in-chief’s mental health. This is according to physician and National Review contributor Pradheep Shanker, who took to social media on Monday to raise his concerns.
“So in the last couple days,” posted Shanker, “1. Trump threatened to bomb ally Oman. 2. Applauded a defense pact between the Saudis and Pakistan. 3. Claimed North Korea is more peaceful than South Korea. If this keeps going on, we may have to question his sanity. Seriously.”
Shanker is referring to a string of consequential assertions made by Trump. On Monday morning, the president threatened to “bomb the s–– out of” Oman if they “get in the way” of his efforts to end the war with Iran. It was the second time Trump has threatened the country, which the Guardian explains is a “longtime US strategic partner that has traditionally served as a key backchannel between Washington and Tehran.” Trump issued his latest threat via an interview on Fox News, where he also said he is “not in a hurry” to reach a deal.
A day earlier, Trump had hailed the signing of a defense pact between Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan, posting, “It shows how the Middle East is coming together and how countries will finally be able to defend themselves in a more meaningful way,” and calling the agreement a “BIG, BOLD, IMPORTANT FIRST STEP.” Largely unreported by American media, as foreign media outlets like Al Jazeera explain, the agreement will push the region to rethink decades of American-led security architecture and upend the balance of power throughout the Middle East. According to the Times of Israel, Iran has applauded the deal as well, claiming that it represents “a shift away from alliances with the U.S.”
Then on Sunday night, Trump announced that the U.S. would scale down its joint military exercises with South Korea, “citing the U.S. ally’s refusal to join the war in Iran and his ‘very good’ relationship with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.” According to NBC News, “Trump said the large, annual military drills sent a ‘signal that is totally inappropriate and hostile’ to North Korea, a nuclear-armed state with which the U.S. has no formal diplomatic ties but which Trump says has been ‘unthreatening and respectful’ as long as he has been president. ‘Based on the fact that it is too late to cancel, I have instructed Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, to substantially reduce the Joint Military Exercises!’ Trump wrote on social media. His announcement came just hours before the drills were set to start.”
Another conservative journalist at the National Review shared his thoughts on the news, posting, “Reprehensible. The president covers a great and good country in shame. Again.” He later added, “The president and his party would like your vote this fall to defeat so-called ‘communists’ at home; meanwhile, his position on actual blood-soaked communists: ‘unthreatening and respectful.’”
Noted yet another conservative journalist, Michael Sobolik, “Xi Jinping has already internalized the logic Trump lays out in this post: convince Trump that you’re ‘unthreatening and respectful,’ and he’ll offer unilateral concessions and blame America’s partners for being ‘hostile.’”
“This is truly pathetic,” Shanker concluded over news of the spiraling negotiations with Iran. “I'm almost getting to the point where random Democrats would be handling this better than Trump is.”
