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sparkleflit 76F
5205 posts
9/18/2019 7:25 pm
WHY TRUMP CAN'T LEARN


An Educated Guess by a Veteran Teacher

While dyslexia has been mentioned now and then as one of the reasons Donald Trump is so ignorant of what it takes to govern in a free society, I want to explore it as foundational to his inability to learn and grow while in office—and also as a way to link disparate troubling elements in his makeup.

So what follows is the informed speculation of a former classroom teacher.

Considering Trump’s well-documented aversion to reading and his difficulty with complex sentence structures when he talks without a script, my hunch is that he has mild to moderate dyslexia, a neurobiological condition that makes it difficult to learn to read and can also affect sentence formation and vocabulary. When he was young it may not have been adequately diagnosed and treated.

"I am suggesting that Trump’s lifelong experience with dyslexia, instead of increasing his capacity for compassion, has instead combined with problematic elements in his personality, including a penchant for revenge that was apparent even when he was a young adult."
Because trying to read was frustrating, as time went on he read as little as possible. Because he experienced humiliation and shame in the early grades when he saw other acquiring information with ease from books, I believe he came to resent those who were academically successful, who loved school, and drew the teacher’s praise. His own natural curiosity about the world waned.

Trump has left himself no way to enjoy learning and to benefit from knowledge. As he grew older, he neither had the patience to laboriously read even moderately difficult material. Nor could he enjoy listening to people who knew a lot more about specific realms of knowledge than he did. That felt like school, which he hated. Reporting indicates he still can’t tolerate policy briefings of more than a few minutes.

How does Trump’s difficulty in reading relate to his penchant for uttering falsehoods? I think he began faking when he was six or seven and couldn't keep up with the other his age who had learned their letters and were starting to read sentences and little stories. He wanted to be "great" so he made things up. Faking got baked into his personality. He couldn’t stop now, not for anything.

Trump was fortunate to find a lucrative role in television where he didn’t need to read much and his fakery, tall tales, and grandiosity enhanced his media personality. If only he had stayed there!

Instead, he turned into a president who not only disregards expertise and knowledge but also enjoys surrounding himself with people who are totally unsuited to their offices or are even more ignorant than he.

He especially rejects academics, scientists, and people with deep knowledge of other cultures when they oppose his actions. These people are to be scorned and distanced from his regime. He loves lording it over them and making them unhappy.

Consider his current imposition of very large tariffs on imports from China and elsewhere despite vehement opposition from a whole array of economists, diplomats and international trade experts. He simply cannot allow himself to learn from those people and refuses to admit he has made some bad decisions and should change course.

Estimates are that Trump’s reading level is about fifth grade, maybe fourth or sixth. That’s enough to tweet and to follow a teleprompter, but not enough to comprehend an ordinary longish article in The Wall Street Journal. If there were a way to give him a reading test, I would have someone choose a few such articles, give him three times as long to read them as a typical Journal reader would take, and then ask him for a coherent explanation of what’s in each one.

I would wager thousands of dollars that he couldn’t do it. He could never have read his textbooks at the Wharton School. Someone would have had to read them aloud to him or create "bullet points" so he would grasp the main ideas.

Dyslexia is not predictive of a particular fate but combines with elements in each person's personality. One person might become an excellent forest guide who knows all the birds, small creatures, and trees intimately and doesn't need to rely on reading. By contrast, another might undertake a strenuous course of tutoring to maintain grade level in school, be open about his or her reading problem, ask for extra time in exams, and eventually graduate from college with a stellar record. A third might inherit a lot of money, then create and monitor a foundation to help people with various disabilities. A fourth, discouraged, might drop out of school and settle for doing odd jobs in the neighborhood.

And a fifth might fake and falsify his way to fame and power and enjoy lording it over so-called “smart” people and thwarting their hopes. I am suggesting that Trump’s lifelong experience with dyslexia, instead of increasing his capacity for compassion, has instead combined with problematic elements in his personality, including a penchant for revenge that was apparent even when he was a young adult.

The result is a toxic combination of ignorance. Because it was so hard for him to learn from books—coupled with his unwillingness to listen to people with deep knowledge and alternative perspectives—he nurtured resentment and mistrust. He just doesn’t have what it takes to govern thoughtfully and fairly in a free society. Instead he exhibits a combative complacency, a receptivity to unworkable and dangerous ideas, an admiration of dictators, and an almost savage destructive push that is causing severe ongoing harm to our democracy.

Harriet Feinberg

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sparkleflit 76F
10271 posts
9/18/2019 7:26 pm

***


LeafReport 73M

9/19/2019 2:53 am

Interesting article and while I cannot disprove the theory I wonder if this problem alone accounts for the revenge problem that worries me daily. There is also the racism too and the perverse obsession with undoing public policy championed by Obama, to include important and effective policy and the result is clear harm to the country. Not enough attention is being paid to this matter. But I think THAT problem doesn't have racist roots, it is foreign, driven by Putin and its an incredibly clever strategy to harm the country from the outside and pin it all on Trump and racism. Getting America to undo effective policy resurrecting problems that will only grow even bigger is a national emergency that must be addressed immediately.


LeafReport 73M

9/19/2019 2:57 am

    Quoting  :

I see this mess as bigger than this Earthy. I sure don't discount the theory though. I do share your observation on Bigblock. I've tried to reach him in many different ways. It is really sad.


rus1940 84M
92 posts
9/19/2019 4:26 am

All of you are very sick in the head!! President Trump has made billions and is very successful in everything he does. President Trump has turned America around and you are so shallow minded you cannot see the accomplishments. America will re-elect President Trump for another 4 years next year.

RDD


sparkleflit 76F
10271 posts
9/19/2019 8:33 am

    Quoting rus1940:
    All of you are very sick in the head!! President Trump has made billions and is very successful in everything he does. President Trump has turned America around and you are so shallow minded you cannot see the accomplishments. America will re-elect President Trump for another 4 years next year.
You apparently live under a very thick rug.......


sparkleflit 76F
10271 posts
9/19/2019 8:34 am

    Quoting  :

Tip of the iceberg........


dusty117 73M

9/19/2019 11:01 am

    Quoting rus1940:
    All of you are very sick in the head!! President Trump has made billions and is very successful in everything he does. President Trump has turned America around and you are so shallow minded you cannot see the accomplishments. America will re-elect President Trump for another 4 years next year.
My guess is Trump is ignorant because he never needed to learn anything … and he's lazy because he never needed to work at anything.

Trump is a 73 year old man still wearing his mommy's shoes.


sparkleflit 76F
10271 posts
9/19/2019 3:52 pm

    Quoting rus1940:
    All of you are very sick in the head!! President Trump has made billions and is very successful in everything he does. President Trump has turned America around and you are so shallow minded you cannot see the accomplishments. America will re-elect President Trump for another 4 years next year.
How about all his bankruptcies? ......The gambling joints ?You call those successes too?....LOL...And Trump University?......how many millions did he have to pay out for defrauding the public? And his fraudulent charity......Trump and his kids were ruled by the courts not to be able to be on the boards of any charity for many years.......that's success for ya......Yup.......