Hairbrained

Recently, President Donald Trump had a great idea. Let’s charge people applying for H-1B visas $100,000. People in the White House are convinced that there is widespread abuse of the H-1B visa program and that US employers (most of them high tech) are using the visas to hire low-wage foreigners to replace American workers in order to fatten their bottom line. The proclamation announcing the increased fee was published on September 19th and took effect on September 21^st, causing panic on Wall Street and in Silicon Valley giving companies little time to adjust.

This isn’t to say that the H-1B visa program wasn’t in need of reform or that companies weren’t abusing the program to the detriment of American workers. But the way it was done was abrupt and arbitrary. There was no consultation period as is customary when making such changes. No period for comments by those affected by the order. Companies are advising visa holders to not travel outside the US and telling those visa holders coming into the US to change their plans. The actual visa holders are confused, anxious and possibly suicidal.

The point is that President Trump loves doing things like this. We don’t know how he got such a harebrained idea (although I do have a couple of suspects I could name) or how he came up with the amount of $100,000. Was he trying to reduce the deficit? There were 758,994 visa applicant registrations in 2024 which would require payments of about $75 billion. But the visa lottery only allowed 188,400 to apply. Do the losing applicants lose their money too? A lot of this is still unclear.

But Donald Trump loves this. He loves to sow chaos and confusion. His tariff program is of the same mold. Onerous tariffs are imposed, they are then postponed or lowered based on negotiations with the Trump administration’s team. And how are the tariff levels arrived at, how come the tariff for Indonesia is 32% while the rate for Cambodia is 49%? Who knows (probably the same suspects as in the new visa fees). Did Trump impose a 50% tariff on India because he was pissed off that Indian Prime Minister Modi watched a military parade in Beijing with Xi Jinping? What is it with India anyway? 73% of H-1B visa holders are Indian nationals.

Mr. Trump loves this power. An idea pops into his head (often in the middle of the night) which he then promptly posts on Truth Social. Et voila. It’s now government policy. He is the most powerful person on the planet and he wants everyone to know it. His wish is our command. But there is a dark side to all this accumulation of power (or should I say darker side). People in power get seduced by the power. As Lord Acton wrote in 1887, "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." People with unlimited power tend to go mad. Nero fiddled while Rome burned. The power of Rome converted Caligula into a cruel, sadistic, sexually perverted and insane, murderous tyrant. The list goes on and on, Ivan the Terrible, King George III, Henry VI, Leopold II of Belgium, etc. More recently we have had, Adolf Hitler, Mao Zedong and Pol Pot. And Vladimir Putin must be mad to risk nuclear war in his attempt to conquer Ukraine. Meanwhile Xi Jinping is showing some odd behavior now that there is no check to his power in China.

Eccentricities and quirkiness are often the hallmarks of great people. But when eccentricities descend into madness people die. Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot were untroubled by the millions that they killed. Putin orders wave after wave of young Russians to be cannon fodder to the withering fire of the Ukrainians. Donald Trump shows more anguish about the horrific carnage than Putin even as he orders the US Navy to blast drug runners to smithereens.

Donald Trump has always been odd. His narcissism is notorious. His character flaws are too numerous to count. But is he mad? Has he lost his grip on reality? He wields power thoughtlessly and dangerously. He directs that power against his many enemies, real or imagined. He ordered the Attorney General of the United States to prosecute those enemies. He admitted at Charlie Kirk’s memorial that, “I hate my opponents, and I don't want the best for them. I'm sorry. I am sorry, Erika. But now Erika can talk to me and the whole group, and maybe they can convince me that that's not right, but I can't stand my opponents.”

This is a man who has the nuclear football at his right hand. He is 79 years old and has shown troubling medical problems such as venous insufficiency, bruising and stumbling that are common among older people. By the end of his term in office he will be as old as Joe Biden was at the end of his term in office. And while the behavior he is exhibiting is different than Joe Biden’s afflictions they are still very troubling.

The American political system favors leaders that have a high opinion of themselves and an exaggerated belief in their abilities. And now that party hacks no longer pick presidential candidates in the smoke-filled backroom, the presidential campaign is little more than a truth-optional celebrity contest. The president of the United States is the most powerful person in the world, responsible for the lives and livelihoods hundreds of millions of people. Who in their right mind would want all that responsibility and all the vile criticism that comes with it?

I am no psychologist or psychiatrist but I find President Trump’s actions disturbing. More than disturbing – scary. He acts without the constraints on human behavior most people consider normal and acceptable. Those of you out there that have studied psychology or psychiatry please tell me if my fears are unfounded. And if they are not, what can I do about it.