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by avalys 704 days ago
Yes, we shouldn’t confuse verbal fluency with intelligence, or the lack of one with the lack of the other. Perhaps you should go back in time to 2000 and step up to defend George W. Bush.

However, when someone was previously verbally fluent and then the whole world can see that that person’s fluency has deteriorated, it’s completely reasonable to believe that deterioration of other mental functions is happening as well, as seems to be the case with Biden.
2 comments
oceanplexian 704 days ago
Verbal fluency is a job requirement for a president. It doesn't matter if the president is the most intelligent person, it matters that they can communicate effectively, particularly with world leaders in life-or-death situations when a miscommunication can result in a great catastrophe. Personally I would rank intelligence as less important than several other attributes.
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TylerE 704 days ago
Exactly. A stutter doesn’t cause you to confuse names.
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khazhoux 704 days ago
No, the names thing has always been exaggerated.

I occasionally call my kids by each others' names. My parents would call me by my brothers' names. This is a running joke in large families. I occasionally in large meetings swap the names of two products we're talking about and have to be corrected. It's just a very low-grade "verbal dyslexia" that means nothing except that the brain isn't a perfectly-wired machine.

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TylerE 704 days ago
When you confuse the name of the leader of one country with the leader of the country they're at war against, that's...a bit more than that.
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khazhoux 704 days ago
Occam’s razor— which is more likely:

* Swapping a name as he’s known to do, with the name of the person who is contextually-adjacent and the other main character?

* Thinking the man he just finished discussing our continual support against Russian expansion, was actually Vladimir Putin himself?

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TylerE 704 days ago
I don’t beleive he’s actually confusing them, but it’s not a good look for a guy who’s supposed to be a leader in uncertain times. One should never be question if the president meant what they just said.
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khazhoux 704 days ago
Oh it’s a terrible look, no argument there!

I’m only saying that life-long wors-swapping is not dementia, as so many say.

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