Just saw an Nespresso ad with George Clooney. Boy has he aged. I could hardly recognize him. When did

[JohnSJ]

recognizing a celebrity suddenly become a litmus test for Cognitive aptitude?



It is almost as bad as someone mistaking his ex-wife for E. Jean Carroll, and confirming that mistake when asked in a follow-up.

just saying..........

[BannonsLiver]

1. I'm think most people would still recognize him.

[SocialDemocrat61]

3. Maybe

[JohnSJ]

7. I guess my comment about someone who thought their ex-wife was e Jean Carroll didn't register.

[LisaM]

22. He doesn't look like that in the ad.

I don't know what he looked like at the fundraiser, but he (Clooney) has aged considerably in the last few years.

It also doesn't help that he sports several different looks.

The issue is how Biden was governing. Strangely, no one brings that up. They just zero in on these stupid anecdotes.

I think it's also worth mentioning that Amal Clooney was one of those somehow blaming Biden for the situation in Gaza. I have consistently given my own opinion about that - it wasn't Biden's fault and I think he was navigating it as well as anyone could - but she may well have been an unconscious influencer in all this.

And in the end, they got what they wanted. They drove Biden out. Then they complained about the ensuing process. It was always going to be a no-win.

[Bettie]

47. And in the end, it was really about

wealthy people not wanting to pay taxes.

[LisaL]

41. I don't think this is very recent, is it?

The latest photos of him I saw had died black hair, and it didn't look good.

[SocialDemocrat61]

46. That's from the show he's doing on Broadway

and he’s in make up to resemble Edward R. Murrow.

[JohnSJ]

5. My comment was meant to point out the double standard. I think most people would recognize an

ex-wife.

[muriel_volestrangler]

8. "Not as bad as Trump" is not a great advert.

If we're talking about E. Jean Carroll, I wouldn't have phrased it as "President Biden recognizes people better than Trump", but as "Trump is a rapist. President Biden isn't." I do think that Democratic strategists made a big mistake when they didn't run on "Trump is a rapist".

[JohnSJ]

11. I thought I was pointing out the selectivity of our hypocritical, hyperbolic obsession of our media

that President Biden is old, but they have no issue with the sociopath unable to identify an ex-wife. That's all.

I guess I will add the sarcasm tag on there so there is no ambiguity.

[muriel_volestrangler]

18. I think a mention of the media is what was needed, not that it was sarcasm

Without mentioning the media, your sarcasm could have been directed at various Democrats (Clooney himself, Pelosi, many DUers ...), either about what they said, or how they ran the 2024 campaign.

[krawhitham]

19. men's journal didn't, "George Clooney Looks Totally Unrecognizable in Broadway Debut"

https://www.mensjournal.com/entertainment/george-clooney-looks-totally-unrecognizable-broadway-debut

[StarryNite]

21. He looks like a wax figure in this picture.

[BannonsLiver]

23. Yeah, I still think most people would.

I get that he's not popular on DU right now, which is what this is all really about.

[SocialDemocrat61]

45. Based on what?

Did you take a poll of people showing them a picture of Clooney and most recognized him? And how did you conduct this poll? Did you go door to door in different regions of the country or maybe you stood on a corner and asked random passerbys?

And it’s not about Clooney’s popularity, it’s about the future of our country and the suffering being inflicted on innocent people.

[LisaL]

42. Yep.

His hair doesn't look good this way as far as I am concerned.

[beaglelover]

33. Agreed.

[Prairie Gates]

2. You took a while to get there...4 out of 10

[Aristus]

4. I'm nine years younger than George Clooney. And I wouldn't mind looking the way he does at his own age.

It's a sacrifice I'm willing to make...

[JohnSJ]

10. My point wasn't even about that. It was pointing out how a person occupying the WH thought his

ex-wife was someone else, and based on some of the responses, I guess that doesn't seem unusual to some.

[mcar]

15. You're injecting sense into

a bash Biden free for all.

[JohnSJ]

16. I just added the sarcasm tag, so hopefully it won't be misinterpreted. Thanks.

[MorbidButterflyTat]

38. Exactly.

It seems the ever increasing saturation of bullshit about President Biden's frailty, and the horrific revelation of his administration covering it all up like Watergate on steroids, for the purpose of maximizing book sales for a CNN relic cosplaying a "journalist," is a predictable success!

[IA8IT]

6. Are you Joe Biden? Poking George? Fun stuff

[JohnSJ]

9. Obviously someone not recognizing their ex-wife, and repeatedly identifying his ex-wife as someone else,

that hardly bothered the press, and it appears my sarcasm was missed by some.

[MorbidButterflyTat]

39. Under oath, even!

That was from the deposition taken for E. Jean Carroll's lawsuit(s).

"He (Orange felon)...misidentifies an old photo of himself with Carroll, thinking it was Marla Maples, his ex-wife."

Nothing to see here, move along to the next Democratic hit job.

[Johonny]

12. I honestly had the same reaction

I wondered who he was until I remembered his career is basically those commercials now.

[Mosby]

13. I didn't recognize him immediately in this photo

https://ibb.co/v6ZMDyGL

[SheilaAnn]

17. TBH, I think he looks quite unwell, still nice looking but.... n/t

[Mosby]

31. He's starting to look a little gaunt.

Nt.

[choie]

36. The dark hair does him no favors.

[Ms. Toad]

20. There is a difference between recognizing a celebrity -

And recognizing someone you know in person and who has hosted at least two fundraisers for you.

From George Clooney's NYT editorial about the event in the "he didn't recognize a celebrity" distortion.

I’m a lifelong Democrat; I make no apologies for that. I’m proud of what my party represents and what it stands for. As part of my participation in the democratic process and in support of my chosen candidate, I have led some of the biggest fund-raisers in my party’s history. Barack Obama in 2012. Hillary Clinton in 2016. Joe Biden in 2020. Last month I co-hosted the single largest fund-raiser supporting any Democratic candidate ever, for President Biden’s re-election. I say all of this only to express how much I believe in this process and how profound I think this moment is.
I love Joe Biden. As a senator. As a vice president and as president. I consider him a friend, and I believe in him.

. . .

It’s devastating to say it, but the Joe Biden I was with three weeks ago at the fund-raiser was not the Joe “big F-ing deal” Biden of 2010. He wasn’t even the Joe Biden of 2020. He was the same man we all witnessed at the debate.

No one would have batted an eyelash if the issue was **just** not recognizing a celebrity. But to not recognize the host of your largest fundraiser ever - at that fundraiser - someone with whom you have had a relationship for at least 2 decades, who has previously hosted at least one fundraiser for you isn't the same.

[JohnSJ]

24. As far as I am concerned the country is getting exactly what it deserves, and the impact of the disaster of

putting the rapist, insurrectionist, conman back into the WH will cause a lot of unnecessary misery and suffering, and it will not be easy to reverse the damage that will be done in the next four years.

Some people want to ignore incoherent press conferences from a damaged sociopath who tried to overthrow the government, and is in the process of tearing down our institutions, putting the most incompetent people in charge of everything from our healthcare to our security, while much of the illustrious media which masquerades for journalism, believes this is such an important story going on right now while the country is being dismantled. Sounds about right to me.

and I wonder how many people wouldn't recognize their ex-spouse?

[Ms. Toad]

28. Then argue on that front -

Dismiss the outdated concerns about whether Biden's competency - don't even bless them with a response. Call the media on not sufficiently addressing Trump's gross incompetency and cruelty. You'll have my unqualified support.

But when you argue that Clooney's interactions with Biden - a person he has known for at least 2 decades and who has hosted the largest Democratic fundraiser ever on his behalf are the equivalent to you not recognizing a celebrity with whom you have no personal relationship, I'm gonna call you on it. Biden is not a current candidate for any office. He will likely not be one ever again. There is no reason to dwell on what happened. But if you want to go there, at least be honest about it.

[iemanja]

30. If you were introduced to that ex

Multiple times in one evening but still couldn’t remember them, that would be a red flag—especially if you were told you were attending a fundraiser hosted by your ex. Those are the circumstances of the events of Clooney’s fundraiser.

[RobinA]

29. Fundraisers Aside

I think a little less of Clooney for making a deal of this. It's water under the bridge however you look at it. I thought Clooney was above this sort of thing. Really, why?

[Ms. Toad]

34. The point isn't that he had fundraisers -

But that the relationship makes it a very different scenario than not recognizing a random celebrity with whom you had no relationship.

That aside, I think Clooney sincerely believed that Biden would not win against Trump. Having watched both slow and rapid changes in cognitive behavior, I believe he was correct - and that (given Biden decided to seek a second term, pretty much precluding any serious contender in the primaries), he acted at a time when he perceived the least damage was for Biden to bow out - and that his opinion piece might tip the balance.

My spouse has a similar cognitive decline to Trump's - gap filling including, as he calls it, the weave. It is much harder to convince others who are not living with it that it exists. My spouse is still - at least 15 years after it was severe enough that I insisted she take a battery of cognitive tests - practicing law and fooling most people. Her gap filling is so smooth, no one notices that a lot of what she says is made up. As someone who lives with her, I recognize when she describes my experiences as her own. I recognize when she exaggerates incidents beyond recognition. Like Trump - she is entertaining, and people flock to her partly because of how entertaining her "true" stories are. Her decline is very slow, but fitful. She has been diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment, consistent with the early stages of Alzheimer's, and has taken two Alzheimer's medications for at least 15 years. Her siblings jokingly reference her memory, but they clearly still (most of them) think it is a joke - not reality. By now, I believe it is related to diabetes. She will go through periods of relatively stability with her blood glucose. She has has wild swings in cognitive ability in the last year - coinciding with needing three new medications to control her blood glucose. But the point is her decline is like Trump's. People who are close to her - or who are paying attention and comparing her stories to verifiable reality - know. Others just dismiss it as charming quirks, metaphors, klutzy wording.

My mother has a decline more similar to Biden's. It is much more obvious. She has no ability to gap fill - so she has spaces where it is clear her mind is empty. Her false memories are far more obvious. My daughter has two life-threatening illnesses, the first diagnosis was just before her 5th birthday. This past weekend my mother had no recollection of it (my daughter is 34 now). My spouse wanted to watch a TV show on Mother's day. While she was watching it, and my mother was talking to her about it, she all of a sudden - out of the blue disconnected and imagined it was my daughter who wanted to watch the show and that was why my daughter (who was working - a fact we had mentioned less than an hour earlier) stayed home because she (not my spouse) wanted to watch the shows my spouse was actively watching at the time of the conversation. There are time she is mostly there - and times she is really gone. Her decline is much more rapid - as it seems to me Biden's is.

Suffice it to say - I have seen multiple forms of cognitive decline up close and personal. (These are not the only two.) I recognized what I was seeing in Biden on the debate floor - especially when reinforced by someone who knows him reasonably well. And I lived through Reagan, when his cognitive decline was hidden from the world (he's more similar to my spouse - a decline that is more easily hidden/explained away). I have had more than my share of people insisting there is nothing wrong with my spouse - so my personal tendency is to believe those who closer to the source than I am.

I didn't jump on the dump Biden bandwagon - but only because the time for him to bow out was before the primary season. I didn't see how we could coalesce around a new candidate quickly enough to run an effective campaign. Ultimately, I believe Harris was the best choice - and would have won, but for her refusal to distance herself from (1) Biden's justified touting of the stock market economy, while unjustifiably ignoring the pocketbook economy and (2) Biden's posture on the Middle East. Those two postures cost us votes in people staying home because some people couldn't get over their personal interests to go to the polls and vote for the better option for the country. They just didn't see enough there to motivate them to get out to the polls. They were stupid. But it was also an unforced error on Harris's part.

[marble falls]

25. Nestles' products will mess a person up. Poor George.

[dweller]

26. I thought he was Inspector Clouseau

maybe Joe did too


✌🏻

[iemanja]

27. You obviously didn't read the details

Biden was attending a fundraiser hosted by Clooney. Even after being told who he was multiple times that night, Biden still didn’t recognize him. He had to be introduced to Clooney multiple times that night. That may not be atypical for many 81 year olds, but it’s not good as president.

You all insisted a now 82 year old should run uncontested for reelection. You got the entirely predictable results of that.

[BannonsLiver]

37. Someone needed to say that.

[MorbidButterflyTat]

43. I don't get that

He was ousted and VP Harris was on the ballot, not President Biden, the incumbent.

Maybe you mean he wasn't ousted fast enough?

"You all"?

[iemanja]

48. IMO

He should never have run for reelection.

[doc03]

32. I just read yesterday George Cloney said Joe

Biden didn't know him last time they met. Maybe it wasn't Joe's cognitive problem but Cloney"s age.

[MorbidButterflyTat]

44. Boom!

[kimbutgar]

35. I used to be a big fan of him and now I can't stand him when i see him !

What he did to Joe Biden really pissed me off and he contributed to having the orange hitler back to destroy America! 🤬

[Meowmee]

40. Yes 👍🏻