The Goldwater rule is Section 7 in the American Psychiatric Association‘s (APA) Principles of Medical Ethics:

 Psychiatrists have a responsibility to participate in activities contributing to the improvement of the community and the betterment of public health, but they should not give a professional opinion about public figures whom they have not examined in person, and from whom they have not obtained consent to discuss their mental health in public statements.

The Goldwater rule is highly controversial because dangerous people can run for office and if the psychiatrists are not going to say anything, who will? And yet it is taken so seriously that a tenured professor at Yale was fired over her comments regarding Trump and Dershowitz. From the NY Times.

Mr. Dershowitz’s phrasing — in response to questions about his connections to the accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein — drew headlines at the time. The comments also prompted Bandy X. Lee, then a psychiatrist at Yale University who had questioned Mr. Trump’s mental fitness and his influence over his supporters, to assess Mr. Dershowitz’s behavior.

We do not know whether Dr. Lee has faced questions or complaints about her license yet. Certainly, there are some that want Lee to lose her license. She lost her job, after all.

If Dr. Lee, a trained psychiatrist can lose her job over “diagnosing” Trump and Dershowitz, then certainly a physician who has no specialized training in psychiatry or neurology should not be allowed to keep his job or license if he makes a similar comment.

Dr. Ronny Jackson is also Rep. Ronny Jackson now. Republican representatives are supposed to criticize Biden, it’s a job requirement. But he can do so without adding an opinion about Biden’s mental health and – as a physician – the rules are very clear that even a psychiatrist is not supposed to make such comments.

And yet Jackson tweeted on Thursday:

Biden’s hiding out again in Delaware while our country is dealing with yet another crisis. We need a leader not a retreater. At this point we’d be better off if he stayed in the basement in Delaware for the next three years! He’s not cognitively capable. Who’s REALLY in charge???

— Ronny Jackson (@RonnyJacksonTX) December 31, 2021

“He is not cognitively capable.” There it is, a physician’s opinion straight out in a tweet, completely unnecessary and entirely definitive. He could have made his point – to the extent he had one, that Biden has been “gone” without saying anything about Biden’s health.

But Jackson chose to “go there.” If the “Goldwater Rule” applies to psychiatrists, surely to God, it applies with even greater force to non-specialists. A complaint needs to be made to whatever state board handed out a license to Jackson.

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