PRAGMATIC ISSUES

There are failures of leadership that require long investigations.

And then there are failures so blatant they photograph themselves.

In recent weeks Americans have been treated to a gallery of images that no spin machine can bury.

The president of the United States asleep.

Not metaphorically.

Not rhetorically.

Literally unconscious while meetings proceed around him.

Different rooms.

Different events.

Different photographers.

The same negligence every time.

This is not about a bad angle or a split second blink. It is about a man repeatedly disengaging from the most powerful job on earth in full public view. It is about a pattern of indifference so routine that editors no longer debate whether to run the image. They debate which one best captures the decay.

Presidents are tired.

That is not news.

What is news is disrespect.

What is unprecedented is a leader who cannot summon the basic discipline to remain present while holding authority over economies, courts, wars, and lives.

Staying awake is not an aspirational leadership trait.

It is the minimum standard.

Any working American knows the rule. Fall asleep in meetings and you are disciplined. Do it repeatedly and you are gone. Do it while overseeing complex negotiations or national security briefings and you are replaced. Yet this president sleeps through proceedings while demanding loyalty, reverence, and obedience.

The insulting part is not the fatigue.

It is the entitlement.

This is a man who mocked others relentlessly as weak, slow, unfit. He turned physical slips into political weapons. He sold himself as the embodiment of energy and dominance. Now the image that defines his administration is stillness. Slack shoulders. Closed eyes. A man checked out while the nation waits for leadership.

Defenders insist the press is being unfair. They claim media bias, yet cheered when Trump coined the term “Sleepy Joe”. They say everyone gets tired. But the reason nearly every major outlet is running different photos is simple. There are too many to ignore. No coordination is required when reality supplies fresh evidence daily.

Photos are not editorial attacks.

They are documentation.

They do not accuse.

They reveal.

The danger here goes far beyond optics. A disengaged president creates power vacuums. When the person elected to govern withdraws physically and mentally, others fill the space. Advisors with agendas. Ideologues with axes to grind. Opportunists with no accountability. Indifference at the top is not neutral. It is corrosive.

What makes this moment intolerable is the timing. Global instability. Domestic fracture. Courts reshaping rights. Alliances under strain. Authoritarian movements watching closely. Leadership requires vigilance even when enthusiasm is gone.

Especially then.

Instead Americans are offered a presidency that shows up loudly for rallies and vengeance but disappears when governing becomes boring or inconvenient.

This is not exhaustion.

It is disdain for responsibility.

Respect for the office is not ceremonial. It is demonstrated. You demonstrate it by preparation. By attention. By staying conscious in the room where decisions are supposed to happen.

Sleeping through meetings is not human weakness. It is professional failure. Doing so repeatedly while clinging to power is institutional contempt.

History will not care how defensive supporters felt. It will care that warning signs were visible and documented and normalized. The presidency is not a throne you nap through.

It is a job.

And right now it is being treated like one that bores its occupant.

The country does not need perfection or theatrics but it does require alertness. When the most consistent image of a presidency is unconsciousness rather than leadership, the message is unmistakable.

This office is no longer being governed with urgency or respect but merely occupied, and that quiet abandonment may prove more damaging than any loud scandal ever could.