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Donald Trump’s former lawyer has called for the President to be removed from office because he has turned into a “madman”.

Ty Cobb, who worked closely with Trump during his first administration, claimed that the President’s “mental condition has deteriorated substantially” to the point where he was now unfit to serve.

In an exclusive interview with The i Paper, Cobb said that Trump’s second term was “scary and dystopian” because the President was now surrounded by enablers who were unable and unwilling to control his impulses.

Cobb warned that the President, 79, the oldest person ever to be inaugurated into the role, appeared to growing “desperate” and more dangerous the longer his war on Iran went on. Despite a fragile ceasefire, both the US and Iran are blockading the global chokepoint of the Strait of Hormuz, fuelling a rise in energy prices worldwide and threatening spiralling disaster.

“We’re in a real crisis here in the US,” he said. The President had become a “dictator” who was “destroying our democracy”, he added.

The President has faced renewed questions about his mental health due to his conduct during the Iran war, which he started alongside Israel on 28 February. Trump’s critics have pointed in particular to a notorious post on social media in which he warned that a “whole civilisation will die tonight” if his first deadline for peace talks passed: with hours to go he delayed the threatened annihilation by two weeks. He has since extended it again, but reports suggest he is now being briefed on plans for renewed “short and powerful” strikes to try to break the deadlock in talks.

Trump’s other warning to Iran to “Open the F**kin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in hell” sparked a new round of anxiety about his mental capacity for the job.

Last month Congressman Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the powerful Judiciary Committee, wrote a letter to the White House demanding a comprehensive neurological examination of the President because of the “deep and growing alarm about the [his] mental fitness”. He cited in particular “signs consistent with dementia and cognitive decline” as well as Trump’s “increasingly incoherent, volatile, profane, deranged, and threatening” tantrums.

Cobb represented Trump during his first presidency for a year in 2017 during the inquiry by the Special Counsel Robert Mueller into his alleged dealings with Russia. Cobb is one of the few lawyers to emerge from his time in the White House unscathed.

However, more recently, he has turned on the President.

Cobb explained how during Trump’s first term, the two had “substantive” discussions and that they would see each other every day, often having lunch together.

Cobb’s office was a level beneath the Oval Office and he would frequently go upstairs to speak with the President.

According to Cobb, back then there were people around the President who would say no to him, telling him if something he wanted to do was illegal or not presidential.

He said that officials like Trump’s former chief of staff General John Kelly and Trump’s former UN ambassador Nikki Haley would guide the President and, given his lack of experience in the White House, he would follow their advice.

“That’s different from now because there’s nobody in the White House [who] is assisting the President with acting lawful or morally,” Cobb said.

He singled out people like the War Secretary, Pete Hegseth, and former attorney general Pam Bondi as being part of a “kakistocracy”, or a government made up of the least-qualified people.

Cobb said: “Trump created this because of the controls he faced the first time around. Now you have grifters and sycophants and that is not a minor deviation from norms: it’s unprecedented in American history.

“It’s made us vulnerable domestically and internationally and it’s fuelled the divide in the country”.

The other big change could be seen in Trump’s mental health, Cobb said. He agrees with the analysis of doctors like psychologist Dr John Gartner who say the President is exhibiting many signs of frontal lobe decline, and possibly dementia.

Coupled with his view that Trump suffers from “long-running malignant narcissism”, this makes a dangerous combination, Cobb said.

He said: “The narcissism has always been an issue for him but in an absence of the impulse control the frontal lobe provides it has unleashed furiously, which is why we see revenge, corruption, delusions of grandeur and [alleged] abuses of power.

“There has never been a President before who announced war crimes he would commit at 4am or danced on the grave of decorated public servants like Robert Mueller.

Cobb also pointed to the insults Trump directed at the Hollywood director Rob Reiner after he and his wife were brutally murdered. Trump claimed that Reiner, an outspoken Trump critic, had been killed “due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME”.

“This is a man who has demonstrated he’s way beyond any ability to lawfully carry out the duties of the office and has no business in the position.

Cobb added that it increasingly felt as though “we’re governed by a madman at this stage, there’s no other way to put it”.

According to Cobb, things could get even worse given Trump’s popularity was at an all-time low, with just 32 per cent of people approving of his presidency according to a poll last month, numbers seen by Jimmy Carter during his single term in the White House from 1977 to 1981.

Cobb cited Trump’s increasingly frequent late-night posts on social media which indicate that the President is barely sleeping: on one Thursday night last month Trump posted 18 times over three hours until around 3am.

Such behaviour was so erratic that it made even the former president Joe Biden look favourable in comparison, Cobb said.

Biden, 83, was forced to drop out of his re-election campaign in 2024 after a car-crash presidential debate where he appeared confused on stage. That performance made public concerns friends had privately held for years about his mental decline.

Cobb said: “Biden at the end of his presidency was not qualified to be president either and his deterioration was palpable.

“But that’s the difference for the ageing process for a normal person and a malignant narcissist

“When Biden’s controls faded he became a doddering old grandfather.” Trump, however, had become something far worse. He is “not Jesus as he thinks he is”, Cobb said.

In a statement to The i Paper, the White House spokesman Davis Ingle said: “Ty Cobb should immediately seek psychiatric help to treat his severe case of Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

In a reference to Cobb’s handlebar moustache, Ingle added: “And he should also shave that caterpillar off his face.”

Ingle added: “President Trump’s sharpness, unmatched energy, and historic accessibility stand in stark contrast to what we saw during the last administration when Democrats and other lunatics intentionally covered up Joe Biden’s serious mental and physical decline from the American people”.

My daughter smoothed down her embroidered top and turned to look up at the cherry blossoms, their petals floating gently down towards the water. Dressed in a traditional Korean hanbok outfit, with tree-fringed steps and low curving wooden roofs in the background, it felt like a moment out of time.

I’d assumed modern culture would be the highlight of my 13-year-old’s trip to South Korea, but watching her face light up as we strolled through Yongin Folk Village, an hour or so outside Seoul, proved the country’s past was just as engaging.

We’ve visited more than 30 countries together, but for my daughter – a firmly committed K-pop fan with an encyclopaedic knowledge of her favourite groups and their dance routines – a holiday here has long topped her bucket list.

And she’s not alone. Tourism to South Korea is soaring, with visitor numbers up almost 50 per cent in 2024 and likely to rise further with the recent launch of Virgin Atlantic’s new flights from Heathrow. Younger travellers are helping to drive this boom, with figures from Trip.com showing last summer’s release of K-Pop Demon Hunters alone prompted a 34 per cent rise in flights booked from the UK to Seoul. Hallyu (the “Korean wave”) – a term describing the global popularity of South Korean culture, from music and TV to beauty products and food – is undoubtedly a key driver.

We packed in plenty of teen musts in Seoul, including shopping for K-pop merch in Gangnam and browsing ramen in 7-Eleven, but our trip weaved in just as much history and heritage. We were far from the only ones dressing in the unexpectedly comfortable hanbok, which secures free entry into Seoul’s palaces for anyone who wears it. Perfect for blending in at 600-year-old Gyeongbokgung Palace, where performers in vibrant silk uniforms re-enact the medieval changing of the guard ceremony here twice a day to a soundtrack of drums, conch shells and horns.

A 20-minute walk away, as locals relaxed in deckchairs at a pop-up library on the banks of Cheonggyecheon stream, my daughter lived out her K-pop dreams performing in the interactive rooms of HiKR Ground. Set inside the Korea Tourism Organization Seoul Center, it’s designed as an introduction to K-culture, with everything from virtual skateboarding to digital graffiti walls, plus a huge library of music and video backgrounds to record your own videos. In the UK, I’d expect eye-watering queues for this free experience but only a few other people were waiting.

There were other happy surprises for my bank balance, too: metro journeys cost less than 80p, entry to palaces is only £1.50 (if you aren’t dressed in hanbok) and you can eat until bursting in a restaurant for well under £10.

From Seoul, we took a day trip to the DMZ, the Demilitarised Zone between North and South Korea, 50km or so from the city. It’s an unexpected haven for wildlife, with landmines helping to keep humans out, but visitors are allowed in parts of the surrounding buffer zone. Looking through telescopes across the border, the single inhabited village we could see seemed eerily deserted, and it was flanked by equally silent ornamental propaganda villages.

We descended into the “third tunnel” – so called because it was the third known tunnel dug from north of the border into the south – which would have allowed an invading force of 30,000 soldiers to pass through each hour. A steep incline slopes 350m down, leading 73m below ground, where the walls still carry scars from explosives used to blast through the granite. My daughter peppered me with questions about communist ideology on the taxing climb back up.

We could have easily spent our whole 12-day holiday in and around Seoul, but high-speed rail connections make it easy to see other sides to the country; both the ancient capital Gyeongju and Korea’s second city Busan are just a couple of hours away.

In the former, about 150 symmetrical grassy mounds dot the landscape, housing the tombs of the kings of the Silla dynasty, which ruled Korea for almost a millennium from 57BCE until 935CE. Only a handful have been excavated so far, but 11,500 artefacts were found in one tomb alone, including the largest and most elaborate gold crown found in Korea, a gold cap, gold belt, gold diadem, gold earrings and even gilt shoes. Unsurprisingly, Gyeongju is nicknamed “the Golden City”.

The whole city keeps one foot in the past. We wandered past cafes selling cute pink strawberry mochi snacks, and around the corner we tucked into traditional Korean dishes on a street given over entirely to restaurants in traditional, low-rise buildings. Known as hanok, they often come complete with courtyards with trickling streams and ornamental bridges.

Some of these houses are available for overnight stays, too, although happily we discovered that history comes with mod cons. Bed still meant a futon mattress, but there was also underfloor heating, a mini fridge and en-suite bathroom.

Less than an hour from Gyeongju by fast train, Busan is modern Korea through and through. It’s the fifth busiest container port in the world and bridges stretch for miles, with one spiralling 360 degrees as it climbs high above the water. Beyond the glimmering skyscrapers, we found another taste of Korean tradition – painting our own calligraphy mottos in hangeul script under the watchful eye of calligraphy master Mrs Choi.

We then learnt to make gimbap with Park Kyung-hee at her home. This snack of rice wrapped in seaweed is often called Korean sushi, but the cooked fillings are designed to keep for longer than raw fish. The trick, we discovered, is not to overstuff your seaweed square. As we watched our host stir glass noodles in homemade soy sauce to create japchae, my daughter eagerly devoured a plate of crispy courgette slices and wondered why there were two big fridges in the apartment. One, revealed Mrs Park, is entirely for kimchi, packed into red tubs that won’t show the chilli stains.

Korea has over 200 recognised varieties of kimchi and traditionally families make it once a year, although Mrs Park is currently stocked up for a couple of years. If fermented cabbage is still something of an acquired taste for my teen, there’s no question this trip has only whetted her appetite for all things Korean.

How to get there

Virgin Atlantic, Korean Air and Asiana Airlines fly non-stop from Heathrow to Seoul.

Where to stay

Moxy Seoul Myeongdong has doubles from about £120 and Felix by STX hotel in Busan from £50. Hanok in Gyeongju can be booked from about £26 via popular online booking sites.

How to do it

Intrepid Travel has an eight-day South Korea Family Holiday tour from £3,537 for one adult and one child, excluding flights. [can cut this bit for space if need be – writer wasn’t hosted]

More information

visitkorea.or.kr

There’s a movement quietly taking hold on social media. Singledom has taken on a new dimension. It’s been repackaged as an art form; an impermeable, sacred solitude to be mastered by those of us chronically unattached. Pastel images of foam-swept lattes or swirling two-tone iced coffees perspiring next to ornate journals or leather-bound literary novels abound on lonely user feeds.

Instagrammers like thirty-something singleton Sophie F Williams advise followers to “learn to enjoy spending time alone and value it. Don’t feel sad about it”. She suggets: “Book girls’ trips and find a hobby.” But this kind of advice can skim over the realities of singledom. Many singletons may not have the luxury of a space to host dinner parties and, like me, enough thirty/forty-something friends available to attend thywithout months of advanced planning – let alone a “girls’ trip”.

Late last year, a Vogue article titled “Is Having a Boyfriend Embarrassing Now?” lamented on the “lameness” of boyfriends in an era of “heterofatalism”. The conversation followed a wave of female influencers deleting or obscuring pictures with their partners after romantic content appeared to dent their following. But while the need to move away from internalised norms of centring men – and cat-lady tropes – is real, it gives rise to a different kind of pressure for those who still believe in romance, who may feel quietly diminished by the suggestion that enjoying a relationship status is cringey.

It’s easy to romanticise singledom with its freedom and uncompromised “me-time” in abundance. Even I, a chronic singleton on the cusp of 40, have fallen for the lazy Sunday marketing approach in all its filtered glory. But, in reality, my default disposition is more Bridget Jones than the cottage-core aesthetic promoted by Instagram. My oversized pyjamas are drafty and approximately two glasses of wine into a film I find myself noting down self-improvement goals.

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy solitude. I have been in relationships where a day or evening to myself feels like the equivalent of a mini-break; no compromise, no expectations, no judgement for my choice of music, podcasts nor the trashy TV I’m occasionally partial to; bingeing a family bag of crisps instead of a meal and double-dipping to my heart’s content. But singledom isn’t just one heady continuation of Home Alone like some influencers would have you believe.

My longest relationship was around six years and it was largely happy – we built so many memories I smile about to this day. But, as with many relationships, it wasn’t to be. We ended in my early 30s, around the time an onslaught of weddings, baby showers, first birthday parties ensued among family and friend circles. Although it was the right decision, losing a best friend, someone who had known me like no one else, felt like a bereavement.

Psychotherapist and life coach Aimee Barnes talks about how singledom is not an identity and should not make us feel “less than” – a conviction I wholeheartedly share. There’s power in showing up alone and socialising without a “back-up” – but, admittedly, sometimes the feeling of never having a plus-one weighs heavy. I was recently at a friend’s 40th birthday party, heaving with couples and kids and, while I didn’t feel self-conscious attending by myself, leaving – no partner to give the private “let’s go” signal, no one to unpick the day’s events on the journey home – and arriving to an empty flat sent a twisting ache through my gut. When you’re always coming home to and waking up to silence, its accumulative roar rattles deep, like ghosts of futures that never were. The feeling can’t be banished through solo-picnics, journaling and people-watching alone – I know because I’ve tried.

I follow individuals and communities of women, either single, child-free or both, on social media, where managing loneliness and filling silence is a common thread. However, such posts fall prey to dismissive responses like “the grass is greener” – with those in a relationship unburdening the woes of being romantically tied. Another frustrating line is “you can be in a room full of people and still be lonely”, or even worse, the suggestion you’re lonely because you’re “not enough”. Then there’s the dreaded cliché: “Love yourself.”

All I want is to laugh along to a film with someone or hold hands around the park – an entirely valid feeling, which shouldn’t come with a side of shame.

If you’re in a relationship, trotting out tired clichés when your single friends are honest about feelings of loneliness or heart-aching absence is incredibly unhelpful. Instead, just listen. Don’t tell them to have a bath or compare your relationship irks – acknowledge their single-person ones, otherwise that kind of dismissal risks reinforcing the invisibility single people have long been trying to outrun.

Author and podcaster Shani Silver is among those calling out the weary “love yourself” rhetoric. In a TikTok video she points out that prioritising yourself and desiring a relationship can both be true at once. That you can live with intention, practice self-care yet still feel that infamous ache. Similarly, psychologist Fiona Murden calls the phrase an “oversimplified self-help slogan”. She doesn’t completely disregard the sentiment, but says “learning to love yourself” can lead people to become stuck in a search for “mythical inner peace”. She puts it best when she says “loving and being loved isn’t about having it figured out… but it’s still worth investing the time in learning to love yourself along the way”.

As my on-off dating life can attest, those of us on the apps are always doing the work. It takes a thick skin to become used to the ghosting, awkward dates and disappointment. And an even thicker layer to weather the raging sense of absence when so many dates become an investment only to be squandered weeks or months later, until they’re eventually filed under “character-building”. To accept it’s not personal, that some people are still figuring out what (or who) they want. It’s a disorientating and emotionally laborious experience but with each one comes a lesson and I learn something about myself – including knowing the kind of person I want to be with. Finding them, it seems, is just a small matter of patience.

Until then, I better dust off my notebook – and pour myself a large wine.

Os EUA já alertaram os bancos contra o negócio com empresas supostamente envolvidas no comércio de petróleo do Irã

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