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I have watched 3 generations of my family age into their mid - 80's to mid-90's (great-grandmother and great-aunt, 4 grandparents, my mother (just died at 94) and her various siblings and my dad's sibs. In addition, I have spent the last 6 years making weekly visits to my Mom's assisted living facility and then to her nursing home. By "visits" I do not refer to a 1/2 hour, here's-some-flowers-nice-to-see-you-the grandkids-say-hi. I would stay with her for several days at a time in her assisted living apt. and spend whole days at her nursing home. I would eat 3 meals a day in the dining room with her and other residents, accompany her to the little beauty salon, the bingo games, the various entertainments, the physical therapy department, etc. Most of the residents were at least a decade younger than her - from early 70's on up. I am sorry to tell you that of the 100 or so whom I knew by sight/name, there were only 2 whose mental facilities were not noticeably diminished. Most of them could have stayed in their own homes were it not for their diminished mental capacity. Our brains age along with the rest of our bodies - no getting around it.
That said, I believe the diagnosis of Alzheimer's is overused. I came across one social worker who had taken one course in geriatric care, and had the gall to design her very own diagnostic test for Alzheimer's. She approached my Mom in a very patronizing way, which offended my Mom. After a few bizarre questions like, "Did you like blueberries when you were a little girl?" my Mom just started answering every question with an abrupt "No!" Despite the fact that my Mom could still play the piano, win at gin rummy and tell jokes, the social worker diagnosed her with a "9" on her handy-dandy Alzheimer's test. ("10" being brain dead!) I'd been an NIMH research fellow decades ago, and have a master's in applied sociology, which involved developing, testing and administering tests and surveys. Luckily I was there when the social worker "tested" my Mom. I complained to the director of the facility. Turned out a few other people complained also, and the social worker was fired.
Now my Mom had no idea of the current political situation and had a severe short term memory problem. I considered it slowly progressive senility. I agree with my doctor who told me that Alzheimer's is a subclass of senility.
Re: John McCain - doubtless he can still tell jokes and win at gin rummy. But his repeated errors and inability to learn from them such as which countries no longer exist, the way he is increasingly isolating himself from interaction with the press (for fear of screwing up his answers to their questions), his reversals on long-held policy positions - all of these are indicative to me of a man whose mind is losing its grip. Another thing I noticed when dealing with dozens and dozens of elderly people was that people who were nasty and had bad tempers got progressively nastier and more short tempered as they aged. Ronald Regan was an easy going, good-tempered man. His wife and aides were able to guide him through scripted cabinet meetings, scripted public speaking, and generally control him. McCain is a completely different proposition. Imagine Cindy trying to control him and him exploding with more of his expletives. Imagine him taking a swing at another foreign leader, like he did at a fellow Senator. The man is a timebomb.
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