By the way, if you watch the video of Reagan's testimony, it is pretty easy to see that an encounter with alzhiemers symptoms makes people feel uncomfortable. No one wants to hurt Reagan, or make him look stupid... and so there is this elaborate dance that takes place where the matters at hand are presented in a way that the person can respond.... "do you agree that...." etc.
Also, if you look at the early tapes of the proceeding, you will see an entirely different President Reagan... who spoke clearly, confidently, etc. One Of the characteristics of Alzheimers that I noticed with my dad is the person has limited reserves of intellectual energy.... If I caught him when he was rested and fresh, he seemed fairly well. But if I caught him after some period of stress, then he was more like the Reagan in the video I linked to
Also, a characteristic of Alzheimers is an reduced to deal with detail.... Again you see this with Reagan..... he was comfortable with general concepts, but had a very difficult time with the details.
As Issodhos pointed out, Pres. Reagan did not have clinical Alzheimers while he was president. But I think there is pretty strong evidence that he was to some degree compromised.
