I will say this for the Donald — if you are teed up to believe the things he says, then when he is talking off-script he's an incredible salesman.
But give him a script, put a teleprompter in front of him, force him to stick to the message, and he sounds like your great-grandfather on Prozac.
Despite the low affect and wooden delivery (except when relishing the Immigrant Crime Porn section of his speech), what was actually more more remarkable was the endless array of inaccurate, misleading, deceptive, inappropriate, and downright deceitful statistics and assertions of fact that the Donald peppered his 10 minutes of public address fame with.
From his laughable statement that he's deeply concerned over the migrant children crossing the border, to his ignoring his own DEA's confirmation about where heroin enters the country (hint: it's not in the middle of the desert), to his assumption that the only way to address this "crisis" is by shutting down the US government until the Dems are willing to build is Beautiful Wall … the attached fact-checking annotations to the speech by the WaPo are woefully inadequate in questioning almost every factoid Donald put forward.
He was wise enough to avoid a number of previous statements that have had holes shot through them, e.g., his assertions that previous presidents had told him that they should have built a wall, or his suggestion that tens of thousands of terrorists had been caught crossing the Mexico border. But he still made some dubious assertions (that we have no room for migrants, or that the jobs they take are jobs that American minorities are dying to have), or that the Dems haven't supported any sort of border protections (let alone that he's actually spent every penny that's already been allocated to border protection, vs. less than the actual figure of 10%).
To be fair, Schumer and Pelosi were so wooden and low-key in their rebuttal as to make Donald almost look animated in comparison. But they were at least 75% less fact-checkable than he was — which should make a difference (even if it won't).
Donald didn't actually say anything new tonight. But I suspect a lot of the people watching his speech haven't actually been following along the news on all of this (or, among his true fans, they've only been getting his statements through the Fox News filter). To that extent, I don't think this speech will dramatically change the debate or negotiations between the White House and the Dems — but it will create some rallying points for Donald's base, which was really the point of the exercise.
Prozac is an anti-depressant. It actually makes people more animated and lively.
"But I suspect a lot of the people watching his speech haven't actually been following along the news on all of this (or, among his true fans, they've only been getting his statements through the Fox News filter)."
Really, this is two separate categories. The people watching Fox News (or other opinion-centric media sources) are at least engaged. You and I are probably missing it, but I bet a huge segment of the population might not even realize that the government is shut down, or may only know little bits and pieces of it (hey, Joshua Tree National Park is closed – why is that?).
These people may have learned something new from the dueling speeches – if they happened to be listening to one of the few TV channels that carried them live. People watching ESPN or Food Network, or people streaming on Netflix, may not even know that there were speeches last night.
Here are Twitter's trends for Los Angeles. The "FEMA" trend is not shutdown-related, although it is Trump-related.
https://plus.google.com/photos/…
For what it's worth (or for reference when your crazy uncle starts quoting Donald), here's AP's fact check on the speech.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/ap-fact-check-donald-trump-and-the-u-s-mexico-border
And here's Factcheck's fact check …
https://www.factcheck.org/2019/01/factchecking-trumps-immigration-address/
Aaaand some criticism for the fact checking of both the AP and the NYT …
https://www.vox.com/2019/1/9/18175186/trump-oval-office-speech-fact-check-failures
In such moments he's always sounded to me like the D student who is struggling to read the essay his smarter sister wrote for him. Flubbing the syntax, mispronouncing words .. attention always on the verge of wandering.
+Stephen Waterhouse Scripts are obviously not his strength. He certainly has a talent for speaking off-the-cuff, and (for a certain segment of the population) communicates very effectively when doing so. For the most part (except when testifying in court) this works for a luxury real estate developer or a football team owner. And even when he had to go to scripted material on his TV show, the scripts were short ("You're fired") and were pre-taped.
Now, a 70 year old man is being told by everyone around him, "Uh…sir…this is a different ballgame here. There are certain times when you need to speak with precision, and if you don't, the world economy will collapse or nuclear bombs will rain on Mar-a-Lago."
For the most part he ignores his forrest of advisers, but occasionally they prevail and he has to speak from a script. He hasn't done it a lot, and he hates having to do it, so it's no wonder that his performance is substandard.
Pelosi and Schumer, however, have no excuse. They've both been at the top of the Congressional heap for a while now, and they are both experienced in making precise statements. So why did they fail to focus on the visuals of their rebuttal? (I can't upload the photo, but I have an excellent American Gothic/Pelosi & Schumer mashup. There are undoubtedly others.)
+John E. Bredehoft I heard all the Madame Tussauds quips on progressive radio today – no doubt just like you – and I am aware that in 2007 these wax figures voted for the Wall before they took a stand against it (Trump's Bollard Wall, that is, and that a muscular Salvadorean with a good hacksaw could cut a standard door-sized hole in in 10 minutes) but I really don't care .. coz at least they got common sense on their side.
+John E. Bredehoft ' And even when he had to go to scripted material on his TV show, the scripts were short ("You're fired") and were pre-taped.'
There was recent feedback from some Apprentice production folk that it wasn't even that good — that they struggled mightily in post-edit to make Trump sound coherent, and, sometimes, when he made a nonsensical judgment as to whom to fire, to edit the program to make that otherwise fine contestant look just justifiably fireable.
Granted, it's long after the fact, so take that rumor-mongering for what it's worthy.
+Dave Hill To be fair and balanced, all reality shows edit their programs to make people look wonderful or terrible, to fit in with the storyline.
Of course, most reality shows are more concerned with editing the contestants than they are with editing the host.