Trump and the convention speech only he could give

Like a kaleidoscope that is constantly shifting, you see everything if you are a fan and nothing if you are a foe.  To say he did it his way, is an underestimate for the ages.  It’s better to say, he did it the only way he knows how, and perhaps the way no one else in the entire history of politics would’ve done.

Whether or not he prevails in November, and whether or not it was almost immediately wiped from the news when President Joe Biden abruptly withdrew from the race a few days later, former President Donald Trump’s epically expansive and equally meandering 93 minute long, third and final acceptance speech was one that only he could have delivered.  To say he did it his way, is an underestimate for the ages.  It’s better to say, he did it the only way he knows how, and perhaps the way no one else in the entire history of politics would’ve done, at times for the better and others for the worse.  The conventional wisdom holds that acceptance speeches should be soaring, scripted, and tight, moving purposely from point to point, segwaying intentionally between attacks on your opponent and your own policy positions.  Bizarrely, we tend to judge them on the quality of a speechwriter we know is not the candidate and how well the candidate reads what he or she hasn’t written from a teleprompter they aren’t operating, pretending that the entire thing isn’t simply theater and the candidate themselves isn’t really an actor in search of a role, a political Hamlet.  President Trump, however, has never fit neatly into that little box from the time of his initial announcement in June 2015 until now, preferring his own signature, what can only be described as avant-garde style of dancing around the script rather than reading it directly, part politician, part hyperbolic salesperson, part demagogue, part outside observer and storyteller, part stand up comedian and more, shifting effortlessly and instantly between all these modes and others, wherever the moment takes him like an actor in an improv troupe.  Who else, whether a politician or otherwise, would find a way to remark on how Hulk Hogan can “lift a 350 pound man over his shoulders and then bench press him two rows into the audience,” note the high inflation in the Weimar Republic before Hitler rose to power, tout his own convention as “the most organized, best run and most enthusiastic…that we’ve ever seen,” ponder how he compared to other speakers at that same convention and note that he can’t blow it, insist that a waitress gave him better advice on taxes than all the experts, more on that in a moment, and refer to Hannibal Lecter as “the late, great” in the middle of an aside about immigration in a single speech?  “It is an invasion indeed, and this administration does absolutely nothing to stop them.  They’re coming from prisons.  They’re coming from mental institutions and insane asylums.  You know the press is always on me because I say this.  Has anyone seen Silence of the Lambs?  The late, great Hannibal Lecter.  He’d love to have you over for dinner.  That’s insane asylums.  They’re emptying out their insane asylums.”

Rather incredibly, this only captured the smallest fraction of the whole. Perhaps the only thing he did that was expected, was opening with an unprecedented, emotional recounting of the assassination attempt at a campaign rally just five days earlier, insisting this was the one and only time he would tell it “because it’s actually too painful to tell.”  Even so, he started the story, rather typically, by bragging about his accomplishments and overall attitude right up until the moment the bullet grazed his year, describing how he was “speaking very strongly, powerfully, and happily because I was discussing the great job my administration did at the southern border.  We were very proud of it.  Behind me, and to the right was a large screen displaying a chart of border crossings under my leadership.  The numbers were absolutely amazing.  In order to see the chart, I started to, like this, turn to my right right and was ready to begin a little bit further turn, which I’m very lucky I didn’t, when I heard a loud whizzing sound and felt something hit me really, really hard on my right ear.  I said to myself, ‘Wow, what is that?’  It can only be a bullet and moving my right hand to my ear, brought it down.  My hand was covered with blood.  Just absolutely blood all over the place.  I immediately knew it was very serious, that we were under attack and in one movement proceeded to drop to the ground. Bullets were continuing to fly as very brave Secret Service agents rushed to the stage and they really did. They rushed to the stage.  These are great people at great risk, I will tell you, and pounced on top of me so that I would be protected.”  The former President also praised the bravery of the crowd itself, offering a unique take even after five days of constant coverage and opining.  “In almost all cases, as you probably know, and when even a single bullet is fired, just a single bullet, and we had many bullets that were being fired.  Crowds run for the exits or stampede, but not in this case.  It’s very unusual.  This massive crowd of tens of thousands of people stood by and didn’t move an inch.  In fact many of them bravely but automatically stood up looking for where the sniper would be.  They knew immediately it was a sniper.  And then began pointing at him.  You can see that if you look at the group behind me…Nobody ran and by not stampeding many lives were saved.”  In his retelling, it was the behavior of the crowd that prompted him to rise up, pump his fist, and cheer “fight” in that instantly timeless image, not any personal bravery or desire for glory on this part.  “When I rose surrounded by Secret Service, the crowd was confused because they thought I was dead.  And there was great, great sorrow.  I could see that on their faces as they looked out.  They didn’t know I was looking out.  They thought it was over.  But I could see it.  I wanted to do something to let them know I was okay.  I raised my right arm, looked at the thousands and thousands of people that were breathlessly waiting and started shouting ‘Fight!  Fight!  Fight!’”  At points, the former President seemed downright humbled by the traumatizing experience, eschewing his normal bravado to insist he was saved by divine providence and shouldn’t be standing before the convention in the first place.  “For the rest of my life,” he declared, “I will be grateful for the love shown by that giant audience of patriots that stood bravely on that fateful evening in Pennsylvania.”

President Trump is not often described as “human” in that hard-to-define sense of the word, but here was perhaps the most human anyone has ever seen him in public, and the general sense that he’d been humbled – at least a little, continued as the speech shifted into a more traditional campaign oriented mode.  “Despite such a heinous attack,” he began the change in direction, “we unite this evening more determined than ever.  I am more determined than ever and so are you, and so is everyone else…Our resolve is unbroken and our purpose is unchanged to deliver a government that serves the American people better than ever before.  Nothing will stop me in this vision because our vision is righteous and our cause is pure.  No matter what obstacle comes our way, we will not break, we will not bend, we will not back down.  And I will never stop fighting for you, your family, and our magnificent country.  And everything I have to give with all the energy and fight in my heart, and I so I pledge to our nation tonight.  Thank you very much, I pledge that to our nation, and to turn our nation around and we’re going to do it quickly.”  In that regard, quickly, rapidly, and fast were three key themes of the evening, to the point where President Trump promised accomplishments before he even returned to office next January including getting the hostages back from Hamas and potentially ending the war in Ukraine.  The more traditional convention speech continued for an altogether brief period, however, before he started changing direction in rapid fire, sometimes in a single sentence. “This election should be about the issues facing the country and how we make America successful, free, and great again.  In an age when our politics too often divide us, now is the time to remember that we are all fellow citizens.  We are one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. And we must not criminalize dissent in this country, which is what’s been happening on a level that nobody has seen before.  In that spirit, the Democrat Party should immediately stop weaponizing the justice system and labeling their opponent as an enemy of democracy.  Especially since that is not true.  In fact, I am the one saving democracy for the people of the country,” he added combining several distinct thoughts into a single paragraph.  From there, he thanked his wife, insisted her letter after the assassination attempt should be part of the Republican platform, “something really beautiful…it captivated so many,” mentioned his children, and then jumped right to UFC CEO, Dana White, who’d introduced him earlier in the evening.  “And how good was Dana?  Was Dana good?  Wasn’t he good?”  He proceeded to tell a lengthy story about how Mr. White was supposed to be on vacation, and he was only there because  his wife allowed him to fly in and fly out.  “And his wife, she said, ‘You can’t turn him down.  You just can’t do it.  You have to go.’ That’s a good wife.”  Kid Rock, who’d performed earlier, was up next, who also flew in and flew out and was bigger than Trump thought, then Lee Greenwood, then Hulk Hogan, then Eric Trump, Donald Trump, Jr., the subpoenas they received from Nancy Pelosi, which was followed by yet another aside about we “have to work on making America great again, not on beating people.”

This continued to Jason Aldean, followed finally by his newly minted running mate, JD Vance, wherein he even managed to sneak in a joke about his campaign slogan, Make America Great Again.  “He’s going to be a great Vice President.  He’s going to be great.  He’ll be with this country and with this movement, the greatest movement in the history of the country – Make America Great Again.  When they criticize it, they said ‘We’re gonna try and stop MAGA.’  I said, “MAGA is making America great again.  What are you gonna stop?  There’s nothing to stop.  Then they say, ‘Oh, that’s right.  It’s very tough to fight it.”  After thanking the people of Milwaukee for hosting him, and noting that the Republican National Committee spent $250 million in the city, “I am trying to buy your vote.  I’ll be honest about that,” the former President finally began talking about his vision, for at least a few sentences.  “I’m here tonight to lay out a vision for the whole nation.  To every citizen, whether you’re young or old, man or woman, Democrat, Republican, or Independent, black or white, Asian or Hispanic, I will extend to you a hand of loyalty and friendship.  Together, we will lead America to new heights of greatness like the world has never seen before.”  At this point, a regular politician would likely have continued to outline how they would bring that into fruition, but President Trump swerved yet again, this time offering his thoughts on the pandemic and his Administration’s response, among many other things.  “We were right there in the first term.  We go hit with COVID.  We did a great job.  Nobody knew what it was but nobody’s ever had seen an economy pre-COVID, and then we handed over a stock market that was substantially higher than just prior to COVID coming in, did a great job.  Never got credit for that.  We got credit for the war and defeating ISIS and so many things, the great economy, the biggest tax cuts ever, the biggest regulation cuts ever, the creation of Space Force, the rebuilding of our military.  We did so much.  We did so much.”  This, apparently, offered yet another opportunity to segway to healthcare.  “Right to try.  Right to try is a big deal.  We got right to try.  They were trying to get that for 52 years.  Somebody’s terminally ill and hopefully there’s nobody in this audience, but it does happen a lot.  They’re terminally ill and they can’t use our new space age drugs and other things that are way ahead.  We have the greatest doctors in the world, the greatest laboratories in the world, can’t do it.”

These remarks came approximately 30 minutes into the speech less, but when most politicians would be winding down, former President Trump was just getting started.  He continued to promise that America would be respected again and  law and order would return to our streets, though not before the country is rescued from “failed and incompetent leadership.  We have totally incompetent leadership.”  In this view, the incompetence of leadership has prompted an inflation crisis, immigration crisis, multiple world wars, potential conflict in Asia, so that our “planet is teetering on the edge of World War III.  And this will be a war like no other because of the weaponry.  The weapons are no longer army tanks going back and forth shooting at each other.  These weapons are obliteration.  It’s time for a change.  This administration can’t come close to solving the problems we’re dealing with.  Very tough, very fierce people; they’re fierce people.  And we don’t have fierce people.  We have people that are a lot less than fierce, except when it comes to cheating on elections and a couple of other things, then they’re fierce.  Then they are fierce.  So tonight I make this pledge to the great people of America, I will end the devastating inflation crisis immediately, bring down interest rates, and lower the cost of energy.  We will drill, baby drill.  Can you believe what they do?”  In terms of what a future President Trump himself would do, his plans were scattered across the speech like everything else, “We’ll end lots of different things” including “every single international crisis that the current administration has created.”  He talked about Russia, Ukraine, Democrat congressmen, Iran, oil, inflation, illegal aliens, their impact on the minority community, the labor force, his own humility, how awesome the convention was again, how much he loved it, the Speaker of the House, economic relief, mortgage rates, American energy, electric vehicles, offshore jobs, how other countries take advantage of us, NAFTA, its replacement, the China virus, and more.  So much, that perhaps it would be better to mention what he didn’t talk about, which was rather incredibly, his opponent at the time, President Joe Biden, whom he only mentioned once in the entire 93 minutes.  “If you took the ten worst Presidents in the history of the United States, think of it as the ten worst, added them up, they will not have done the damage that Biden has done, only going to use that term once.  Biden, I’m not going to use that term anymore.  Just one time.”

Amid it all, there was such a steady stream of at times disjointed ideas that it’s difficult to focus on any one thing, like a kaleidoscope that is constantly shifting, you see everything if you are a fan and nothing if you are a foe.  Perhaps my personal favorite was when he described how he came up with a key part of his tax plan while talking to a waitress in Las Vegas, which I alluded to earlier.  “At the center of our plan for economic relief are massive tax cuts for workers that include something else that stood out to be very popular actually.  Here, it’s very popular in this building and all those hotels that I saw that are so nice.  I’m staying in a nice one.  It’s called no tax on tips.  No tax on tips. I got that by having dinner recently in Nevada where we’re leading by 14 points.  Hello.  I’ll see you there very soon everybody.  We’re having dinner at a beautiful restaurant in the Trump building on the strip and it’s a great building, and the waitress comes over.  ‘How’s everything going?’  Really nice person.  ‘How’s everything?’  ‘Oh, it’s so tough.  The government’s after me all the time on tips, tips, tips.’  I said, ‘Well, they give you cash, would they be able to find it?’  She said, ‘Actually,’ I didn’t know that, but very little cash is given.  ‘It’s all put right on the check.  And they come in and they take so much of our money.  It’s just ridiculous and they don’t believe anything we say and they’ve just hired as you know, 88,000 agents to go after ‘em even more.  And I said, this shows the level of – most people out there hire consultants, they pay them millions of dollars.  But I said to her, ‘Let me just ask you a question.  Would you be happy if you had no tax on tips?’  She said, ‘What a great idea.”  I got my information from a very smart waitress.  That’s better than spending billions of dollars.”  Love him or hate him, we will never see his like again.  President Trump remains the sort of figure that comes along once in a century or longer.  His speech will not be remembered in the annals of convention history as a perfect piece of rhetoric, but that the fact that he delivered an entire 93 minutes in his own signature style five days after getting shot at, should be.  It was the speech that only he could give, and perhaps I should add, only he would give.  As President Trump put it when he finally wound down, “For too long our nation has settled for too little.  We settled for too little.  We’ve given everything to other nations, to other people.  You have been told to lower your expectations and to accept less for your families.  I am here tonight with the opposite message.  Your expectations are not big enough.  Not big enough.  It is time to start expecting and demanding the best leadership in the world.  Leadership that is bold, dynamic, relentless, and fearless.  We can do that.  We are Americans, ambition is our heritage, greatness is our birthright.  But as long as our energies are spent fighting each other, our destiny will remain out of reach and that’s not acceptable.  We must instead take that energy and use it to realize this country’s true potential and write our own thrilling chapter of the American story.”  With President Trump, of course, you rarely ever get too little.