It was a great concession speech. I was impressed, and I don’t really like the guy that much.
This is out of line and I would hope that it gets deleted by a mod. Next time I would suggest that you DO resist. With all the parisan stuff going around, this ranks up there with the comment by Tampa.
[Edited by Gaudere on 12-14-2000 at 09:01 AM]
Um. This was in Texas right? You don’t honestly believe that there are any real democrats in Texas do you? In Texas they call their center-conservatives Democrats and their right-conservatives Rebublican. When they see a real Democrat they call a lynch mob. 
tj
Out of line, and possibly illegal (and certainly childish). And, i was freedoms “nemesis” during the elections.
[Edited by Gaudere on 12-14-2000 at 09:03 AM]
Good to see ya, tj, (even if you do speak out against Apple, I love ya anyway [sub]and your’e right about the business problems, but the poot itself rocks. For now. I fear X[/sub])
Anyway, as far as bush reaching out by having a democrat introduce him, I think it can just as easily be read as a way of showing dominance, knwowhatimean?
stoid
Speaking of concession speeches, I still remember Dan Quayle’s concession speech [sub](has it really been eight years?)[/sub]. After years of saying stupid things in public, at the last he had one of the most gracious concession speeches I’d heard in a long time.
I didn’t see either Gore’s or Bush’s speeches (as they began at 2am here), but I’m sure they’ll be shown over and over on the news today). At last, something to look forward to in the election coverage.
And thanks to Freedom2 for such a gracious thread as well.
jr8
Hey, wait a second, I thought that was my role! 
Of course, it’s possible that Stoidela might also deserve the honor…
Seriously, Freedom2, for a conservative, you ain’t half bad. Stick around, guy - the election may be over, but there’s always something for us to bash each other over! 
Very big OP, Freedom2; not in volume but in content.
Since most know how I feel about Gore, I’ll just leave it that I wasn’t surprised in the least by the class he showed. Nor was I totally surprised by Bush’s conciliatory comments. I thought it was quite clever, both as a “coalition building” prelude and as a public image builder, for Bush to emphasize the points of consensus he and Gore had during the campaign.
Both men said the right things last night. Let’s all hope George W. Bush continues in that vein.
Re the Gore speech: great speech.
Re PowerpuffKue’s comment on Bush: completely out of taste, childish, obnoxious, worthy of being banished from SDMB either by the mods or by members.
:Note to self: add this creep’s name to short list of idiots to ignore:
Gore showed a lot of class in his speech. I’ll reiterate that had he been himself more in the campaign, and listened to his advisors less, he would probably be President today. On CNBC’s special about the election they interviewed the guy on SNL who imitates Gore. And he said that Gore’s team would actually play the skits for Al Gore during the campaign and advise him how to improve his image with the American people.
They failed to realize, I guess, that people hate a phony worse than they hate a robot.
I would like to publicly apologize a second time to Freedom in this thread. I withdraw my remarks to you in your ”Will Gore concede with class” thread because I did not see you had started this thread. My sincerest apologies – you were quite gracious in your remarks.
(Then again, it’s easy to be gracious when you won. )
Esprix
I emphatically voted for Gore, so I’m biased, but I think that may have been the best speech I heard in the admittedly short 12 years I’ve been paying attention to politics. Clinton’s 2000 DNC speech is a close second.
Chris Matthews on MSNBC, who’s normally tough as nails, looked like he was about to cry and admitted he could have never written a speech that good when he was a Carter speechwriter.
Some have compared it to the Gettysburg Address, which I think is a bit much. But in an era when political speeches are so bland, this one shines.
I only wish he could have talked that sincerely when campaigning, but he’s set himself up well for 2004. And after tonight, it’s gonna take a lot for him to lose my vote.
Thanks, Al. I knew you were a leader in there somewhere.
Yikes, I must have too long a memory…
As a Democrat, you need to listen sometime to Ted Kennedy’s concession at the 1980 Democratic Nominating Convention. There is NO politician in the current era who has the ability to speak like that any more, at least none who gains real attention. Too many Ronald Reagan wannabes any more. (Sigh, nostalgia for the old lectern thumping style)
As for Mr. Gore’s speech, it was nice to see him be relatively gracious, and one hopes it means he isn’t going to take the Andrew Jackson approach, but, rather, the Sam Tilden approach to this election result. But I am sorry, I still think he simply can’t do a good job of the being a regular guy routine; his humor is always stiff and sounds out of place, as it did last night.
But he did concede, and he didn’t make it sound partisan, and that was really good for the nation. NOT that it means that there will be cooled tempers…
Ted Kennedy’s speech at the 1980 convention was no more gracious than his launching a primary campaign against an incumbent President of his own party. The damage he caused had to contribute to Carter’s loss and Reagan’s election.
All Kennedy talked about was himself and his misty visions, with thanks to his supporters, but with no reference at all to Carter and certainly no call to support his own party’s incumbent candidate. It was nicely phrased and smoothly delivered, I’ll grant that, but I believe substance matters more than style.
:eyeroll:
Where did I say that Ted Kennedy’s speech was gracious?
Why is a ‘gracious’ speech a ‘good’ speech?
Ted Kennedy’s speech was about the whole concept of being a liberal Democrat, the philosophies that were embodied by the party of FDR and carried forward by the party of Kennedy and Johnson. It harkened back to the concepts first brought into the party by Andrew Jackson; a party that represented individual people, common people, people who would otherwise be left out of the process, as opposed to parties (Whig, Republican, etc.) that prefer to let the common person benefit from policies that have a smaller section of the populace in mind. And it did so in a very grand fashion, with well written phraseology, excellent delivery, and good old-fashioned political appeal.
I’m not passing judgment on WHAT he did or said, only on the quality of the speech, as a speech. :eyeroll:
Okay, am I missing something? Is there a copy of Gore’s speech someone could link me to? I (a Gore supporter) was thouroughly unimpressed with it. I thought it was forced and extremely stiff (even for Gore, and considering the situation). I just don’t see the “Greatest speech ever” that everyone else does.
Could someone give me a specific rundown as to why people feel this way?
here’s a link to both:
DSYoung, do you happen to have a link to Kennedy’s speech?
Esprix
You’re really saying that what someone says doesn’t matter compared to how eloquently they say it? And you’re serious enough about that to roll your eyes when anyone suggests that substance really does matter? I certainly hope I’m missing something.
“Why is a ‘gracious’ speech a ‘good’ speech?” ???
Does that question really need an answer?
Esprix I’d recommend Mario Cuomo’s keynote address at the 1988 Democratic convention as a superior example, without the undertones of defiance and self-importance that I thought underlaid Kennedy’s in 1980.