Obama didn’t see it that way, he figured that if he went balls to the wall for the public option, etc., he would have totally lost. All of it. We would be precisely where we were a year ago. I voted for him to make those decisions, at least in part because he’s smarter than me. I think he’s most likely smarter than you as well, but you are welcome to your own opinion.
The “A Time For Choosing” speech from 1964 is well remembered. His address on the shooting down of KAL 007 is well remembered. So are his speeches from the Challenger explosion and the 40th anniversary of D-Day.
The “Evil Empire” speech is also memorable, as is his Berlin speech that you mentioned. Even if you disagreed with these speeches, they were impactful. And I didn’t mention inaugural addresses or State of the Union addresses here.
The one I remember best is when he said that, yes, Iran-Contra happened, all the evidence says so, but he didn’t remember it that way, so he guessed he was sorta kinda guilty, in a way. The main reason I remember it so well is that nobody else seems to. He stood there, he said it, and nobody noticed. I guess the liberal media conspiracy took a day off, huh?
Hey, mistakes were made… Wha’d’ya want, fer cryin’ out loud?
If you made this post to be humorous, in that you are fully aware that a teleprompter is standard equipment for politician’s speeches, and has been for many political cycles, and also with the knowledge that (compared with his predecessors), Obama is actually pretty good at speaking extemporaneously, then… Bravo sir! Hahaha!
On the other hand, if you were actually trying to be serious, then you are dumber than half a sack of hammers. I mean, really seriously fucking dumb. In which case, I’m sorry for using the word “extemporaneously” because it probably made your parietal lobe bleed.
Not that I disagree with your objection in principle, Euphonious P, but while Magiver’s opinion may be a mark of skewed perception, I take exception to your insult about his relative level of smarts. I think it’s neither accurate nor appropriate for the forum.
BTW IMHO YMMV, but you can be clever and off-base just the same as you can be “stopped clock” correct about something by accident. (Probably easier to be smart and very wrong than the reverse, actually.)
On behalf of the brilliant, I offer that this is a common misperception amongst our dull/normal brethren. More in sorrow than in anger, as it would be surly and mean-spirited to deny you this scrap of comfort.
Yes, Reagan was absolutely a good speaker. You’ll get no argument out of me on that.
You understand ‘luc’, I don’t deny it’s easiest of all to be box o’ rocks brainless and wrong about everything. But if smart always equalled “right” then we wouldn’t have tactical nukes, derivatives trading on subprime mortgage backed securities or American League baseball.
Actually, as a WRITER of good speeches, he is above par, writing quite a lot of his own. I’m still waiting for an example of the right-wing “teleprompter meme”…the few times I’ve seen him stumble a bit, as we all do from time to time when speaking, he recovered very nicely, often in his own words.
As opposed to say, Palin with her crib notes or Reagan’s famous flub on live T.V. when HIS teleprompter went off in the middle of an impassioned speech on the Nicaraguan “freedom fighters” and he just blanked for several seconds, completely losing his train of thought and apparently having NO IDEA what he’d JUST been saying with such sincere emotion…scary shit, as if he was a fucking robot (or actor:p). Of course, in all likleyhood he was already in the early stages of Alzheimers.
But come ON, enough with that tired old attack already…every president since the INVENTION of the teleprompter has USED one. Some seem to rely on them more than others. Obama is, by most objective acounts, one of the better speakers to hold the office. Seems silly to keep trying to perpetuate this slander when it essentially says nothing about his worth as a president. :dubious:
nvm
I find it interesting that so many are content to let the progression to the right continue. How many people on this forum grew up in poverty or are currentlyin poverty? So many these days seem to be worried about losing what they have. They seem nervously content to watch a slow drip of erosion. There comes a point at which people need to make a stand. It’s certainly not going to come from middle class America. I doubt it will come at all.
Is it truly that people are so much worried that he would fail if Obama had tried harder or is the middle class more worried that he would have succeeded? There seems to be a fear and anxiety that goes beyond mere power politics.
No, actually, it isn’t. And I speak as one who has actually troubled to read a real doorstopper about the Goldwater campaign.
Thefirst random video I grabbed shows him stammering through the whole thing.
It has nothing to do with “right wing” or “left wing”. He is not good on his feet. He’s great when he’s reading from a script. He uses a teleprompter well.
I would guess that he studied Reagan’s style as he mirrors him closely.
According to much of the polling I’ve seen on this issue, it appears that a strong majority of Americans favor Universal, single payer health care, so I don’t see much support for your theory.
Polls which ask about the legislation as written/passed reflect both the oppositition of those who reject ANY government role in health care AND the disaproval of those who wanted reforms to go further than they did, and so tend to show a much more evenly divided split. But it’s not really a split between those who want to keep the status quo and those who want government to take the lead in health care…it is a split between those who consider the current reforms worth keeping and those who reject them as either completely worthless or consider them a poor compromise.
Interesting. I look at that video and I see a politician considering a series of related questions fairly and giving thoughtful and very complete replies. Yeah, he fills in some pauses with some ahs and ums. That’s what happens when you’re not giving canned responses.
#25 in the list of Top 100 American Speeches, as compiled by AmericanRhetoric.com.. Pops right up in the Google Books search of the book you mentioned.
Just because you don’t remember it doesn’t mean it isn’t remembered.
That you like the content is irrelevant to his ability to speak. He stammers when he talks. So did Reagan. Deal with it.
You consider THAT “stammering”? THAT is your example? He never loses his train of thought, and delivers an articulate message throughout, responding to questions “on his feet” deftly and articulating his views clearly (W/O any teleprompting).
His manner of thoughtfully pausing for a second or two, often interjecting an “uh” or a “ah” is hardly “stammering”…it is a natural mode of speech many of us use, taking those brief moments to clearly formulate the words we are about to speak.
I suggest that if you see this clip as an example of Obama’s failings as a speaker, it DOES have something to do with partisan/ideological bias.
P.S. THIS is “stammering” (mental and otherwise):
Thank you. It has been a long time since I considered the significance and gravity of Nixon’s “Checkers” speech (#6). Had it not been for you, it might have been much longer.