Let’s not kid ourselves. That was a super speech. Not flowery, except that in parts it was eloquent without being flowery. Not poetry, except that it was poetry. It was a blast from the heart of the heart of America. It was as if Mr. Trump did not even have to use words. His sincerity and power in touching what Americans want to hear was beyond prose.
The days of being pushed around — especially by the worst elements in our own country — are over. We’re proud to be Americans. We have nothing to be ashamed of, so we’re going to stop being ashamed.
The world is a dangerous place, so we’re going to rearm. There are people out there who want to hurt us badly. It’s Trump’s priority to keep them far away. The streets of America have roaming gangs of savage beasts. Trump will save the urban Americans by locking up the savage beasts.
The cops are our saviors here on earth. So we’re not going to lambaste them and shame them with nonsense about “systemic racism.” We’re behind them. Mr. Trump, with us standing with the men and women in blue, has got their backs. He’s not going to stab them in the back the way recent high officials have done: he’s going to protect their back and their front.
There’s a Civil War going on in the violent urban parts of America. Mr. Trump is going to win that war for the peaceable families by war to the knife against the gangs and the gangsters.
The military wife is the backbone of America. She will never be forgotten. She will always be cheered and loved. The President will not mock her for believing in God. He BELIEVES right along with her as all America weeps for her loss.
Pride and conviction that America is the greatest place on earth and in history. The sure and certain hope and belief that whatever problems we have, we can fix them.
In response to the back of the hand from the black “leaders,” an unwavering hand of friendship to the blacks. And a plan to bring them into the middle class with the only ladder that works — education by choice, not by union diktat.
Yes, there were parts that were wrong. Mr. Trump’s stand on trade is dead wrong. We need free trade. His stance on immigration from this hemisphere is wrong. We need those workers desperately. But his urgent promise not to let the migrants come here for a drugging and raping holiday is absolutely right.
No apologies. No quavering before the snobs of McLean and Georgetown. Light up America first and then that light lights up the whole world. Light up the world with the prayers and uplifted, pained countenance of a Navy widow, and soon the world glows with hope.
I have been a speechwriter since I was 18. First for Senator Joe Tydings (D-Md.) and then for Mr. Nixon and Mr. Ford and for decades for myself. I listen to all speeches carefully and with an ear to their music. Sometimes, as with Jimmy Carter, there was a dull thud. Recently, there was the wild self-mockery of Mr. Obama talking to whites like a Cambridge, Mass. Don, and a few hours later to black people in Philadelphia as if he were raised with hands bleeding from picking cotton in the Mississippi Delta.
Tonight’s was an early Mozart symphony —far better than we could have expected, hitting every right note, and with the promise of still greater to come. This man is a fast learner. And as my pal, John Coyne, an ace speechwriter himself, said to me recently, “His heart is in the right place.” He’s off and running.
