Grade Trump's Speech

[Torrain]

[No War, but the War on Christmas]

[No War, but the War on Christmas]

Even removing all partisan bias, I think I can confidently say Stacey Abrams impassioned response blew him out of the water.

Trumps speech was not genuine, droning, went on and on and didn’t address a single major issue effecting Americans. Disgraceful.

[Ye We Can]

C+. I liked it, but Id care more if he meant any of it.

[Bismarck]

A-. I mean sure there was the usual Trumpiness but he got the freedom caucus and the women in white to cheer and chant USA together. As sad as it is i think that’s a good short moment of our country. He also laid out several policy positions that democrats should have no trouble finding common ground with. Paid family leave, more AIDS funding, infrastructure. Interesting how half of the “F” voters didn’t watch the speech. You’re allowed to be objective. Everybody knows you don’t like Trump. I don’t much either.

[Cold War Liberal]

[Gustaf]

I don't Think I'll have the energy to listen to it, but I read the transcript and it seemed fairly decent by Trump standards. I can't Believe he'd be able to make it sound genuine though.

[Modernity has failed us]

BIG MOOD

[History505]

B.

It was a triangulating-type speech. A Clinton 1995-ish type speech.

However, he is still unpopular.

Clinton type speech in length lol.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Am I the only one who thought this was one of Trump’s better speeches?  Obviously, it had both awful and rambling parts, but you’ll always have that with Trump.  He is terrible at trying to act reasonable or Presidential, you can tell how much he hates it and it’s just so clearly not him.  That was on full display last night.  However, he had one or two moments where he actually came across as remotely likable (specifically, the “don’t sit down yet, you’re really gonna like this” line when the congresswomen in white were applauding).  

Granted, such brief moments were few and far between, but the only other moment where Trump has had a remotely likable moment was when Huckabee said “I never took any money from you” during one of the debates and Trump replied “That’s because I never needed you for anything.  You’re not important enough,” or words to that effect.  Maybe it was Rand Paul rather than Huckabee, I forget.  

Trump is an exceptionally uncharismatic individual (like Gingerich in debates, he’s a mess whenever he’s not in front of a mindlessly cheering crowd of supporters) who oozes unlikabilty out of every pour whenever he does anything, so I’d argue Trump had a good night if he gave speech where he had two or three brief moments of actual likability before quickly reverting back to the loathsome, egomaniacal, scatter-brained, selfish, bigoted con-artist America has been suffering since Trump announced he was running for President.  That said, I am very much not the target audience for his schtick, so this post should probably be taken with a grain of salt.

[Koharu]

He spoke well enough to get a passing grade. Other than that, it was nothing inspiring and certainly not any major rhetorical feat. D.

[SInNYC]

On the Trump curve, its an A.

Compared to normal people, I was ready to give him a B- (boring, long, lots of platitudes, not inspiring or particularly memorable, but stayed on message and said nothing fundamentally nutsoid either). However, his 'if you investigate me, I wont work with you' threat pulls it down a lot to a D. He could have just said 'stop the witchhunt, and work with me on policies to help America' instead.

[here2view]

Watched it all. If he was a normal, sane person I'd give him a D-.

Since it's Trump and you have to grade accordingly, I'd give him a C-. He started off strong but quickly delved into immigration and it started sounding like a rally speech almost.

[DINGO Joe]

He didn't mention coal once.  F--

[JGibson]

Didn't watch it but voted F.

Me too.

Abrams' response: A+.

[ProudModerate2]

I like how someone actually voted and gave trump an F+

[Santander]

13/88

[RINO Tom]

C+. I liked it, but Id care more if he meant any of it.

[Koharu]

I'm still really surprised by folks giving anything more than a C. Even setting policy and "alternate facts" aside, it's not anything moving or particularly well-written (or read). Most state of the union addresses by most presidents would be in the C- to B- range.

If you truly want to hear an A+ speech, give these a listen:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCXUbQ4JjXI&feature=youtu.be&t=212
https://youtu.be/vP4iY1TtS3s
https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/ronaldreaganbrandenburggate.htm
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5057/

SOTU addresses don't rise to this level, and while Trump sounded composed and gave a coherent speech, that doesn't mean it deserves anything more than a passing grade.

[Progressive Pessimist]

I ended up watching some of it towards the end, hoping to catch Abrams' speech, but that wouldn't be for another half frigging hour. But from what I've gathered about it, I give him a D-. On the Trump curve, that's some massive credit there, from his usual F grade speeches.

I am only giving him that credit because he was more positive than usual...but again, that's not saying much. His conciliatory moments ended up significantly contrasting with his usual Trumpian fear-mongering, misleading, gas-lighting, outright lying, and probably most significantly contradicting himself. Apparently we need a border wall because our border cities are apocalyptic dystopian hellholes, yet El Paso is one of the safest cities in the country because it already has a wall? So then, why do we need a wall across the entire border if parts of it already have them and aren't so unsafe after all? I would also be curious if El Paso is a sanctuary city or not, because that undermines his entire agenda on immigration if it is. Furthermore, he did mention some important issues that should be addressed and have some bipartisan appeal like reducing prescription drug prices, infrastructure...and I guess that was it. But even then, it's out of character to think that he will follow up on that, and he still seems to be prioritizing those less than his ridiculous wall! It's also impossible to take his calls for rejecting "retributive and revenge-driven politics" when he fear-mongers about Socialism in our own country (talking more about that than the situation of Venezuela), exaggerates the extremity of the New York and Virginia abortion bills, continues to misunderstand and distort immigration issues, and declares the legitimate investigations into him as "partisan." He has no credibility, and probably never will. This speech was still typical Trump.

Also, his delivery was ass. I should have felt a little choked up when he told the story of that Holocaust survivor, but he narrated that story horribly. It just felt uncomfortable to see this man's story get butchered like that. He cannot read competently to save his life. I've heard kindergartners sound less choppy and awkward reading 'The Cat In the Hat.' And it as even more awkward when he goaded the entire chamber (sort of) into singing "Happy Birthday.' The "U-S-A" chanting from the Republican side was also pretty obnoxious and they applauded for some shocking things like "making peace with the Taliban," as referenced in another thread.

Stacey Abrams however, performed excellently. Her speech was personal, smart, succinct, and effective at addressing the issues that actually, or should actually matter while also not coming off as too confrontational but also still drawing a clear distinction with Trump's "vision" for the country. She delivered it with gusto and there wasn't a singly distracting or meme-worthy moment. It was probably the best rebuttal...maybe ever, definitely in the internet age. Though that also means that her speech will probably be forgotten about, but maybe that's an objective indication of how good it was that we won't be talking about her drinking water or staring at the camera, or anything like that. She really is talented, it's such a shame that Georgia looks to be such a non-starter for her. Either way, she would be the best bet against Perdue in 2020. She has a future, I just don't now when it will finally come to her.

Overall though, whatever goodwill Trump cultivated from this speech is also sure to be forgotten about when he leads the country into another shutdown or starts hate-tweeting again. Every day is like 'Groundhog Day' with Trump and I would rather trade places with Bill Murray due to it.

[MATTROSE94]

B-. The comments about investigations, late-term abortion, immigration, and socialism were laughable. But there were a lot of really memorable moments. In fact, it was largely conciliatory to some leftist causes like prison reform and ending wars.

But yeah, he still sucks.