I've been teaching public speaking, at introductory and advanced levels, for more than 30 years. In all of that time, I've always used the speeches of presidents of the United States to demonstrate how basic and more sophisticated principles of rhetoric operate in the "real" world. While my own personal politics lean closer to FDR, LBJ, and Barack Obama, I've never hesitated to pull from the rhetoric of Dwight Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan, or Bush 41 and 43 to demonstrate rhetorical techniques. You can find an excellent archive of historical and contemporary speeches of presidents and other public figures at
President Trump is the first White House occupant I cannot work into a public speaking course. The problem is not that I am so "woke" that I will not allow my students' innocent ears to be exposed to Trumpian rhetoric that is time and again divisive, demonstrably false, and dopey. Unfortunately, you can find those qualities in much of what passes for political rhetoric in the United States.
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| Politicians have engaged in trolling since the beginning of time. "Tempered" trolling invites debate and is consistent withe values of ethical public speaking. "Toxic" trolling is more akin to the social media norms of bitterness and division. |
The problem is that outside of his State of the Union addresses, in which the president hesitates like the Godfather's Frank Pentangeli being coerced into perjuring himself lest the mob knock off his brother, Mr. Trump does not really deliver anything that could in good conscience be called a "speech." For centuries, effective public speaking has been conceived of as a mindful, well-prepared attempt to deliver a clear message, tailored to particular audiences, in a situation that provides constraints the agile speaker attempts to overcome. Great public speaking is the opposite of narcissism: rather than fixate on self, the mindful speaker is forever cognizant of audience needs. Being cognizant of audience needs does NOT mean "telling them what they want to hear." That's demagoguery. Being cognizant of audience needs means, from the perspective of the speaker, "telling them WHAT I BELIEVE, with evidence to support it, in a language everyone can easily understand."
At his rallies, which since 2015 have been Mr. Trump's preferred vehicle for verbal communication, he typically stands at a podium and words come out of his mouth. That's pretty much all those presentations have in common with "public speaking" as I've defined it. Even at their worst, ALL prior presidents have respected the fact that their remarks must reach beyond merely stoking an uncritical base of supporters. For most prior presidents, reaching beyond the base happened even at campaign rallies in front of cheering supporters.
The point here is not that Donald Trump is an exceptionally bad public speaker; I wrote about that in 2016, referring to him as "the bad man speaking poorly." The point is that what Donald Trump does on the political stage is public speaking only in the most narrow, technical sense. More accurately, what he does is a form of Internet trolling done openly on stage for the world to see. It's an inflammatory effort to trigger or "own" his opponents in a manner equal parts vacuous and vicious.Think of it this way: If a quarterback constantly spits at the defensive linemen, repeatedly accuses his opponents of cheating with no evidence to back it up, blames all his mistakes on his team mates, doesn't attend practice sessions, and only recognizes the fans wearing his jersey, is he really playing football? Technically yes, but not in a manner we would teach Pop Warner league kids in the "how to play quarterback" training camp. And that's why it's extraordinarily difficult to work Mr. Trump into classroom instruction on "how to compose and deliver a public speech."
Which is not to say that there's not room for some form of trolling in political speech. I can explain what I mean by comparing President Obama's campaign speech in Osawatomie, Kansas on December 6, 2011 with President Trump's rally in Tulsa on June 20, 2020. Why compare these two events? Because when first-term presidents announce intentions to run for a second, shortly after the announcement they typically give an address designed to set the tone for the campaign season. The events in Osawatomie and Tulsa were designed to serve that purpose for Obama and Trump, respectively. What I will argue is that while both Obama's and Trump's remarks featured trolling, Obama's was a kind of "tempered" trolling that falls within the bounds of acceptable public speaking practices in that it was designed to highlight policy differences between the president and his opponents. Trump's trolling was of the "toxic" variety in which policy differences take a back seat to crude attacks and exploiting the personality cult surrounding the president.
Obama in Osawatomie: Tempered Trolling
Barack Obama assumed the presidency in 2009 at the height of the worst economic conditions since the 1930s. While his stimulus program did spark a recovery, Obama was lambasted on the right for going too far, and on the left for not going far enough. The roll out of the Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare") was sufficiently disastrous that the Republicans were able to take solid control of both houses of Congress in the November, 2010 midterm elections. With the Republican Congress making explicit vows to work against the Obama agenda, the president's reelection in 2012 was not at all guaranteed.
Further complicating Mr. Obama's reelection chances was the emergence of the Occupy Wall Street movement in September of 2011. Occupy's populist "We Are The 99 Percent" rhetoric and stinging critique of corporate America were not-so-subtle digs at the Administration's failure to hold Wall St. criminals fully accountable for corrupt practices that led the country into recession. Combined with Tea Party sniping on the right, the president was suddenly at risk of losing one of the major powers of the office: the ability to proactively SET the national agenda rather than defensively RESPOND to agendas set by others.
Seen in that context, the purpose of President Obama's Osawatomie speech was to define what should be the critical issue on which the 2012 election should turn, and thus once again take control of the national agenda. With a clear nod to the Occupy movement, Obama framed the campaign this way:
“There’s been a raging debate over the best way to restore growth and prosperity, restore balance, restore fairness . . . But, Osawatomie, this is not just another political debate. This is the defining issue of our time. This is a make-or-break moment for the middle class, and for all those who are fighting to get into the middle class. Because what's at stake is whether this will be a country where working people can earn enough to raise a family, build a modest savings, own a home, and secure their retirement.”
In his engaging memoir Confessions of a Presidential Speechwriter (Michigan State University Press, 2014), Craig R. Smith is guided by the Greek philosopher Aristotle's theory of rhetoric and argues that "a campaign speech is usually a mix of a deliberative agenda, a forensic condemnation of the sins of the opposition, and a ceremonial celebration of certain American values . . . " The "forensic condemnation of the sins of the opposition" can be thought of as a form of "trolling."
In the best presidential campaign rhetoric, trolling is "tempered." That is, it is not simply a series of cheap shots, straw man arguments, and red meat for the base. Rather, tempered trolling issues a challenge to real or perceived opponents. The troll forces the target to consider if the troll might actually be right. Harry Truman's 1948 Whistle Stop reelection tour, rooted in a stinging critique of the Republican "Do Nothing" Congress, was a classic case of tempered trolling. Truman challenged the Congress to defend its record on labor rights, farms, civil rights and other issues. The GOP leadership's inability to make the case led to "Give 'em Hell" Harry's stunning upset victory in November.
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| In 1948 Harry Truman was widely expected to lose the presidency to Republican Thomas Dewey. Truman's tempered trolling of the "Do Nothing" Republican Congress helped reinforce the president's populist image and propelled him to an upset victory. |
Obama's Osawatomie speech included some overt--but tempered--trolling:
*The fact that he chose Kansas as the location for the address, a mecca of Red State America, by itself was an act of trolling the Republicans.The New York Times coverage was headlined "Obama Strikes Populist Chord With Speech on G.O.P Turf."
*In many ways Obama's campaign pitch was an updated version of Teddy Roosevelt's "New Nationalism" speech delivered in Osawatomie on September 1, 1910. By identifying heavily with a Republican icon, Obama challenged the Republicans to demonstrate that they--more than he--were the rightful heirs to TR's economic policy legacy.
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| In his Osawatomie speech, Barack Obama practiced tempered trolling by channeling a Republican icon--Teddy Roosevelt--and suggesting that he (Obama) was a better heir to his populist legacy than the modern GOP. |
*Obama characterized the modern GOP as being in league with the same elements that opposed TR's reforms:
"Now, just as there was in Teddy Roosevelt’s time, there is a certain crowd in Washington who, for the last few decades, have said, let’s respond to this economic challenge with the same old tune. 'The market will take care of everything,' they tell us. If we just cut more regulations and cut more taxes -- especially for the wealthy -- our economy will grow stronger. Sure, they say, there will be winners and losers. But if the winners do really well, then jobs and prosperity will eventually trickle down to everybody else. And, they argue, even if prosperity doesn’t trickle down, well, that’s the price of liberty."
The fact that tempered trolling places pressure on opponents to defend their positions is significant. But even more significant is what tempered trolling does to the troll: it challenges him or her to "walk the talk." In staking out a populist position, Obama placed pressure on HIMSELF to have to deliver the goods should he get reelected. Indeed, the Osawatomie speech put Mr. Obama on record as supporting a range of policies for the economy not always enthusiastically endorsed by the corporate wing of his party. In taking such positions, he challenged the American public to ask if he was "up to the challenge" to deliver.
In short, any public speaking teacher regardless of political orientation could easily use President Obama's Osawatomie speech as an example of how real world speakers can advocate policy without having to resort to vile and empty attacks. Obama's "tempered trolling" put pressure on the Republicans to show why their brand of populism was more credible than the president's, and put pressure on Obama to demonstrate that he could deliver.
Trump in Tulsa: Toxic Trolling
Donald Trump is unique among the 45 presidents in a number of ways, including the fact that he has been holding campaign rallies continuously since shortly after his inauguration. In each one, he does pretty much the opposite of what a public speaking teacher would suggest:
What Speech Teachers Suggest
What President Trump Does
Prepare, Prepare, Prepare
vs.
Wing It
Adapt to multiple audiences
vs.
Speak only to narrow MAGA base
Treat your opponents fairly
vs.
Mock and ridicule opponents
Demonstrate goodwill to all
vs.
Demonize all who disagree
Get your facts straight
vs.
Introduce "alternative facts"
Organize ideas coherently
vs.
Scattered all over the map
You get the idea. When a speaker openly violates so many of the basic rules of public speaking, at some point you have to accept the fact that he's really not doing public speaking in any meaningful sense. What he is doing is the in-person equivalent of Twitter, with millions of characters espoused instead of just 280.
Twitter and other social media have become known as "safe" spaces for a particular brand of bitter, toxic trolling that often features heavy doses of bullshit, bluster, and bullying. The traditional public speech, if prepared and presented ethically, seeks to invite disagreement and hopes to resolve it through civil debate in the public sphere. Toxic trolling is not interested in any of that; it seeks only to "own" the ______________ (fill in the name of your favorite enemy) and "trend."
President Trump's June 20, 2020 rally in Tulsa was a classic example. As with most toxic trolling events, the build up to it was as important as the actual event. Cable pundit shows fixated for days on whether or not people would wear masks, if there would be a literal civil war outside the arena between Black Lives Matter and MAGA activists, and if the president's promise of a standing room only crowd would come to fruition. (As it turned out, the campaign itself was trolled by teen Tik Tok users, who successfully conned them into thinking there were a million requests for tickets. The actual event ended up being quite small by presidential rally standards.).
What to make of the president's actual remarks? Anyone hoping that it would define Mr. Trump's vision of what Campaign '20 should be about, as Obama did in Osawatomie, had to be disappointed. Instead it was a never ending stream of consciousness filled with personal grievances, bizarre formulations of the pandemic and the protests, and a cartoonish effort to frame establish Democrats and Mr. Moderate Joe Biden as "radical left" and anarchist sympathizers.
Mainstream media, still trying to judge the president's rallies as if they are sites of public speeches, of course concluded that it was a disaster. They don't understand that Mr. Trump is not trying to be judged by traditional public speaking standards. In fact there's a line in the Tulsa remarks, wherein he recounts a conversation with Melania after his speech at West Point, in which he shows that he grasps the purpose of toxic trolling:
"I call my wife, I said, 'How good was that speech?' I thought it was a … Hey look, I will tell you when I make good ones and bad ones. Like so far tonight, I’m average, but we’re having fun, we’re having fun. So far tonight, but I call my wife and I said, 'How good was it, darling?' She said, 'You’re trending number one.' I said to our great first lady, I said, 'Let me ask you a question. Was it that good of a speech that I’m trending number one? Because I felt it was really good.'"
"You're trending number one." THAT is what the critics of the president's style generally do not get, because they are using a standard for judgment rooted in a game that he is not playing.
Conclusion: Where Do We Go From Here?
In this rant I've shown how Barack Obama and Donald Trump, in participating in the tradition of incumbent presidents trying to set the tone for the reelection campaign season, both performed forms of trolling. Obama's "tempered trolling" was consistent with the principles of traditional public speaking, pressuring his GOP opponents to defend their brand of populism and pressuring Obama himself to be able to demonstrate that he could deliver on his promises. Trump's "toxic trolling" was not public speaking at all, and was more interested in triggering opponents and trending online as opposed to staking out policy positions to guide the campaign year agenda.
Given my background as an educator, I am concerned that President Trump's brand of toxicity is becoming normalized as a legitimate form of public address. I urge my colleagues in all teaching areas to resist the urge to normalize toxic trolling as public speaking, and to do so in a way that does not alienate students or others who might be sympathetic to some of the president's views. As I suggested at the start of this rant, a good way to do that is to use examples from presidents of both parties to demonstrate that your objection to President Trump's trolling is not partisan. For example, my students are sometimes shocked to hear that I consider George W. Bush's Second Inaugural Address to be one of the better ones of the last 50 years. While I disagreed with Mr. Bush on pretty much every public policy issue imaginable, and I think his two terms were terrible for the world, that particular speech articulated a humane vision of conservatism and America's place in the world not typically promoted on Fox News (or in Mr. Bush's actual policies, tragically).
At the same time, we need to make sure that citizens, young and old, are aware of the reality of and power of toxic trolling in our world. Mr. Trump's BS, bluster and bullying can sound "edgy" and "authentic" to people not familiar with the code he is operating in. As more people recognize and reject that code, they might begin to demand basic standards of decency in public discourse as a condition for getting their vote.
If you ever find yourself having to give a policy speech, here's my advice. Stay positive and try to avoid needless trolling. But if you have to troll, be more like Obama in Osawatomie than Trump in Tulsa. If you do the former you might not trend online, but you won't contribute to the debasement of our public discourse. Who knows, you might even provoke people who disagree to see things your way.
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