President Donald J. Trump gave his State of the Union speech this week, and it was the longest one in American history, time wise. It wasn’t always this way. George Washington averaged just 2,080 words in his eight speeches and John Adams only 1,790 spoken words.
Andrew Jackson bumped it up to 10,645 words and James K Polk hit 18,014. But these were all written only, not delivered as a speech. It dropped to 6,838 with Abraham Lincoln, the master of brevity.
William Howard Taft was the first to top 22,000 but his successor Woodrow Wilson revived the speech form with texts averaging just 4,545 words. Franklin D. Roosevelt dropped it to 3,563 and he spoke 12 times. Things stayed manageable until Bill Clinton, who spoke, on average, 7,426 words. Obama was at 6,824 and Biben bumped it up to 8,333. Now Trump, in second term, has doubled his take from his first term, from 5,690 words to 10,599 this past Tuesday evening. It took him one hour and 47 minutes, partly because there were so many interruptions for applause and several presentations of medals and such.
I did not watch the spoken version of this speech, not live, not later. But I did read the speech, which is the best way to go. What it took Trump almost two hours to say, I read in 10 minutes or less.
Even that ten minutes was a waste of time. It was so full of lies, self-congratulations, and outright buffoonery. Attendees who endured to the end are deserving of one of the medals he distributed, a Purple Heart or a Congressional Medal of Honor. I would support the creation of a new award, a Trump Titanium Tie Clasp featuring an image of, yes, Trump Himself, that can be worn all the times, with a digital recording of the speech embedded so an awardee (and that is anybody who preserved to the end) can listen to the speech frequently and often and even all the time.
Even at one hundred seven minutes of voice time, it was not long enough. A great deal was left out, as I am sure many noted. Ukraine and its war of survival was omitted, no doubt out of respect to Trump’s buddy, Vladimir Putin. I am, frankly, surprised Putin was not in the chamber to hear the speech and receive some sort of award.
Same for Ghislaine Maxwell. Why wasn’t she there to receive an award? After all, Trump is mentioned more than one thousand times in the Epstein Files (and references to him or his businesses number up to 38,000). You would think Trump could return the favor and say just a few words about his friend Jeffery Epstein. That is really rude, don’t you think, to omit his friend and colleague when he mentioned just about everybody else he knew.
Somebody else he did not mention was the late, great Jesse Jackson. But had he done that, his speech would have been flagged by the FBI and their Anti-DEI Snoop and Search Unit (or whatever it is called). Now that I think about it: did he mention anybody of color during that almost two-hours of self-congratulatory demagoguery? Are their any people of color in his United States of America? Probably not, and that would explain that.
Two white people he failed to mention were Renee Good and Alex Pretti. They were murdered by ICE agents, and that is probably why Trump did not mention them, even though he mentioned other people murdered by undocumented immigrants. I guess the freedom to murder people, even white citizens, is one of the perks of signing up with ICE, that and a $50,000 bonus. Next year, some ICE officers will be in the chamber to receive recognition and reward. Mark my word.
Trump talked about the tax cuts but failed to mention they were primarily for rich people and they are made possible by the cuts to food programs for poor people. Neither at that time nor any time in the speech, did Trump mention the struggles of the poor, the sick, and the homeless. He wanted to tip his hat to his MAGA millions, so he gave due recognition to Erika Kirk and her late husband who, Trump said, was “martyred for his beliefs.” Most of us say, with the killer, that Charlie Kirk was cut down by a person angered by Kirk’s hate speech. But, I suppose, that is a matter of taste.
The President, devout and observant man that he is, did not neglect to celebrate what he calls “a tremendous renewal in religion, faith, Christianity and belief in God.” He did not share any stories or statistics to back this up, and I wonder if anybody can help me at this point. What might he be talking about? What is he seeing that the rest of us, including scholars and researchers, priests and preachers, cannot see? Help me out here.
But for these omissions, Trump mentioned just about everybody and everything. Except, of course, how much money he and his family have made doing deals wrapped in the swaddling clothes of government business. I think I know why: that would have taken another hour or two, and 107 minutes was long enough already. God bless your heart!
President Donald J. Trump gave his State of the Union speech this week, and it was the longest one in American history, time wise. It wasn’t always this way. George Washington averaged just 2,080 words in his eight speeches and John Adams only 1,790 spoken words.
Andrew Jackson bumped it up to 10,645 words and James K Polk hit 18,014. But these were all written only, not delivered as a speech. It dropped to 6,838 with Abraham Lincoln, the master of brevity.
William Howard Taft was the first to top 22,000 but his successor Woodrow Wilson revived the speech form with texts averaging just 4,545 words. Franklin D. Roosevelt dropped it to 3,563 and he spoke 12 times. Things stayed manageable until Bill Clinton, who spoke, on average, 7,426 words. Obama was at 6,824 and Biben bumped it up to 8,333. Now Trump, in second term, has doubled his take from his first term, from 5,690 words to 10,599 this past Tuesday evening. It took him one hour and 47 minutes, partly because there were so many interruptions for applause and several presentations of medals and such.
I did not watch the spoken version of this speech, not live, not later. But I did read the speech, which is the best way to go. What it took Trump almost two hours to say, I read in 10 minutes or less.
Even that ten minutes was a waste of time. It was so full of lies, self-congratulations, and outright buffoonery. Attendees who endured to the end are deserving of one of the medals he distributed, a Purple Heart or a Congressional Medal of Honor. I would support the creation of a new award, a Trump Titanium Tie Clasp featuring an image of, yes, Trump Himself, that can be worn all the times, with a digital recording of the speech embedded so an awardee (and that is anybody who preserved to the end) can listen to the speech frequently and often and even all the time.
Even at one hundred seven minutes of voice time, it was not long enough. A great deal was left out, as I am sure many noted. Ukraine and its war of survival was omitted, no doubt out of respect to Trump’s buddy, Vladimir Putin. I am, frankly, surprised Putin was not in the chamber to hear the speech and receive some sort of award.
Same for Ghislaine Maxwell. Why wasn’t she there to receive an award? After all, Trump is mentioned more than one thousand times in the Epstein Files (and references to him or his businesses number up to 38,000). You would think Trump could return the favor and say just a few words about his friend Jeffery Epstein. That is really rude, don’t you think, to omit his friend and colleague when he mentioned just about everybody else he knew.
Somebody else he did not mention was the late, great Jesse Jackson. But had he done that, his speech would have been flagged by the FBI and their Anti-DEI Snoop and Search Unit (or whatever it is called). Now that I think about it: did he mention anybody of color during that almost two-hours of self-congratulatory demagoguery? Are their any people of color in his United States of America? Probably not, and that would explain that.
Two white people he failed to mention were Renee Good and Alex Pretti. They were murdered by ICE agents, and that is probably why Trump did not mention them, even though he mentioned other people murdered by undocumented immigrants. I guess the freedom to murder people, even white citizens, is one of the perks of signing up with ICE, that and a $50,000 bonus. Next year, some ICE officers will be in the chamber to receive recognition and reward. Mark my word.
Trump talked about the tax cuts but failed to mention they were primarily for rich people and they are made possible by the cuts to food programs for poor people. Neither at that time nor any time in the speech, did Trump mention the struggles of the poor, the sick, and the homeless. He wanted to tip his hat to his MAGA millions, so he gave due recognition to Erika Kirk and her late husband who, Trump said, was “martyred for his beliefs.” Most of us say, with the killer, that Charlie Kirk was cut down by a person angered by Kirk’s hate speech. But, I suppose, that is a matter of taste.
The President, devout and observant man that he is, did not neglect to celebrate what he calls “a tremendous renewal in religion, faith, Christianity and belief in God.” He did not share any stories or statistics to back this up, and I wonder if anybody can help me at this point. What might he be talking about? What is he seeing that the rest of us, including scholars and researchers, priests and preachers, cannot see? Help me out here.
But for these omissions, Trump mentioned just about everybody and everything. Except, of course, how much money he and his family have made doing deals wrapped in the swaddling clothes of government business. I think I know why: that would have taken another hour or two, and 107 minutes was long enough already. God bless your heart!
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