I both love and hate rhetoric. The way it’s taught in philosophy departments, rhetoric and sophistry are the two great foes of philosophy. But in poetry and literature, there’s something quite beautiful in an elegant turn of phrase and a timely, minute gesture toward assonance. Even if it’s meant to merely manipulate our feelings. My training and background in journalism further complicates things.
And then there’s my experience in speech—one of my many undergraduate fields of study. I have judged several contests, coached students, and I even taught it for a few years in Japan, where one of my students, after my coaching, won a national speech competition.
Because I’m already not a fan of political conventions (we already know what everyone is going to say) and because I’m typically always busy and overbooked, I had no intention of watching the Democratic National Convention. But then I found myself with a little time in the evenings and early mornings when I was away from home and otherwise uncommitted, and so my curiosity got the better of me. What follows are some brief thoughts about the overall quality of some of the speeches and performances at this year’s DNC.
Oprah Winfrey’s speech, whose major theme was character, seemed oblivious to the fact that she herself bore responsibility for unleashing, platforming, and sustaining such unscrupulous characters such as Mehmet Oz, Phil McGraw, and J.K. Rowling, among too fucking many to count. Fuck Oprah. One imagines that the stage directions for her speech included “use Oprah voice” when saying Kamala Harris’ name. C-.
There were a few strong moments throughout Hillary Clinton’s time at the podium. I thought her historicizing was stronger than her more soaring, rousing speechifying about the moment of now. As usual, I want her diction and intonation to be hardier. Ultimately, however, there wasn’t anything that changed my mind about her or the kind of President she would’ve been. A solid B.
Despite the fact that his policy positions tend to be further right than Mitt Romney’s, Pete Buttigieg made a decent enough speech. I particularly appreciated his narrative about the social progression of his family from unthinkable to ordinary. But someone should have told him that his use of darkness was excessively overdramatic. Maybe it’s a gay thing. As a gay thing myself, I can write that. Or maybe a gay Christian thing. Either way, yuck. B+.
As per her contract, P!nk always oversings and over-emotes, but it seemed warranted and less annoying in this context. B+.
From his speech it’s clear that Barack Obama still thinks of himself as the father of the nation and accordingly spent his time on stage humorlessly scolding the audience for being humorless scolds. You’d think that someone with so much rizz would sometimes try to be a bit simpatico. But no. He spent eight years in the White House barely bothering to bolster democratic reforms and basically sat on his ass during the rise of Donald Trump instead of working to guarantee a viable Democratic, or democratic, heir. Fuck that guy. B+.
Sit down, John Legend. But Sheila E. hit the eff out of that cymbal. It’s always good to hear her play. And Ari O’Neal—somebody give her $1,000,000. A-.
Tim Walz’s “pep talk” had exactly what it needed to have: inspiration + nuts and bolts. After all these long decades I’m still amazed at how horribly trite yet potently effective sports metaphors, or as I call them: sportaphors, are. Everyone knew exactly what the content and form of his speech would be, even before hearing John Mellencamp’s “Small Town,” which was musically, and perfectly, bookended with Neil Young’s “Rockin’ in the Free World.” A-.
Intimately knowing the history of Young’s political stances over the decades and the particularities about how he allows or prevents the use of his music, I immediately went to the internet to search on the DNC’s licensing agreement for the song. I ask you: what’s better than intersemiotic rhetorical registers at a political convention? And my only answer: perhaps this article by Gil Kaufman in Billboard. This, friends, is how you do journalism. And rhetoric. (And if intersemiotic rhetorics is also your thing, then you might like this video interview with Shepard Fairey on his new Harris poster.)
True legend Stevie Wonder confused and amused us with his peculiar rising intonation. It would’ve been great if he would’ve said, “If I can see how clear the choice is, then you sighted folks don’t have one good goddang reason.” A-.
The Chicks nailed it on the national anthem. Lovely country harmonies while featuring an alto melody. Pure class. Fuck the haters. A.
The strongest speech of the DNC was Michelle Obama’s.1 She was forceful and articulate, and she didn’t (need to) shy away from calling a trump a spade. Solid content and rhetorical register. No notes. But one suggestion that would’ve been the cherry atop her speech: as she was reminding the audience about all of Trump’s personal attacks against her and her husband, I wish she would’ve said something along the lines of “Remember when Sarah Palin came out against hope? I wonder whatever happened to her?” A+.
1 I haven’t watched all the speeches, and I probably won’t. I’m not sure, for example, that I can stomach listening to Bill Clinton for more than a few minutes. I mean, fuck that guy. And Congressperson Colin Allred, whose speech I did watch, can eat a bag of dicks. Despite representing my district in Congress, he’s not worth my time to comment on. And if Kamala Harris wasn’t introduced by Beyoncé, then what even is the point of any of this?