Peggy Noonan, Reagan’s speechwriter…
…explains to Obama why speeches are not that important:
Democrats were sure Reagan was wrong, so they explained his success to themselves by believing that it all came down to some kind of magical formula involving his inexplicably powerful speeches. They misdefined his powers and saddled themselves with an unrealistic faith in the power of speaking.
But speeches aren’t magic. A speech is only as good as the ideas it advances. Reagan had good ideas. Obama does not.
And yet, if I recall correctly, early in the game Noonan herself was somewhat seduced (in the metaphoric sense) by Obama’s speeches.
That Obama magic also appears to have worked on Ann Althouse.
Didn’t Peggy Noonan write quite a few of those speeches of Reagan’s? If the magic had come from the actual words of his speeches, then it would have been her magic, not his.
Speaking of Althouse, she had a personal email from Michelle yesterday…in which the First Lady pointed out that poor, overworked Barack is literally turning gray before our eyes:
http://althouse.blogspot.com/2011/08/ann-every-day-i-see-barack-make-choices.html
Kid you not. The comments on the thread are pretty entertaining (and mean, of course) but I think people are quite fed up at this point.
Its my understanding that Reagan wrote most of his own speeches. Speeches offered by speechwriters were usually heavily market-up and changed by Reagan. Regardless – the difference was that Mr. Reagan believed what he was saying and fighting for and put forth his case with passion and compassion – and more that a bit of class and humor.
the Viking
CV, I’m pretty sure several thousand of Michelle’s close friends got a similar missive.
CV said, “Speaking of Althouse, she had a personal email from Michelle yesterday…in which the First Lady pointed out that poor, overworked Barack is literally turning gray before our eyes.”
I am quite sure this is an ordeal for the Obama’s. All those mighty academic ideas that were going to work so well. All the wonderful things that were going to happen just because he was going to make things “right.” And it isn’t happening! And no one likes it. And some uppity no nothings are sending him suggestions for turning things around, which he couldn’t possibly do because………..it just wouldn’t be fair!
If I were in his shoes, I wouldn’t be sleeping much either. All his big dreams are in the crapper. It’s got to be getting under even his narcissistic skin.
You are very likely right, DerHahn, but it boggles the mind that anyone in the White House would think it a good PR decision to blast email (with personal salutations) bloggers (conservative or otherwise) in which the First Lady basically WHINES, yet again, about the physical toll the presidency is taking on her husband.
I mean, tone-deaf doesn’t even begin to cover it.
Peggy Noonan is not a progressive. Progressivism is a belief system. She can look at evidence, and is educable.
The WSJ link requires a subscription. As of this writing, the full editorial is cached here. Noonan’s personal site, where she has been archiving her columns, is down at the moment.
Before he was president, Reagan had written all his speeches. He quickly discovered that the presidency left little time for speechwriting. However, his speechwriters studied Reagan’s own speeches meticulously, so they had a good idea how he himself wrote, and he always inserted his own editorial hand into the final version of the speeches (even within hours of scheduled delivery) and would study the major speeches carefully for delivery. He did write both of his inaugural addresses and, I think, some other major speeches.
Making the current president a victim is the logical end-point of “progressivism” as practiced in the USA over the past several decades. I would expect it to be, at the least, an undertone in the re-election campaign, in certain circles anyway.
CV
That goes with the territory. JFK got grayer and more worn out. It happened with Dubya, but Laura Bush didn’t send out a “poor Dubya” notice to thousands.
Barack Obama, whose middle name should have been “Condescension,” is not someone who invites sympathy. Hasn’t Michelle figured that out? No need to answer that question.
Peter Robinson, now at Stanford’s Hoover Institute, was also a Reagan speechwriter for a year or two. He wrote the speech that Reagan gave in Germany in which Reagan delivered the now famous line that will live forever,”Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”
I don’t know how involved Reagan was with all of his speeches, but after Robinson wrote that speech he claims Reagan and several of his senior advisers reviewed it and made editing suggestions. He says the advisers unanimously agreed and recommended that the historic line be removed. Robinson says Reagan liked the line but he accepted the consul unanimously offered by his advisers and asked that the line be removed from the final draft. And it was. Nobody, including Robinson who wrote the speech, thought that line was going to be uttered when Reagan delivered the actual speech.
That’s how one of the most memorable speech lines in the latter half of the twentieth century made history (according to Robinson).
Meanwhile they partied like gangsta’s in the Rose Garden last night to celebrate the poor graying one’s 50th birthday.
Funny that he’s never too tired to rub elbows with the politically illiterate Hollywood elite, or get in another round of golf, or appear at $25,000+/plate fundraisers, or….
Ah, Neo, you’re such a tolerant lassie. Noonan wasn’t seduced; she was recruited. A few critical bits notwithstanding, she has yet to go AWOL.
She has critiqued The Won but she has yet to acknowledge that he is out to make certain things happen and he cares not if the things he wants are bad for the U.S. or if in the process the country is trashed.
She has never said Obama delenda est.
S&P just downgraded the US to AA. I wonder how the Obambi will rationalize this? Tea party terrorism?
I recall Peggy was quite smitten with Mr. Obama during the campaign. She was bowled over by his “gift” of reading a speech and his ivy league credentials. On the other hand, she was dismissive of Sarah Palin. She was downright nasty and condescending as a matter of fact. Remember her on-air groan and insulting comments following McCain’s announcement of Palin as his running mate? So many of us saw the Obama disaster in the making because we actually educated ourselves about his ideological leanings and political alliances. Peggy focused on the image, not the ideas. And, now. oddly she’s writing about the ideas. Day late and dollar short, Peg.
Peggy must feel pretty silly, being so taken by the TelePrompTer In Chief early on. And herself, being a speechwriter for the Gipper, a truly honorable man makes it all that much more inexplicable. And now her words are just as empty as Obama’s. She’s lost her credibility along with McCain, Newt, and all the rest.
And as for Michelle…..I wonder that she even knows her husbands hair color. Does anyone else notice how separate they seem? Obama has never spent a birthday with her and the kids yet, always going to Chi town to see old chums. WHY is that? Was it his last birthday he was holed up at a private house with his old butt buddies while a bus load of reporters waited docile as puppies outside while being threatened by paranoid Louie Farrakhan security thugs in bow ties not to leave the bus? If it weren’t for the alternative media, that embarrassment would be private memories of the lapdog press.
Speaking of empty family photos, has anyone seen the Obama’s family dog around?
Haven’t read Noonan since she lost her mind and endorsed a Marxist, Muslim-educated, Communist- and Weatherman-mentored, America-hating racist for president of our dear nation.
Which was inexcusable, given the fact that the woman is privy to all the knowledge available about how rancid this one was, and she ignored it because, apparently, she thought he was a Dreamboat.
I mean, What?
As far as Moochelle’s Complaint is concerned: poor baby. I reckon she’s back to “not being proud” of her country again, which is a national tragedy. It’s not enough that they’re living high on the hog, wallowing in our money, taking Air Force One and scores of armored limos on “dates,” and in general comporting themselves like trash that suddenly hit the lottery. We must genuflect to them as well, while he continues to ruin our once-great nation.
iirc, Noonan once mentioned going to a second-tier eastern school, mentioning it was not one of the Ivies.
Wonder if she has Ivy envy.
“”And now her words are just as empty as Obama’s. She’s lost her credibility along with McCain, Newt, and all the rest.””
Jim Kearney
In reality it was made fashionable by media elites to trash America and elect someone who wouldn’t flinch in downgrading her. We know who was too weak to stand up against it. We know who embraced it. And not one of them gave a damn about the common man suffering.
We won’t forget 9/11 and we sure as hell won’t forget them.
I wrote Noonan at the time she was ooshying all over herself about Obama, and asked her what the hell happened to her. Like most of those who eneter here, I was never “fooled” by Obama. I could not believe Noonan got roped in. I don’t read Noonan anymore.
In the comments section of her blog, I asked Althouse twice why she voted for him. She never answered. I don’t go there anymore because I just don’t know who she is now.
Whether you agree with her vote or not Althouse has posted her reasons for voing for Obama. I think the post might even have been called “Why I voted for Obama.” I know she wrote a post called “How McCain Lost Me.” (or something very similar). If you really want to know why, look it up. It is territory she has covered.
To paraphrase her from memory I think her basic contention was that she thought John McCain didn’t have the “right stuff” for the job. She was never in love with Obama, but McCain “lost” her and so she went with Obama even though she realized he had big problems, too. (Note: I’m not defending her, just explaining what she said.)
I certainly didn’t vote for Obama and was horrified that Peggy Noonan or anyone like her had a kind word to say about him. All you had to do was look at the type of people he associated with to figure out what type of person he was. What has been a surprise to me is how lazy, distant, and or disengaged he has been. I know he voted “present” all those times in the Illinois Senate but I didn’t think he’d have the gall to try that as president. But he has, with the debt ceiling deal being just the latest example. In some sense, it’s helped us, though, in that a more engaged president would have won more battles. I see why a lot of Dems are pissed at him.
I’m sure an element of East Coast snobbery has a lot to do with why Peggy Noonan and other ostensible Republicans gave Obama the time of day in the first place. One set of opponents in Washington is the Dems vs the Reps. But one shoulde never forget that an equally important set of opposing camps is the Washington/East Coast/Ivy League insiders versus the outsiders. The insiders close ranks all the time, irrespective of party, to protect their prerogatives. Their reaction to Sarah Palin was a prime example of that.
“I’m sure an element of East Coast snobbery has a lot to do with why Peggy Noonan and other ostensible Republicans gave Obama the time of day in the first place.” Precisely. I gave up on Peggy when she went all schoolgirl over Zero. She is one of those whose nature is to suck up to the governing class. I call them “Renfields”.
kcom – I believe you are precisely correct about Sarah Palin, and this is one of the big reasons I hope she does run, easy to tell the ruling class/elite GOP.
Obama will go down in history one of 2 ways, either as the man who brought down the USA, or the one who awoke the sleeping giant (We The People), who successfully re-captured control of the government in the 2012 elections.
Scary isn’t it, sigh.
Noonan has said in the past that she lives in Manhattan surrounded by lefties and she gets her news from CBS News (where she used to work for Dan Rather who she still holds in high regard) and the NY Times. Over the years, you can spot when some of the elitist, liberal drivel has seeped into her thinking on one subject or another.
For example, I remember a column she did on how terrible it was for the military and America that the Ivy Leagues no longer send ROTC grads to fight. We were clearly worse off because of the absence of our “best”. Of course, the idea that our best were those who went to the Ivies is totally absurd. All three of our military academies are among the ten most selective colleges in the nation.
This is the kind of elitist silliness that passes for intelligent thought. And because it isn’t expressly political, she absorbs it without realizing it. Enough of that type noise and she’s affected in ways she doesn’t even realize.
The Boy King, flanked on each side by Edvard Munch’s “The Scream”, is the truly priceless part of Peggy’s latest from WSJ.
Whether or not you totallly agree with Peggy Noonan (I don’t), I must say that disdaining her leads me to believe that Obama might just win another term.
why? “There is more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over the ninety nine others who have no need of repentance.”.
In other words, welcome the converted, forget the past, focus on the future. Otherwise, they return to their former positions and vow not to make themselves another move.
It’s also know as cutting off your nose for racial (or whatever) purity.
And I shall be the first to condemn you for blowing a perfect opportunity, “Learned Nothing, Forgot Nothing”…you and the Bourbons
Good Ole
You think that Noonan will, at the end, go with one of the Great Unwashed, somebody who drops the “g”, somebody with the hard “r”?
Few of us were in as good a position as Noonan to know what was what, and she went where she went.
Now, from time to time, she gets it. But not about politics. See, for example, “Welcome Back, Duke”. When you search for it, make sure you use the comma.
Michelle’s talking about how poor Barack is suffering, suffering because Presidentin’ is so hard. I wonder if she’s laying the groundwork for him to bail out in 2012 for “health reasons” and leave the mess he made for someone else to clean up?
RA:
Thanks to living with my wife 52+ years, I drop my terminal “g”s, pronounce “r” closer to “h”. That’s what you get for marrying into Maine…
Sp why not encourage Noonan? As mentioned, I don’t completely agree with her – as I don’t completely agree with Tea Party-ers – but I’m open to their arguments, if logically consistent.
Nobody loves a fanatic – either from the left or right. And sometimes both the left and right sound like mind-less fanatics.
Or as a noted professor of mine once said: “You can teach ignorance, but there’s not a damn thing you can do with stupidity!”
Yeah, as my life goes along, his wisdom becomes more and more obvious.
“What has been a surprise to me is how lazy, distant, and or disengaged he has been.”
It’s not surprising to me. Apart from his politics, many of us were suspicious of BO simply because he had never held a real job in his life before his election as POTUS. He kept getting bumped up the political chain despite a lack of accomplishment because he had a slick, favorable image. He is the emptiest suit ever.
Gary Rosen: no surprise here, either. One of the first things I ever noticed about Obama was his odd lack of energy for the job (or even the campaign), and his proclivity for making excuses.
neo, that is impressive – May 2007! It makes me all the more disdainful of those like Noonan who should have known better.
Good Ole.
My basic accent comes from Norwich, CT. It’s said that in that area, a Honda dealer has to have his sign read “Honder” so the locals will pronounce it correctly.
But neither you nor I are running for president on the republican side, and so the self-anointed elites aren’t interested in how we speak as a proxy for being ignorant.
Noonan has a variant of what is supposedly all gone now, the “mid-atlantic” accent, sometimes referred to as the American theater received pronounciation, as somebody on this blog mentioned years ago. When I last looked up the midatlantic thing, it was said to be non-existent.
Point is, you have to work at sounding like that, and you don’t do that without a goal.
As I’ve said before, some people are invested in certain world views for personal reasons and they cannot, literally cannot, afford to change them, most especially cannot afford to change them to the point of admitting they’d been wrong.
Noonan, Buckley’s pup, any number of other so-called elites are in that group.
IOW, trying to convince them would be pearls cast in vain. I do think, nasty guy that I am, that the more facts which, afterwards, can be shown to have been presented to them, the worse they’ll feel, I hope. So that’s a reason to keep telling them. Changing their views…not so much
Wikipedia reports “She is a graduate of Rutherford High School in Rutherford, New Jersey, and Fairleigh Dickinson University.”
Ivy League envy is an East Coast depravity. Some other parts of the country are getting over it.
I once knew somebody who lived in Rutherford, or East Rutherford, or wherever.
I ought to call her up and ask if the indigenous personnel sound like Noonan.
Think it’s worth the effort? Or can we guess?
Peggy Noonan’s opinions on anything mostly resemble what I have to avoid when I run on bridle trails. That applies to most of our coastal elites.