After doing a close reading of Trump's speech, I believe that Trump should fire his speechwriter. This is not about Trump's political views. This is about the quality of writing and nearly offensive lack of logic.
Language-wise, the address comes short. The rhetoric fails to underscore any meaningful point. There is emotion in its usage, but it's the empty emotion of watching other children's ballet performances. Even though you clap and try to remind yourself of the precious nature of children, even though you know you are supposed to feel something, you are ultimately unstirred. "The American carnage stops right here and right now" is abuse of language; it is redundancy. The speechwriter also falls back on cliches invoking expressions that were first employed literally hundreds of years ago and hand-waving inspirational quotes about dreams or dreaming the same dream or the exceptional nature of America. The one fling at imagery, a comparison between factories and tombstones, feels overwrought, like Victorian hysteria, because it sticks out so much among the other bland expressions. There is nothing new in this speech, nothing grating or fresh. Even Don DeLillo's stilted, inhuman dialogue makes you sit up and notice something. There is nothing demanding in here; you could sleep through it. It's the same touchstones of "freedom" and "America" and "patriotism" and the lame urgency of our current situation—a total bore.
The language is not streamlined either. There is no coherence in the description of our disappearing factories or failing education system which culminates in the pronouncement of these troubles as "carnage." Nothing warrants this word; there is no set-up. Trump's speechwriter utilizes classic metaphorical expressions (e.g., "robbing" someone of something intangible, "stealing" someone's life) that most people would never directly connect to violence because most people have heard these phrases before. This is continued throughout the speech; description of various phenomena is discrete and treated independently. There is no sign of the governing "vision" which Trump promotes within the speech.
Worse yet is the condemnation of Trump that the speechwriter allows to slip through. The pronouns are out of control. The speechwriter can't even pretend that Trump's assertions were consistent. Trump flip flops between "we the people" and "you the people" and even throws in a "they the something else that may also be part of the people." It's a total mess and acknowledges the uncomfortable truth that Trump's central message—that as a member of the "people" and as president, he will be a conduit for the people's will—is impossible. Trump is not a member of the "people" because he holds power over us. The speechwriter failed even to pretend that this is true. It's not like this artifice would have been difficult to maintain either. Simply consistently using "we the people" would have worked. Trump's speechwriter inadvertently introduces a point of view that contradicts Trump's own message and does so out of total incompetence.
Logic is also glaringly absent. The speechwriter makes Donald Trump look like a fool by constructing all sorts of poor arguments. In asserting that patriotism will lead us to affection for one another and unity, the speechwriter dips into some symbolic physical realm to make a completely abstract argument. In arguing that we are all patriots because we bleed red blood, the speechwriter confuses correlation with causation. The speechwriter even knocks Kellyanne Conway out of the water by turning to tautologies to assert our unity. He or she could have just said "might makes right" and called it a day.
This speech is offensive. Yes, it attempts to deceive the American people, but it does so shockingly poorly. A careful reader can feel the clumsiness of the author, careening from side to side knocking vases over while trying to delicately guide the needle of public opinion. It displays a middle schooler's skill at writing and five year-old's skill at logic. Someone should be fired for this awful thing.
