Trump’s convention speech went on late into the night on Thursday, and despite its strong start, many observers thought it was a misstep for the GOP nominee to ramble on for so long. On today’s Editors podcast, however, Charlie Cooke doesn’t agree with this assessment, saying this view “was limited to Twitter and the political chattering class.”
He uses a music analogy to drive home his point, saying, “Trump started with track one, the thing everyone had been talking about. And it was really good. . . . He met the moment. He honored the man who was murdered. But then tracks two through 13 were awful. Rambling, overlong, incoherent, off-topic. And didn’t meet the moment. And that’s still who Trump is.”
Charlie points out that “there’s a lot of political talent in Donald Trump, but his issue has always been, aside from the fact that he is crazy in many ways . . . that he’s completely undisciplined. And last night he was completely undisciplined when he needed to be disciplined.”
The negative reactions to Trump’s speech, though, were limited. “A lot of the reactions that I saw immediately after Trump’s speech I think are absurd. This idea that that speech should give the Democrats hope, might lead them out of their current crisis, or make a difference to the outcome of the election? That’s nonsense. It’s not that the Democrats don’t have a chance in this coming election. They do. But that speech isn’t going to change anything.
“So while I agree with all of the criticisms of the speech, I’m not sure it mattered.”
The Editors podcast is recorded on Tuesdays and Fridays every week and is available wherever you listen to podcasts.