Why Jeff Flake's Anti-Trump Speech Was Meaningless
Maybe this is all Aaron Sorkin's fault.
The Big Speech has always been a powerful tool in politics, and no format is more consistently attention-getting than the public emperor-has-no-clothes soliloquy. Speechifying probably peaked in American politics in the second half of the 19th century, when (aided by the lack of widespread literacy or any form of electronic entertainment) the "four-hour speech" was a cornerstone of party and campaign strategy. Have you ever tried to talk about something for an hour or more without interruption? It's not easy. Now imagine you're an 1870s machine politician who probably isn't real bright but knows a few big words. You can imagine the kind of empty yet florid rhetoric that produced.
We're looping back to the Gilded Age in more ways than it's comfortable to recognize, notably with our zeal for deregulation, immigration restriction and wealth worship. And it seems that in this noisy media environment, elected officials are rediscovering the power of the pretty but totally empty monologue.
It works, after all. Look at the fawning media coverage of GOP Sen. Jeff Flake's speech Tuesday. In reality, it was little more than a two-years-too-late declaration that he has some very important principles for which he absolutely must stand up – right after he works with Mitch McConnell to steal a Supreme Court appointment and, OK, maybe hold out a few more months to see if he can get some tax cuts out of it too. If not, well, voting to allow forced arbitration for nursing home patients is a pretty good consolation prize.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/why-jeff-flakes-anti-trump-speech-was-meaningless-w510175?utm_source=rsnewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=daily&utm_campaign=102517_15
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