On C-SPAN I caught a Mitt Romney event from Monday, talking to the folks from City Year. What a bad public speaker. It’s not that he fumbles over the words like Bush does, nor am I measuring him against really great public speakers like President Clinton. But a basic level, the guy sucks. He has a pedantic speaking style, as if he thinks you are the dumbest person alive (there’s reason to believe he really thinks this). You know the way Al Gore was always derided for having a sort of sing-song voice when he seemed to be talking down to folks? That’s Mitt Romney, times one thousand. Then add a hint of Jon Lovitz’s “The Liar” character and a healthy dose of Eddie Haskell from Leave It To Beaver.
Pendantic, huh? I associate his style of speaking as a rich boy who thinks everyone else is his servant. Why? The way he speaks to donors, fellow politicians and businesspeople is vastly different how he speaks to voters. There’s a level of confidence in the former, that is “These are my people”-ish. With the latter, it’s almost like he’s wracking his brain for models on how “the other half” speak, but since he has nothing but disdain for the other half, he stumbles.
While standing outside my classroom, waiting for a previous class to clear out, one of my eighth graders extemperaneously turned to me and said “I saw that Romney guy on tv last night…he sucks as a public speaker.”
I have some smart students.