Did Michelle Obama Deliver the Most Effective Political Speech Since Ronald Reagan?

October 14, 2016

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If you haven't heard Michelle Obama's most recent speech, you need to. Why? Because whether or not you believe a word of it, the impact was devastating.

"The audience was pin-drop quiet. It connected. Whether you like to believe it or not, whether I want to believe it or not, it connected. And it was powerful," Glenn said Friday on his radio program.

Not only has the Democratic Party co-opted conservative language this election season, they're now co-opting women voters of every ilk with Michelle Obama's speech.

"We've switched places," Glenn said. "We don't control the narrative, and we don't control the culture. They do. They control the language. You cannot fight them on things like this. They win . . . we have become them. And now, they've decided that this is all wrong."

Read below or watch the clip for answers to these questions:

• Who should have given Michelle Obama's speech?

• Why was the first five minutes of the speech so important?

• Who have conservatives lost with this election?

• Did the Trump campaign conduct opposition research?

• What's the greatest irony of Michelle Obama's speech?

Below is a rush transcript of this segment, it might contain errors:

GLENN: I want to start with the most effective speech, the most effective political speech I have heard since Ronald Reagan.

It kills me to say that. I don't -- I don't think this is necessarily genuine. I think she does believe these things. But it was very well done, very well rehearsed. And in the video that I saw -- now, this was a regular campaign speech -- you would not see several angles. You would see one. They come, they put a camera down in the back. It's all -- lock it down. They lock it down on the podium. And that's it.

If you watch the speech that Michelle Obama gave yesterday, they knew. There were four different camera angles on this. They knew exactly -- the press knew what was coming. This was an important speech.

Normally, if you give this speech -- any campaign speech -- you hear, "I'm going to say something about the bad guy." And what does everybody do?

STU: Boo.

GLENN: Boo. Okay. "I'm going to say something about us." Yay!

STU: Yay!

GLENN: And that's a campaign speech.

I will tell you, if you want to look at what the conservatives have lost in this campaign -- we have lost the argument on economics.

Can anybody remember what the number $787 billion is about? Do you remember what it is? Anybody?

STU: Oh, yeah. Yeah. For sure.

GLENN: Yeah. Stimulus package, right? Why do you remember that number, Stu?

STU: Because we it said 9 million times --

GLENN: Why did we say it 9 million times?

STU: To criticize Barack Obama and his huge spending effort --

JEFFY: So big.

STU: Right. And our change from, you know, violating the free market system to save it. That extending into Obama's presidency where we were just throwing money at this problem.

GLENN: How much is Donald Trump's child care bill? How much is that?

STU: Up to $680 billion.

GLENN: So $100 billion short of the biggest number any of us had ever heard the government spend.

STU: Of course, that doesn't include his $550 billion-plus stimulus plan, which is on top of the 680 billion from child care.

GLENN: Right. So we're over $1 trillion for just two things: a stimulus and one child care package.

So we've lost the economic high ground. We are -- we have proven ourselves to be, what? Liars? We don't care if it's our side. We don't care what anybody does, as long as they don't do it economically.

Small government. Single-payer health care system. He has said it over and over again. He will do a -- he will repeal and replace, with a single-payer health care system. Universal health care. We've lost that argument. Compassion. "You know what, maybe we ought to go over there and kill the families. Kill the families of the terrorists." Or even the deportation force. Instead of saying, "We have ICE. We have to empower ICE to do their job."

He says, "We'll have a deportation force." Compassionate conservatism, if it even existed: Gone.

Corruption on business. We say we don't like corruption in business. Listen to the words of, "What? I use the laws. I -- of course, I use bankruptcy because I use laws that benefit me. You don't like the laws, change them." Now, while that is true, how do you defend that?

JEFFY: It's called business.

STU: That's right.

GLENN: It's cold-hearted, Mr. Potter versus the Bailey Building & Loan kind of business. Heartless. "I use what I can." Cronyism. "Yeah, you damn right I give to all of the guys because they'll answer my calls and I get what I need."

What else have we lost? How about the moral high ground? Anger. Vengeance. Vulgarity. I mean, we could spend days on that one.

We've lost Hispanics. They're not coming back. They're not coming back. Because our cheering crowds, they're not coming back.

We're now losing women. Women are dropping like flies. Why? Why?

Because the people who know how to deliver speeches, who have control of the media, who -- who have defended Bill Clinton for 25 years, who dragged all of the arguments that Donald Trump is making out of in front of people right now, the ones that we are using, they're only being -- we didn't develop those arguments. They did. They fought against them and said, "Oh, that's crazy." Now, they're the ones saying that this is a moral outrage.

STU: Right.

GLENN: We've switched places. But what you don't understand is, we don't control the media. We don't control the narrative. And we don't control the culture. They do. They control the language. You cannot fight them on things like this. They win. Especially when you have a guy who has shown that he is into cronyism, corruption, compassion is gone, small government, economics.

We have become them. And now, they've decided that this is all wrong.

Who do you think is going to win? Women are going to leave us in droves because they will be effective where we are not. And in the meantime, we've lost our religious institutions. Because our religious institutions don't stand for principles or morals anymore. We are losing ourselves.

JEFFY: You've highlighted some inconsistencies.

GLENN: Yes. And who didn't see this coming? We were so wrapped up into winning, we said last year, millions of Americans said last year, "You can't do this. When the media gets a hold of this guy, they're going to kill him. They're going to cream him." No, he's got control of the media. "No, he does now because they want him to win." As WikiLeaks has now shown us, that was exactly their plan. They wanted him to get the nomination. Because they knew she was so weak and he could be destroyed.

STU: They talked privately about how it was basically her only path to the presidency.

GLENN: Yes.

STU: Only path to the presidency was Donald Trump.

GLENN: Thank you, Russia. Thank you, Russia, for verifying what we said during the primary.

STU: Probably stop trying to interfere in our elections to do so, but, yes.

GLENN: Yes. Yes.

Okay. So we know that's all true now. And we now also know that Donald Trump was so reckless with our nation, that he refused to have anyone do opposition research on him. That is basic. That's the first thing you do. When you want to run, you say, "I need some opposition research. Show me that the worst that they might be able to find." And you do research so you overturn every stone so no one surprises you.

We found out, in the three administrations that have been running the Trump campaign, all three of them have said, "We -- we need to do opposition research. And he has said no."

So now, the campaign has no idea what's coming next. And if you don't think that that was a setup -- Ben Shapiro hit it right -- the nail right on the head: During the debate, "So have you ever said -- have you ever done any of these things that are on this tape on the bus?"

"Look, nobody respects women --

"No, that's not the question. Have you ever done any of those things?"

"No one respects women more than I do."

"Again, sir, have you done any of those things?"

He was trapped. He had to say yes or no. He chose no. Setup. That's not Gary Hart. Who was the guy who said follow me?

STU: That was Gary Hart.

JEFFY: Yeah, that was Gary Hart.

GLENN: Was it Gary Hart? Yeah. Follow me.

"Everybody is saying that I've had affairs. Follow me."

That's what he did. He said no. People are saying, "Well, you can't trust these women." Oh, so now we don't believe the women? Now we take a very vulgar man with lots of power, celebrity, who we know lives this kind of lifestyle anyway, has bragged about it for 30 years, we have footage of things like this, and now we're taking the position of not believing the women?

Why did the women finally come up? Well, I would imagine if that had happened to you, you're not going to say anything. For all kinds of reasons, you don't say anything. Bill Cosby comes to mind. But there comes a point -- and this was the point -- that you're sitting at home and you're watching that and you snap and say, "That son of a bitch. He did it to me."

STU: There very easily could be a mixture of people actually doing that and --

GLENN: And completely false.

STU: -- realizing, hey, here's a presidency that I can take.

I mean, it's not to say that these women are all going to turn out to be true. It's all alleged.

GLENN: You have no idea.

STU: They all say -- you know, Trump says he's going to come out with evidence that's going to disprove all of them today. Let's see.

GLENN: But you don't have the moral high ground because you've already ceded it. You don't have a guy who you can say, "This is out of character." When Donald Trump said, "Ted Cruz has, you know, 12 mistresses," it was pretty easy to question Ted and say, "Ted, did that happen?"

"Please, Glenn."

There's nothing in his character that shows that. That doesn't mean that it didn't happen.

STU: Right.

GLENN: But there's nothing in his character that hints at that.

STU: Again, think about this again. Here's a guy who is dealing with this now, and having to fight off all these allegations, you know, here's a guy who tried to ruin Ted Cruz's run by pinning a fake cheating scandal on him.

GLENN: Yes. Correct.

STU: And --

GLENN: Beyond this, Stu, beyond this, here's a man -- here's a man who is still trying to make the issue about Bill Clinton and what Bill Clinton did. And the women -- think of this. What did he do on Sunday?

He put people who accused Bill Clinton of doing something 30 years ago in the audience, when his defense of himself is, "That's old news. That's ten years old."

It's the dumbest strategy I've ever seen.

I'm going to take a break. And I don't know if I'm going to have time or patience to play the Michelle Obama speech. But you need to hear it. Because the audience is pin-drop quiet. It connected. Whether you like to believe it or not, whether I want to believe it or not, it connected. And it was powerful.

You don't have to believe it, to see its devastating effects. And I don't even mean on Donald Trump. I mean on the conservative movement. A devastating attack.

We have been talking about, "There is no War on Women." You just handed them a War on Women. And they took it. And if you listen to her words carefully, oh, my gosh, oh, my gosh, they are co-opting women, and it will work. They are -- they are talking about how crippled women are, and it's time you have a protector. Oh, my gosh.

The conservatives, it's probably too late. It's probably too late for you to regain currently, because these crowds are still 15,000 strong. There is a big part of the conservative movement that just doesn't care. And it's going to destroy it. I think it already has.

Featured Image: Screenshot of Michelle Obama's speech at Southern New Hampshire University in Manchester, NH on Oct. 13, 2016.

Occupy Wall Street posts cartoon guide to murdering US border agents

John Moore/Getty Images

Remember when cartoons were happy things? Each panel took you on a tiny journey, carrying you to an unexplored place. In Understanding Comics, Scott McCloud writes:

The comics creator asks us to join in a silent dance of the seen and the unseen. The visible and the invisible. This dance is unique to comics. No other artform gives so much to its audience while asking so much from them as well. This is why I think it's a mistake to see comics as a mere hybrid of the graphic arts and prose fiction. What happens between . . . panels is a kind of magic only comics can create.

When that magic is manipulated or politicized, it often devolves the artform into a baseless thing. Yesterday, Occupy Wall Street published the perfect example of low-brow deviation of the artform: A six-panel approach at satire, which imitates the instructions-panel found in the netted cubbyhole behind seats on airplanes. The cartoon is a critique of the recent news about immigrant children being separated from their parents after crossing the border. It is a step-by-step guide to murdering US Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents.

The first panel shows a man shoving an infant into a cage meant for Pomeranians. The following five panels feature instructions, and include pictures of a cartoonish murder.

Occupy Wall Street promotes killing ICE agents in gory, step-by-step cartoon. https://t.co/nEogmrIDBC
— Fox News (@FoxNews) June 20, 2018

The panels read as follows:

If an ICE agent tries to take your child at the border, don't panic.
Pull your child away as quickly as possibly by force.
Gently tell your child to close his/her eyes and ears so they won't witness what you are about to do.
Grab the ICE agent from behind and push your knife into his chest with an upward thrust, causing the agent's sternum to break.
Reach into his chest and pull out his still beating heart.
Hold his bloody heart out for all other agents to see, and tell them that the same fate awaits them if they f--- with your child again.

Violent comics are nothing new. But most of the time, they remain in the realms of invented worlds — in other words, not in our own, with reference to actual people, let alone federal agents.

The mainstream media made a game of crying racism with every cartoon depiction of Obama during his presidency, as well as during his tenure as Senator, when the New Yorker, of all things, faced scrutiny for depicting him in "Muslim clothing." Life was a minefield for political cartoonists during the Obama era.

Chris Hondros/Getty Images

This year, we saw the leftist outrage regarding The Simpsons character Apu — a cartoon representation of a highly-respected, though cartoonishly-depicted, character on a cartoon show composed of cartoonishly-depicted characters.

We all remember Charlie Hebdo, which, like many outlets that have used cartoon satire to criticize Islam, faced the wrath and ire of people unable to see even the tamest representation of the prophet, Muhammad.

Interesting, isn't it? Occupy Wall Street publishes a cartoon that advocates murdering federal agents, and critics are told to lighten up. Meanwhile, the merest depiction of Muhammad has resulted in riots throughout the world, murder and terror on an unprecedented scale.

The intersection of Islam and comics is complex enough to have its own three-hour show, so we'll leave it at that, for now. Although, it is worth mentioning the commentary by satirical website The Onion, which featured a highly offensive cartoon of all the major religious figures except Muhammad. It noted:

Following the publication of the image above, in which the most cherished figures from multiple religious faiths were depicted engaging in a lascivious sex act of considerable depravity, no one was murdered, beaten, or had their lives threatened.

Of course, Occupy Wall Street is free to publish any cartoon they like. Freedom of speech, and so on—although there have been several instances in which violent cartoons were ruled to have violated the "yelling fire in a crowded theater" limitation of the First Amendment.

Posting it to Twitter is another issue — this is surely in violation of Twitter's violent content policy, but something tells me nothing will come of it. It's a funny world, isn't it? A screenshot of a receipt from Chick-fil-A causes outrage but a cartoon advocating murder gets crickets.

In Understanding Comics, Scott McCloud concludes that, "Today the possibilities for comics are — as they've always been — endless. Comics offers . . . range and versatility, with all the potential imagery of film and painting plus the intimacy of the written word. And all that's needed is the desire to be heard, the will to learn, and the ability to see."

Smile, and keep moving forward.

Crude and awful as the Occupy Wall Street comic is, the best thing we can do is nod and look elsewhere for the art that will open our eyes. Let the lunatics draw what they want, let them stew in their own flawed double standards. Otherwise, we're as shallow and empty as they are, and nothing good comes of that. Smile, and keep moving forward.

Things are getting better. Show the world how to hear, how to learn, how to see.

People should start listening to Nikki Haley

ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP/Getty Images

Okay. Let's take a vote. You know, an objective, quantifiable count. How many resolutions has the UN Human Rights Council adopted condemning dictatorships? Easy. Well. How do you define "dictatorship"?

Well, one metric is the UN Human Rights Council Condemnation. How many have the United Nations issued to China, with a body count higher than a professional Call of Duty player?

Zero.

How about Venezuela, where socialism is devouring its own in the cruelest, most unsettling ways imaginable?

Zero.

And Russia, home of unsettling cruelty and rampant censorship, murder and (actual) homophobia?

Zero.

Iraq? Zero. Turkey? Iraq? Zero. Cuba? Zero. Pakistan? Zero.

According to UN Human Rights Council Condemnations, 2006-2016, none of these nations is as dangerous as we'd imagined. Or, rather, none of them faced a single condemnation. Meanwhile, one country in particular has faced unbelievable scrutiny and fury — you'll never guess which country.

No, it's not Somalia. It's Israel. With 68 UN Human Rights Council Condemnations! In fact, the number of total United Nations condemnations against Israel outnumbers the total of condemnations against all other countries combined. The only country that comes close is Syria, with 15.

The Trump administration withdrew from the United Nations Human Rights Council on Tuesday in protest of what it perceives as an entrenched bias against Israel and a willingness to allow notorious human rights abusers as members.

In an address to the UN Security Council on Tuesday, Nikki Haley said:

Let's remember that the Hamas terrorist organization has been inciting violence for years, long before the United States decided to move our embassy. This is what is endangering the people of Gaza. Make no mistake, Hamas is pleased with the results from yesterday... No country in this chamber would act with more restraint than Israel has.

Maybe people should start listening to Haley. Hopefully, they will. Not likely, but there's no crime in remaining hopeful.

Twitter mob goes ballistic over Father's Day photo of Caitlyn Jenner. Who cares?

Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images

Here's a question unique to our times: "Should I tell my father 'Happy Father's Day,' even though he (she?) is now one of my mothers?"

Father's Day was four days ago, yes, but this story is just weird enough to report on. One enjoyable line to read was this gem from Hollywood Gossip: "Cait is a woman and a transgender icon, but she is also and will always be the father of her six children."

Imagine reading that to someone ten — even five — years ago. And, honestly, there's something nice about it. But the strangeness of its having ever been written overpowers any emotional impact it might bring.

"So lucky to have you," wrote Kylie Jenner, in the Instagram caption under pre-transition pictures of Bruce Jenner.

Look. I risk sounding like a tabloid by mere dint of having even mentioned this story, but the important element is the cultural sway that's occurring. The original story was that a band of disgruntled Twitter users got outraged about the supposed "transphobic" remarks by Jenner's daughter.

But, what we should be saying is, "who the hell cares?" Who cares what one Jenner says to another — and more importantly and on a far deeper level — who cares what some anonymous Twitter user has to say?

When are we going to stop playing into the hands of the Twitter mob?

When are we going to stop playing into the hands of the Twitter mob? Because, at the moment, they've got it pretty good. They have a nifty relationship with the mainstream media: One or two Twitter users get outraged by any given thing — in this case Jenner and supposed transphobia. In return, the mainstream media use the Twitter comment as a source.

Then, a larger Twitter audience points to the article itself as proof that there's some kind of systemic justice at play. It's a closed-market currency, where the negative feedback loop of proof and evidence is composed of faulty accusations. Isn't it a hell of a time to be alive?

These 5 governors are refusing to send national guard troops to the border

CAITLIN O'HARA/AFP/Getty Images

These days, when Americans decide to be outraged about something, we really go all out.

This week's outrage is, of course, the Trump administration's "zero tolerance" policy toward illegal immigration along the southern border. Specifically, people are upset over the part of the policy that separates children from their parents when the parents get arrested.

Lost in all the outrage is that the President is being proactive about border security and is simply enforcing the law. Yes, we need to figure out a less clumsy, more compassionate way of enforcing the law, but children are not being flung into dungeons and fed maggots as the media would have you believe.

But having calm, reasonable debates about these things isn't the way it's done anymore. You have to make strong, sweeping announcements so the world knows how righteous your indignation is.

That's why yesterday, the governors of Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Rhode Island and Connecticut declared they are withholding or recalling their National Guard troops from the U.S.-Mexico border until this policy of separating children from their parents is rescinded.

Adding to the media stunt nature of this entire "crisis," it turns out this defiant announcement from these five governors is mostly symbolic. Because two months ago, when President Trump called for 4,000 additional National Guard troops to help patrol the border, large numbers of troops were not requested from those five states. In fact, no troops were requested at all from Rhode Island. But that didn't stop Rhode Island's Democratic governor, Gina Raimondo, from announcing she would refuse to send troops if she were asked. She called the family separation policy, "immoral, unjust and un-American."

There's so much outrage, we're running short on adjectives.

The governors of Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New York all used the word "inhumane" in their statements condemning the Trump administration policy. There's so much outrage, we're running short on adjectives.

In a totally unrelated coincidence, four of these five governors are running for re-election this year.

I've made my position clear — separating these children from their parents is a bad policy and we need to stop. We need to treat these immigrants with the kind of compassion we'd want for our own children. And I said the same thing in 2014 when no one cared about the border crisis.

If consistency could replace even just a sliver of the outrage in America, we would all be a lot better off.

Glenn's Show Prep

Did Michelle Obama Deliver the Most Effective Political Speech Since Ronald Reagan?

'Time' magazine's attempt to stay relevant by shaming Trump is absolutely pointless

VIRTUE SIGNALLING: It's time for the NFL to dump the politics

Stop trying to be right and think of the children

Occupy Wall Street posts cartoon guide to murdering US border agents

Smile, and keep moving forward.

People should start listening to Nikki Haley

Twitter mob goes ballistic over Father's Day photo of Caitlyn Jenner. Who cares?

When are we going to stop playing into the hands of the Twitter mob?

These 5 governors are refusing to send national guard troops to the border

There's so much outrage, we're running short on adjectives.