The phone rang. A neighbour up the lane excitedly asked me, "Have you listened to Trump's speech in Congress? It was great! It's what we need in this country! Tell me what you think of it!"
And so I settled down to listen to Trump's ninety minutes of highly skilled demagoguery - which, if you want to know, is an appeal to the desires and prejudices of ordinary people rather than the use of rational arguments. Those ninety minutes were the longest since the American Presidency Project began tracking them in 1964, during which time J.D. Vance and Speaker Johnson stood up and applauded 327 times - as did the audience; the greatest mass calisthenics workout ever witnessed.
And I was impressed! I was impressed that a 78-year-old could give such a long delivery without once stumbling on a word - estimated to have been a total of 9,831 - or reading from a script. It was the greatest showmanship by America's greatest showman since Barnum & Bailey (and a tribute to technology as he was probably helped by an earwig).
It wasn't just a speech: it was pure theatre as highly choreographed as a Nuremburg Rally, with a string of average John Does pre-positioned in the galleries to pull the audience's heartstrings, with long pauses needed for the applause which helped to round out the 90 minutes.
Trump ticked all the boxes, even with me: "I deployed the US military and border patrol to repel the border invasion of our country and the illegal crossings last month were by far the lowest recorded - ever." TICK; "I terminated green news scam, Paris climate accord, corrupt WHO, withdrew UNHRC - ended last admininstration - EV mandate." TICK; "Our country will be woke no longer. We believe that whether you are a doctor, accountant, lawyer or an air traffic controller - you should be hired and promoted based on skill and competence, not race or gender." TICK; "Two days ago I signed an order making English the official language of the US." TICK; "We have removed the poison of critical race theory from our public schools. I signed an order making it the official policy of the US government that there are only two genders, male and female" TICK.
Even though it was mainly about domestic issues, Trump said he would "reclaim" the Panama Canal. He then moved on to Greenland: "I think we're going to get it — one way or the other, we're going to get it … We will keep you safe. We will make you rich and together we will take Greenland to heights like you have never thought possible before."
Of course, there have been similar speeches before, as impressive and even more rousing than this one - click here. It's not the speech that's important; what comes afterwards is. So far all we had has been chaos, not least on sharemarkets which are crashing so badly, it's almost as if the country is being run by someone who went bankrupt six times.
Perhaps we are lucky that we don't have politicians capable of such oratory in this country. It far too often appeals to the baser instincts.
P.S. To understand what all this means for Australia, listen to Emeritus Professor of Strategic Studies at the ANU, Hugh White - click here.
