Grover Cleveland - First minute of his 1892 campaign speech

That was neat.


"You only have power over people so long as you don't take everything away from them." Solzhenitsyn

I wish our politicians would go back to talking like this, in any case. I don't care for the sensational raise-your-voice-at-the-end-of-the-paragraph thing they all do now. Bunch of god damned drama queens if you ask me.

I agree, the oratory back then was tremendous. Now, since the actual words are dumbed down, they try to compensate, as you said, with over-dramatized "delivery" and voice modulation and intonation.

Same thing for TV and movies in general today, IMO. You watch an old movie from the 30s-50s and the delivery was more monotonic and without contrived emphasis because the dialogue was more sophisticated and that got your attention. Compare the dialogue delivery by Orson Wells, say in Citizen Kane or The Third Man to what passes for "dialogue" today-- if you can even find a movie with that level of intelligent script-writing.

"You only have power over people so long as you don't take everything away from them." Solzhenitsyn

The Third Man:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fja9kwTl_jU

Actually spoken by Carol Reed:I never knew the old Vienna before the war, with its Strauss music, its glamour and easy charm. Constantinople suited me better. I really got to know it in the classic period of the black market. We'd run anything it people wanted it enough, and had the money to pay. Of course a situation like that does tempt amateurs. You know they, can't stay the course like a professional. Now the city is divided into four zones, you know, each occupied by a power: American, British, Russian and the French. But the center of the city, that's international, policed by an international patrol, one member of each of the four powers. Wonderful! What a hope they had. All strangers to the place and none of them could speak the same language, except of course a smattering of German. Good fellows on the whole. Did their best, you know. Vienna doesn't really look any worse than a lot of other European cities. Bombed about a bit.

Oh, I was going to tell you, I was going to tell you about Holly Martins, an American came all the way here to visit a friend of his - the name was Lime. Harry Lime. Now Martins was broke and Lime had offered him some sort, I don't know, some sort of a job. Anyway, there he was, poor chap. Happy as a lark, and without a cent.

Right? They don't make them like that anymore. Probably because we don't have movie audiences like that anymore.

Great clip. Joseph Cotten and Orson Wells, with one of the top 10 movies themes in history.


"You only have power over people so long as you don't take everything away from them." Solzhenitsyn

That was pretty good. Funny how the internet works. Gives us all the ability to click on a random link and be instantly transported to a different time and culture.

Isn't that great? . I'll be doing a lot more of that leap frogging from random Youtube clips like the one that kinch posted after Monday.

"You only have power over people so long as you don't take everything away from them." Solzhenitsyn

Now Martins was broke and Lime had offered him some sort, I don't know, some sort of a job. Anyway...

I defy anyone to read that and not watchlist this movie.