The New York Times analyzed “every public utterance” by Donald Trump “over the past week from rallies, speeches, interviews and news conferences.”
“The most striking hallmark was Mr. Trump’s constant repetition of divisive phrases, harsh words and violent imagery that American presidents rarely use, based on a quantitative comparison of his remarks and the news conferences of recent presidents, Democratic and Republican… And Mr. Trump uses rhetoric to erode people’s trust in facts, numbers, nuance, government and the news media.”
Key takeaway: “A significant difference between Mr. Trump and 20th-century American demagogues is that many of them, especially McCarthy and Wallace, were charmless public speakers. Mr. Trump, by contrast, is an energetic and charismatic speaker who can be entertaining and ingratiating with his audiences. There is a looseness to his language that sounds almost like water-cooler talk or neighborly banter, regardless of what it is about.”
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