Making a speech is easier than writing legislation, but it is also different. A speech is spoken, and meant to be repeated. If your speech is not lifting, it will not be lifted. The words are less important, even unimportant. The phrases are the punches, the words only muscles.

For a speech to be re-used, it must fit on a napkin, a button, a bumper sticker. Cut out the hedge words. Trim your hedges. Cut the cliche. Sharpen your syntax. Small words will trip the tongue, tumbling tones without tempo. Chop them. Stick to the sharp phrase, either curt or cuddly is better than cliched and cloudy.

the American promise has been threatened once more.

more than just money

clear that we must take out Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants if we have them in our sights.

Read those portions in italics. The one if we have them in our sights. is a perfect hedge. This phrase is made to excuse inaction. Worse though, it sets up a bad lawyering circumstance. Making it easy to avoid action. “Hey, they weren’t in my sight, not while I was on duty. I never saw them.” Sharp phrases induce action, their words endue conception. They also fit on a campaign sign.