Television viewers often think teleprompters are a formation of glass bullet-proof shields that surround the president's podium when he makes a speech. They are really high resolution, LCD teleprompters with an anti-reflective glass cover manufactured by Telescript Inc. Each one of those "idiot cards" runs about $8000.
It's a myth that every modern president relies on a teleprompter. Teleprompters were designed for actors who had to memorize large amounts of dialogue in short periods of time, not as a crutch for incompetent leaders of state to be performers as they parrot the words of someone else's script. Bush uses teleprompters as a crutch. I'm afraid Bush wouldn't have much of anything to say without his old friend the LCD teleprompter screen.
I'm not the president but I've done a enough of public speaking over the years. Most people don't need a teleprompter to speak.
Think of it! The greatest civil rights speeches, presidential addresses and calls to action happened without the use of a single teleprompte.
To make a speech, all I need a few index cards which I lay down on the podium. By the time I'm at the podium and ready to speak, I know what I'm going to say so well, I only need to glance at the index cards four or five times during a presentation. The only information written on the note cards are a few keywords and statistical numbers (always get the numbers right).
Speakers who are well acquainted with their subject matter don't need a teleprompter to present a speech. The key to being a good speaker is knowledge of the subject matter and the rest is practice. If you research, write, organize and present a speech my formula is plan on spending 15 minutes of preparation time for each minute you are at the podium. So if you give a ten minute speech you will probably spend 2 and a half hours preparing for it. Since Bush doesn't write or edit his speeches all he needs to do is spend a little over an hour doing a few dry runs of the speech either on the day of the speech or on the day prior to it.
If you do a dry run of a 15 minute speech 5 or 6 times prior to presenting it, I guarantee that you will give a successful speech, if you know your facts and you have well organized presentation. And you will have absolutely no need for a teleprompter and you're going to sound a lot more confident and spontaneous than hiding behind a desk or a podium reading a speech from a teleprompter. Teleprompters are an obstruction to most speakers and there isn't a single good public speaker who would use a teleprompter as a crutch.
Bush's over reliance on a teleprompter or earpieces to make speeches is just another indication of the lazy and disengaged attitude he has about nearly every task of his presidency. If a guy can't spend an hour rehearsing a policy speech ends up mechanically reading someone else's words from a teleprompter then I don't want to hear it. He should just pass out a policy paper, because that's all it really is.
The reason why Bush doesn't do many policy speeches or press conferences is he's too damn lazy to prepare for them. Clinton by contrast participated in the writing and editing of his speeches and by the time he hit the podium he didn't have the need for a teleprompter.
Theodore Sorensen made this remark about the political disconnect in America:
"Presidential relegation of speechwriting to wordsmiths who are not essentially involved in decision making, combined with reliance on polls, undermines the role of the President as educator and often creates a disconnection between words and actions."
That disconnect becomes apparent to most Americans when they sit at home and watch the president read someone else's words from a teleprompter. Bush seems to think Americans are stupid or don't get it but what's to get from a guy reading a speech like he's reading a lesson from a Fun with Dick and Jane reader.
Christopher Edley former associate director of OMB said Bill Clinton's work style was in sharp contrast to the disengaged, disconnected slacker work style of our current president:
On speeches that he really cares about, he stays up all night and he rewrites furiously. He just fills up the margins of papers. The morning of the event, at about seven, a small group of us were in the Oval Office. He was still working on it. And he was literally dictating -- he was reading from scraps of yellow paper, marked up from what he had been up until three in the morning working on. Don [Baer] was there with his cassette recorder, taping it as the President read through -- the inserts and so forth. . . . Every once in a while he would stop and say, "Is this OK? Is this right?
Clinton may be fair game for other criticism but not for his reliance on teleprompters to deliver a speech.
Only for special appearances -- for example, before a joint session of Congress or at the United Nations General Assembly -- did President Clinton use a formal text, programmed into teleprompters. And even on those occasions (except for State of the Union addresses), recalled speechwriter David Kusnet, twenty-five percent of the delivery was extemporaneous, and an advance text was almost never given out. Using a teleprompter introduced a new limitation for the speechwriters: no sentence should be longer than what could be displayed within the margins of a teleprompter screen.
I'd hardly say that teleprompters are a even necessary adjunct for presidential speeches. Fred Barton Jr., an actor, designed and developed the teleprompter in the 1950s for use by actors who had to memorize large amounts of dialogue in a short period of time. The use of them in the White House began in the late 1960s but only for major speeches policy speeches and the State of the Union address.
Reagan, being an actor was very good at appearing natural while reading lines off a teleprompter & he was the first president to use them for every speech he gave. He seldom held press conferences because he was far more confident reading lines off a teleprompter than improvising them. But Reagan was a true political genius who assessed his own limitations and knew the best possible setting to "showcase" his communication talents.
Bush's problem is he can neither speak extemporaneously nor read a teleprompter with any amount of passion or conviction. Half the time Bush reads the teleprompter as if he doesn't even understand the content of the material. He probably doesn't because Bush feels no need to prepare himself by rehearsing his material or familiarizing himself with the actual content of the speech he's giving.
One would think that any president who commandeers the use of network prime time for a policy speech would have enough respect for the American public to be prepared to make that speech. In the case of Monday's speech, Bush did his first and only dry run reading of it in the studio less than half hour before his 8 pm (EST) starting time. That's why the start of the speech was delayed for several minutes...Bush was practicing the speech for the first time.
Now for a guy who apparently clocks out of the White House every night by 6 pm and takes every weekend off, you'd think that Bush could find an hour or two to practice a speech before he delivers it on national television.
Hell, I'd be up until 3 am on nights before I'd do a presentation in grad school and Bush apparently has to be in the sack every night by 10 pm or else he's grumpy the next day.
Why do I get this feeling that Mr. Bush is never at the top of his game; be it making a decision, approving legislation or delivering a speech?
For my money he's the worst communicator of any president in the White House in my lifetime. He's also the laziest. Is this the kind of bumbling mediocrity we've come to expect as baseline behavior for a president?
You could forgive Bush if he simply lacked charisma but there's no excuse for being completely lazy and disengaged about your presidential dutes.
Bush doesn't even want to make an effort to appear that he cares about anything but pushing his right-wing Christian philosophy, rewarding the wealthy and global coporations with favorable legislation and getting to bed on time every night before David Letterman starts.