Mark Carney - Canadian PM at Davos
https://fallows.substack.com/p/a-speech-for-the-history-books?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=web&utm_content=embedded-post&triedRedirect=true
By James Fallows -a former Presidential speechwriter for Jimmy Carter]
Mark Carney, prime minister of Canada, acknowledging a rare-for-Davos sustained standing ovation, at the end of his brief (17 minutes) but exquisitely composed address to the 1,800-person crowd of world financial and political leaders yesterday. He explained American values, and lamented the effects of their permanent loss, far more eloquently than the person who ranted, complained, bragged, and lied on that same stage this morning. And who left the stage to no applause except from his own staffers. (Photo Harun Ozalp/Anadolu via Getty Images)
It’s impossible to judge the long-term effect of oratory, in the short term. Many presentations that loom large in history were almost ignored at the time. Here’s just one example of many:
At Harvard’s commencement ceremony in 1947, then-Secretary of State George Marshall spent 12 minutes outlining why it was in America’s interest to help Europe recover from the devastation of World War II. Even though this would mean Americans pouring more tax money into the continent where so many of them had already sacrificed. Even though it would include helping Germany, so recently the Allies’ bitter foe.
At the time, the speech barely drew any coverage. But eventually it was recognized as the debut of what became the Marshall Plan, which in turn was the basis for Marshall himself receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 1953.1
None of us can know for sure whether yesterday’s brief address at Davos, by Canada’s prime minister Mark Carney, will similarly be remembered as marking a turning point in understanding world power, and of America’s role. But there’s a chance it will be. And in any case, to keep it above the slurry of the latest outrage news, it’s worth noticing the craft, the composition, and the content of these 17 minutes on stage.
I’ll call this out with line-by-line annotations on the text, below. But the main accomplishments of the speech were these:
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