Call and response isn't going to work in front of a Joint Session. You're alliteration happy: 'guardians of gridlock,' 'protectors of privilege.' I needed an avalanche of Advil. And when you use pop-culture references, your speech has a shelf life of twelve minutes. You don't mind constructive criticism, do you?
Well, maybe he thought that your speeches were obscurantist policy tracts lost in a cul-de-sac of their own internal self-righteousness and groaning from the weight of statistics. I'm just speculating. I can't say for sure.
[pause; laughs to himself] A 500-word stanza on American leadership in a globally interdependent age that moves beyond triumphalism by this time tomorrow. If it's 501, don't show it to me.
[to Leo] You're like the guys who say, 'Are you telling me you could only find one African-American speechwriter good enough to work at the White House?' I'm amazed I found that many. 'Good enough to work at the White House' is a pretty small population to begin with. And guys who can write entire sections of a State of the Union? I'd be as surprised if there were as many as nine of us. And Sam was one of them.
This is incredibly good... Will. 'Never shrinking from the world's...' '...a fierce belief in what we can achieve together.' I used to write like this. It was ten months ago. I don't understand what's going on. I really don't. I've had slumps before. Everybody does, but this is different. I'm sorry, we don't know each other, but there aren't that many people I can talk to about it. I don't understand what's happening. There's no blood going to it. I never had to locate it before. I don't even know where to look. I'm the President's voice and I don't want it to sound like this. And there's an incredible history to second Inaugurals. 'Fear itself,' Lincoln...I really thought I was on my way to being one of those guys. I thought I was close. Now I'm just writing for my life and you can't serve the President that way. But if I didn't write...I can't serve him at all.
Yeah. Can I tell you three things? You are more in need of a night in Atlantic City than any man I've ever met. Number two is, the last thing you need to worry about is no blood going there. You've got blood going there, about thirteen ways. And some of it isn't good. Once again, I say, 'Atlantic City.' I'd say sit down at a table, go for dinner, see a show take a walk on the boardwalk and smell the salt air... but if you're anything like me, nothing after 'sit down at a table' is going to happen.
