Guest Post by James Copeland: 'How I Would Coach Donald Trump for the Next Debate'

Publisher's Note: This guest post was written by James Copeland, executive director, emeritus, of the National Speech and Debate Association. He was a member of the Associated Press Presidential Debate Evaluation Panel, 1976-2000. He is the author of Cross Examination in Debate (1983) and has advised gubernatorial and congressional candidates about campaign debates.

Donald Trump, like Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Reagan, is a leader, not a man of study.  Men of study like Bob Dole, Jimmy Carter and Al Gore were good with briefing books and detail.  But briefing books and practice debates are not the best way for Mr. Trump to prepare.

Preparation for the next debate must be based upon Trump's considerable skills. His greatest skill was exhibited on “The Apprentice”, where Trump evaluated and judged the arguments of others. Trump is a counter puncher and this skill can be honed to create retorts to opposition arguments.

The retort is the most effective and dramatic argument that can be posed in a debate: It takes the PREMISE of the opponent's attack and turns it back against the accuser.

Example #1: [Premise: Transparency]
Secretary Clinton insists I release my tax returns.

I insist she release the transcripts of her speeches to Wall Street firms, which paid her thousands of dollars in speaking fees. How do we know what she promised them? She demands I provide transparency, yet she provides none.

Example #2: [Premise: Honesty]
Secretary Clinton accuses me of not being truthful when I say I did not support the Iraq war.

My opinion was that of a private citizen. I accuse Secretary Clinton of not being truthful about the Benghazi attack. Publicly she blamed the attack on an anti-Muslim video. Privately she tweeted her daughter, Chelsea, that it was a terrorist attack! She demands honesty from private citizens, yet refuses to provide it as a public official.

(NOTE: A retort is NOT a pivot. A pivot tries to dodge an argument, not turn it back on the accuser.)

If I had the honor to coach Mr. Trump I would follow this plan:

1] Mr. Trump should be seated in an executive chair behind a table, like “The Apprentice”
2] Facing Mr. Trump about ten feet away should be two side by side podiums.
3] At one podium is the Clinton surrogate; at the other a Trump surrogate.
4] Staff will have prepared a list of Clinton personal attacks on Trump and a retort for each.
5] Staff will have prepared a list of Trump issues, Clinton's rebuttal and Trump's retort.
6] Each surrogate will be scripted with the material prepared by staff.
7] The surrogates will act out one attack or issue at a time. THEN
8] MR. TRUMP WILL REFINE EACH RETORT ON CONTENT AND WORDING .
9] MR. TRUMP MAY DEMONSTRATE HOW HE WOULD SPEAK THE RETORT.
10] Roger Ailes should attend each session and privately offer his critique to Mr. Trump.
11] Each session will not last more than one hour (15 minutes for each issue).

For James Copeland's assessment of the first debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, see this post on Bearing Drift:  "Champion Debate Coach Assesses Trump-Clinton Performances."

Masticating Thespian

It was one of those obituaries that make you say to yourself, "He died? I didn't know he was still alive."

In this case, it was this morning's report that former Florida Senator George A. Smathers had passed away at the age of 93.

I first heard the name of George Smathers when I was a high-school sophomore. My debate coach, James M. Copeland, used as an illustration a famous speech that Smathers gave on the stump when he was campaigning against incumbent Senator Claude "Red" Pepper, his onetime mentor, in the 1950 Democratic primary. (In those days in Florida, as in Virginia and other Southern states, the only election that mattered was the Democratic primary.)

Mr. Copeland taught us how Smathers had bamboozled some of his less-literate constituents by using fancy-sounding words that implied worse meanings than they actually held.

Smathers, I should add, denied having made the speech throughout his life, even offering a $10,000 reward to anyone who could prove it had been delivered.

In its issue of April 17, 1950, Time magazine reported Smathers' words as follows:

Smathers was capable of going to any length in campaigning, but he indignantly denied that he had gone as far as a story printed in northern newspapers. The story wouldn't die, nonetheless, and it deserved not to. According to the yarn, Smathers had a little speech for cracker voters, who were presumed not to know what the words meant except that they must be something bad. The speech went like this: "Are you aware that Claude Pepper is known all over Washington as a shameless extrovert? Not only that, but this man is reliably reported to practice nepotism with his sister-in-law, and he has a sister who was once a thespian in wicked New York. Worst of all, it is an established fact that Mr. Pepper before his marriage habitually practiced celibacy."

Had Smathers actually given this speech, he would have been practicing a form of the literary technique known as paranomasia, defined as

a play on words or ideas. This term is from the Greek and is a combination of a preposition and a noun, the former primarily meaning beside; the latter indicating to name or to give a name to. Laying aside the rigidity of the etymology of the term, we would say that paronomasia consists of our laying down beside one word or idea that has been used-- a similar one with a little variation or change. The point or force of the word or idea thus employed is contingent upon our understanding of the word or idea upon which it is a pun.

In this case, of course, the point is contingent on the audience's misunderstanding of "the word or idea upon which it is a pun."

Regardless of whether Smathers actually delivered his famous speech, it became a well-known component of political and rhetorical lore. It is even featured on the web site of the Claude Pepper Foundation. In 1970, Mad magazine published a revised and extended version of Smathers speech, which itself has sometimes come to be attributed to Smathers. (According to my research, the parody speech was written by Bill Garvin.)

Garvin's version includes some hilarious passages and demonstrate much more completely the principles of paranomasia. For example:

Let us take a very quick look at that childhood: It is a known fact that, on a number of occasions, he emulated older boys at a certain playground. It is also known that his parents not only permitted him to masticate in their presence, but even urged him to do so.

But wait, there's more:

The men in the family are likewise completely amenable to moral suasion.

My opponent's uncle was a flagrant heterosexual.

His sister, who has always been obsessed by sects, once worked as a proselyte outside a church.

His father was secretly chagrined at least a dozen times by matters of a pecuniary nature.

His youngest brother wrote an essay extolling the virtues of being a homo sapien.

His great-aunt expired from a degenerative disease.

His nephew subscribes to a phonographic magazine.

His wife was a thespian before their marriage and even performed the act in front of paying customers.

And his own mother had to resign from a women's organization in her later years because she was an admitted sexagenarian.

Garvin's take on Smathers' anti-Pepper speech has been republished in numerous places.

Pepper, it should be noted, did not let Smathers end his own political career. He tried for a Senate comeback in 1958 and, failing that, ran for the House of Representatives in 1962, winning election and serving until 1989. "Red" Pepper, whom Smathers had accused of holding pro-Stalinist sympathies, was succeeded in Congress by Cuban-born Republican Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, who is now the ranking minority member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Hat-tip to Tim Hulsey for the reference to paranomasia.