Being the editor of Vital Speeches is busier than you’d think

Everybody thinks I have the easiest job in the world. And I don’t mind people thinking that. Better that people are jealous of you, than sorry for you. And in all, my job is pretty good.

But it’s not quite as quiet as you might imagine.

Take yesterday, for example.

I had just begun to allow myself to believe that a serious presidential candidate had actually quoted the Pokemon movie in a speech—I saw the Cain bow-out speech live, and honestly, the extended Pokemon quote, and Cain’s utter lack of self-consciousness about the source (“I believe these words came from the Pokemon movie”)—it was all was so absurd that it sort of beaded on my mind. The Cain rain only began to sink in when I saw Jon Stewart do a thing on it.

And then yesterday President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton each give a speech that my Facebook friends are crowing about. “Are you fired up?” asks a college-student Democrat about the Obama speech—which stands on the shoulders of Republican Teddy Roosevelt’s “new nationalism” speech, which I must now read.

“A truly great speech,” says a gay Facebook friend—echoing many others—about the Clinton speech on LGBT rights, delivered in Geneva.

“I know that the thoughts I’ve shared today involve questions on which opinions are still evolving,” Clinton said in summary of her argument. “As it has happened so many times before, opinion will converge once again with the truth, the immutable truth, that all persons are created free and equal in dignity and rights.”

And that’s not even our Vital Speech of the Week. The boss got that one.

Am I fired up? More like, scrambling to keep up. —DM