There seems to be meme going around that the President’s speech was written at too high a level. According to CNN the President was too professorial, talking like a snooty liberal with a fancy high school edumacation.
“Obama’s speech may have gone over the heads of many in his audience, according to an analysis of the 18-minute talk released Wednesday by Paul J.J. Payack, president of Global Language Monitor.
Tuesday night’s speech from the Oval Office of the White House was written to a 9.8 grade level, said Payack, who gave Obama a “solid B.” His Austin, Texas-based company analyzes and catalogues trends in word usage and word choice and their impact on culture.
So here it is re-written at a level more appropriate to the American public, with small words, short sentences and simple ideas:
President Obama’s (Now Made Grade Level Appropriate) Oil Speech to the American People
Hello,
The U.S. is in big trouble right now. People need jobs and more money. We are fighting bad guys who hate us in other countries. Our soldiers are doing a good job killing the bad people.
Now, I want to talk to you about the oil in the ocean down South. On April 20th an oil rig blew up. Too many people were killed. There was a big hole dug deep in the ground by the oil rig people. It started to leak oil out into the water. The water is really deep.
We have never had a hole dug that deep into the ground to get the oil out. BP, the big company that dug the hole doesn’t know how to plug it up. I got scared. I then got on the phone and called up some smart people.
One of them is so smart he won a prize for his ideas. His name is Doctor Steven Chu. He works for me. He runs the Department of Energy. He is very bright.
The oil is like a big monster. It is evil. It is hard to cleanup. The oil is killing fish and birds. People who work on boats in the water can’t make money. To fight the monster I told the navy to help. The smart people are going to dig another hole in the ground. With the BP folks they are going to soak up the mess like a big paper towel. I hope that the hole in the ocean will stop leaking in a few weeks.
The water is really sick. We may not be able to get it better for a long time. This is very bad for all of us. BP made this mess. They are going to pay to fix it. I am ordering them to give money to people who can’t work because of the oil. BP is very bad. They did not act like they cared about making a big mess.
The BP people killed the nice people that worked for them. We need to make sure we know why the oil rig blew up. They dug a deep hole in the ground. They didn’t even think about plugging it up. Now, we need to make a rule so that does not happen again. No more messes!
America uses too much oil. This is why BP dug a deep hole in the ground. America needs to get new energy. We will get smart people in a room who can figure out how to do this. I will talk to anyone who will be fair and play nice on this issue. I want good ideas. I do not care where they come from.
Each year the people who fish and live near the messed up water get together to pray for good luck. That is a good idea. The U.S. has God on its side. We will pray that this mess gets fixed.
Remember, we are a great country. We have lots of bad things going on now. But, the U.S. always wins. We will soak up the oil. We will kill the bad guys in those other places where they pray to the wrong God and want to blow us up. The economy will get fixed. God bless America.
Maybe it should be translated into a series of grunts?
I think the public prefers short, declarative blurts like “Mission Accomplished!”