Speaking of Which

I was in attendance one night as Rush Limbaugh spoke to a large crowd, and whether you share his political beliefs or not, the guy is a good speaker. His stage act had more gusto than a New Orleans chef.
At the other end of the spectrum, my former church had a priest who would lose me as soon as he got to the pulpit and cleared his throat. Studies have shown that the ideal sermon should be only six minutes long or else you lose the congregation, and that priest always talked for 15. Bless me, Father, and wake me up when you're done.
Why are some people good speakers while others make me want to bang my head like a screen door in a hurricane?
It's Called an Eraser
Golfer Lee Trevino once gave a golf lesson I signed up for and he spoke to 100 of us prior to demonstrating any shot-making techniques.
“I have a tip that can take five strokes off anyone's golf game,” Trevino said as he began his talk. “It's called an eraser.”
The group chuckled and he immediately had our attention, and everyone knew we were in for a good time.
Those Kids Carried Uzis
Joe Clark was the most dynamic speaker I ever saw, when I caught his live speech in 1995 at Middle Tennessee State University. Clark became famous in the 1980s and '90s as a bat-wielding principal at a crime-ridden inner city high school in New Jersey. He ultimately turned that unruly institution into a model school, and his lay-down-the-law style of teaching and discipline led to a Hollywood movie about him called Lean On Me.
“To the black people in the audience tonight, quit blaming white people for all your problems,” said Clark, an African-American, as he started his MTSU speech. “White people have just as many problems as you, and the vast majority isn’t rich and privileged like you might think. Get off your rusty dusties and do for yourself.”
Clark's early remarks surprised me and probably all the other 10,000 spectators, but he certainly had everyone's attention as he moved to the subject of Black History Month.
"I don't want to think of myself as significant only one month out of the year,” he said. “So America, get together and stop judging people for the color of their skin. That's sick. You should judge people ultimately by the content of their character.”
The audience was spellbound throughout his entire speech, and when he started to wrap things up, Clark reached behind the podium to grab his trademark baseball bat and violently slammed it onto the stage. He laughed softly.
"Y'know, I only used the baseball bat when the media was around, because the media doesn't give attention to soft-spoken people," he said. "The bat represents the young peoples' choice to strike out or hit a home run."
“You really never hit a student with it?” a woman hollered from the audience.
“Ma'am, those kids carried Uzis,” he replied. “They would blow my bat to pieces if they wanted to.”
I'll always remember that night of Joe Clark and his speech, even though he spoke a lot longer than six minutes.