Michael Medved explains what was missed in Trump’s Poland speech

Conservative Michael Medved says that President Donald Trump’s overseas trips haven’t been as sensational as his antics at home. In fact, his meetings with other world leaders haven’t gone terrible.

But his recent speech in Poland had some drawbacks, as well as some context that Americans might have missed.

“When I looked at the transcript of Trump’s speech and then I listened to it, the stuff that he threw in that was ad libbed was so stupid and so unnecessary,” Medved told The Ron and Don Show. “The prepared text (of his speech) was fine and it was responsible.”

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“He went back to this thing about European countries having to pay into NATO — they don’t pay into NATO,” he said. “That’s not what they are supposed to do. There are no NATO Troops. There are Dutch troops that are assigned to NATO. There are American troops that are assigned to NATO. There’s no such thing as a NATO uniform or a NATO tank or a NATO plane. President Trump has to learn that.”

“Then he said it was amazing how much they have inherited from their ancestors [has never existed to this extent before],” Medved added. “This makes no sense; it was an ad lib.”

Trump’s speech: The good

While Trump’s improvised speech didn’t go over so well, whoever prepared the speech for the president had done their homework, Medved said. The speech had a tone that could be lost on many Americans, but it was picked up by the Polish audience. That tone was all about Russia.

“What’s very striking is that he was not only speaking about defending the West against the dangers of Islamic terrorism, people have underrated the extent of speaking to this Polish crowd,” Medved said. “He was speaking about defense against Russia. He did call Putin out to some extent in the text of his speech.”

“This is a country that was invaded by the Soviet Union simultaneously to the invasion by Nazi Germany — Sept. 1, 1939,” he said. “And a country that was terribly oppressed, persecuted and devastated by Russian imperialism … going back to before Communism, to the days of the czar.”

The Polish crowd liked that tone so much that they were cheering “Go Donald Trump,” Medved points out.

“They were very enthusiastic,” he said. “Because they heard that this is a guy talking about rallying us against the danger to our east.”

Another targeted point of Trump’s speech in Poland was the religious overtones.

“President Trump was very smart about this, he spoke to it directly in the speech,” Medved said. “Poland is by far the most religious country in Europe; churches are full and people are serious about their Catholicism … President Trump spoke about the importance of faith in terms of finding that will to resist and to triumph; not only against Islamic terrorism but against any threats from emerging authoritarianism in Russian, North Korea and elsewhere.”