AFP, Palm Beach :
Donald Trump ramped up preparations for his presidential inauguration Thursday, working with aides on an historic address that will be seen as a cornerstone of his administration.
Trump spokesman Sean Spicer said the mogul-turned-politico will spend the day at his Florida estate Mar-a-Lago discussing and running through drafts of the January 20 speech with top aides.
An inaugural address is a starting gun for any US presidency and has come to define some of the men who have held the Oval Office.
It was on the inaugural stage that John F. Kennedy stridently declared that “the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans,” making him the figurehead of a generational shift that defined the 1960s.
Kennedy also told Americans to “ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country,” stirring a sense of national service that remains to this day.
In the 1930s, Franklin D. Roosevelt whipped up confidence in a nation reeling from the deprivations of the Great Depression by insisting “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
And Abraham Lincoln tried to the heal the wounds of the Civil War by urging Americans to approach the future “with malice toward none, with charity for all.”
To help frame his own message, Trump has called in historian Douglas Brinkley and long-time aides like controversial right-wing figure Steve Bannon.
On Wednesday, Brinkley and Trump met in Florida to discuss “a sort of history of the presidency and past inaugurals,” the historian said.
There was also a discussion of some bold presidential promises.
“He was very interested in a man going to the moon and the moon shot, so we were talking a little bit about that” Brinkley said, referencing Kennedy’s pledge to put a man on the moon during another speech at Rice University.
But Trump’s speech in three weeks will not just be a measure of his policies-it will be seen as a monumental test of his oratorical skills and of his ability to lift Americans’ gaze above the horizon.
The idiosyncratic 70-year-old property developer is often more comfortable talking about himself and rallying die-hard supporters on the fly than delivering a pre-written address.
One notable exception was his acceptance speech at the Republican convention in Cleveland, which vividly painted the world as Trump sees it.
The main author that day, and for the inaugural address, will be Stephen Miller, a young Californian and former aide to attorney general-designate Jeff Sessions.
Donald Trump ramped up preparations for his presidential inauguration Thursday, working with aides on an historic address that will be seen as a cornerstone of his administration.
Trump spokesman Sean Spicer said the mogul-turned-politico will spend the day at his Florida estate Mar-a-Lago discussing and running through drafts of the January 20 speech with top aides.
An inaugural address is a starting gun for any US presidency and has come to define some of the men who have held the Oval Office.
It was on the inaugural stage that John F. Kennedy stridently declared that “the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans,” making him the figurehead of a generational shift that defined the 1960s.
Kennedy also told Americans to “ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country,” stirring a sense of national service that remains to this day.
In the 1930s, Franklin D. Roosevelt whipped up confidence in a nation reeling from the deprivations of the Great Depression by insisting “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
And Abraham Lincoln tried to the heal the wounds of the Civil War by urging Americans to approach the future “with malice toward none, with charity for all.”
To help frame his own message, Trump has called in historian Douglas Brinkley and long-time aides like controversial right-wing figure Steve Bannon.
On Wednesday, Brinkley and Trump met in Florida to discuss “a sort of history of the presidency and past inaugurals,” the historian said.
There was also a discussion of some bold presidential promises.
“He was very interested in a man going to the moon and the moon shot, so we were talking a little bit about that” Brinkley said, referencing Kennedy’s pledge to put a man on the moon during another speech at Rice University.
But Trump’s speech in three weeks will not just be a measure of his policies-it will be seen as a monumental test of his oratorical skills and of his ability to lift Americans’ gaze above the horizon.
The idiosyncratic 70-year-old property developer is often more comfortable talking about himself and rallying die-hard supporters on the fly than delivering a pre-written address.
One notable exception was his acceptance speech at the Republican convention in Cleveland, which vividly painted the world as Trump sees it.
The main author that day, and for the inaugural address, will be Stephen Miller, a young Californian and former aide to attorney general-designate Jeff Sessions.
