Playing With / Windbag Politician

Basic Trope: A politician bores the audience with overlong, low-substance speeches.

• Straight: Governor Robert's speeches are boring and usually at least an hour long.
• Exaggerated:
  • Governor Robert's infamous five-hour speeches are full of Purple Prose, Malapropers, Non Sequiturs, Robert getting so sidetracked by analogies and irrelevant remarks that he forgets the original topic, unnecessary repetition, Reading the Stage Directions Out Loud, analogies that break and stop making sense, and various other forms of padding and screw-ups. Also, he talks very slowly in a monotone voice and is prone to misspeaking and correcting himself at least once every third sentence. If he made only the relevant points, expressed them only once each, and spoke at a normal pace, he'd be done within fifteen minutes.
  • Every politician in the work is dreadful at public speaking and those who got elected did so only because their opponents were even worse.
• Downplayed:
  • Governor Robert likes to stretch out his speeches to twenty-five minutes despite the rule of thumb that you should keep them to fifteen minutes.
  • Characters who are interested in politics enjoy the detailed analysis and obscure political humor in Robert's speeches. Everyone else just gets bored.
• Justified:
  • Robert is a pedant who likes to include every detail he thinks might be relevant. He believes that being as fair as possible is more important than keeping the audience interested.
  • Robert can't find a competent speechwriter.
  • Robert has always been The Bore, The Ditz, or both.
  • Robert is an Old Windbag.
  • Robert is prone to abusing Punctuated! For! Emphasis!
• Inverted:
  • Robert's a Terse Talker, and his speeches are extremely brief and to the point. An average Robert speech looks like this:
    Robert: [Takes podium] I'll improve healthcare. [Leaves podium]
  • Robert's speeches are actually enjoyable, but so short that they leave the audience wanting more. In fact, they'd be lucky to even get a minute worth of him talking.
  • Robert has a silver tongue honed by years of practice and multiple credentials from Toastmasters. He can bring even the most jaded listeners with him when he talks, no matter for how long.
• Subverted: Robert's speeches are said to be long, but then Charles praises them as "great from start to finish."
• Double Subverted:
  • It's just one person who praises the speeches: Charles. The sole fanatic Robert supporter. Everyone else is bored stiff by Robert's speeches.
  • Charles happened to have attended the one and only good speech Robert gave during his campaign.
• Parodied:
  • Robert's boring speeches are touted as a miracle cure for insomnia.
  • Robert himself falls asleep mid-speech because it's so boring.
  • Robert loses his bid for re-election because his speeches literally made his voters die of boredom.
  • Robert is supposedly a governor, but is only ever seen giving boring speeches. As a result, his official job description is "Some linguist looking for the world's most boring sequence of words … we guess."
  • Robert and his staff distribute pillows and blankets to audience members in case they fall asleep.
  • Robert gives a speech consisting literally of him saying "Blah, Blah, Blah" for an hour on end.
  • Robert achieves this effect after only a few seconds.
• Zig-Zagged:
  • Depending on the audience and topic, Robert gives speeches that have different combinations of absolute length and substance.
  • Governor Robert is infamous for his boring speeches that go on for hours and never offer any substantive policy, but he is also an Action Politician who'd give an average Hollywood Action Hero a run for his money. Perhaps he can't talk the talk, but can sure as hell walk the walk? A man of action, not of words?
• Averted: Robert's speeches are reasonably long, as well as substantive and lively enough to keep the audience interested.
• Enforced: The author wanted to mock politicians, but was told that making Robert a Sleazy or Corrupt Politician wouldn't be "kid-friendly enough."
• Lampshaded: "Does that governor ever stop speaking?"
• Invoked: Robert's speechwriter deliberately writes a boring speech to sabotage his campaign.
• Exploited:
  • Robert's main rivals use his boring speeches against him in their attack ads.
  • After a Time Skip, Governor Robert has been elected to the Senate, where he now uses his long-winded speeches to filibuster bills he doesn't want to see passed.
• Defied:
  • After one boring speech too many, a strict fifteen-minute time limit is implemented.
  • Shortly after starting on a boring speech, Robert says, "Who wrote this boring garbage?", throws out the script, and ad-libs a witty speech instead. The audience loves it, and Robert goes on to write all his future speeches himself in that style.
• Discussed: "I really hope Governor Robert's first speech won't take more than ten minutes."
• Conversed: "Do the politicians in this show only exist to bore the audience to death with their speeches?"
• Implied: Even though Robert and his opponent Adelaide are said to be about equally popular, only the latter's speeches draw a crowd.
• Deconstructed:
  • Robert is a legitimately good governor, but his reputation as "Mr. Boring One-Hour Speeches" overshadows his positive achievements. His rival Adelaide is a good orator and people actually listen to her speeches, so she uses them to attract a large base and even turn some of Robert's supporters against him. She goes on to defeat him in what should have been his easy re-election.
  • The town is being bombed, and is in desperate need of a Rousing Speech. Robert tries to give one, but it's so boring that it only leaves the audience feeling more hopeless.
• Reconstructed:
  • People forgive Robert's overlong, low-substance speeches for one of two reasons:
    • He is Vindicated by History and encouraged to return to politics.
    • He has Vetinari Job Security in his prime.
  • The situation was so dire and he had such short notice about having to give a speech that even the greatest speaker on earth couldn't say anything encouraging or meaningful.
• Played for Laughs:
  • People are seen doing absurd things just to avoid having to attend Robert's speeches. Even the President, a political ally of Robert's, would rather say "I Need to Go Iron My Dog" than endure a full Robert speech.
  • Robert's rambling speeches include a stream-of-consciousness standup comedy routine.
  • Other characters see Robert's speeches as being full of narm.
  • A Funny Background Event happens during Robert's speech.
• Played for Drama:
  • Robert's rambling speeches are used to show that he's become or becoming senile.
  • Someone has proposed a bill that would give Emergency Authority to President Evil. It's likely to pass, so Senator Robert only has one way to stop it: filibustering it for hours, and the rules don't allow him to go off-topic or stop talking for any reason except to hear questions...
• Played for Horror: President Evil's monotone speeches about his genocidal policies show just how little he cares about human life.

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Dear people of TV Tropes. Ahhh, TV Tropes. A wonderful place. I spent so many hours of my childhood here. Reading about my favourite shows. Troping obscure works myself. Hanging out in the forums. And maybe Edit Warring a little — but we don't talk about that. Pause for effect, looking out over the crowd from right to left and back again. So many nice memories. They helped me turn into the person I am today. Oh, Crap! I forgot to introduce myself. I am Windbag Politician. [Mumbling] Wait, can't I assume everyone interested in this already knows who I am? No? Okay. [Starts talking normally again] I am Windbag Politician. I represent the Lumper Party. As I gesture, I spent a lot of time on TV Tropes before finally finding my place in the fantastic Lumper Party. Uhm, not that there's anything wrong with the Splitter Party, of course. I've met so many nice Splitters throughout the years, and they're all very nice to work with. But enough about that. Let's get to the point. I will now give my, er, one-hour speech about the huge problem of matter and what to do about it — wait, did I say "matter"? I meant "natter". Hmm. Anyway, the most important thing is...

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