Rhetorical Analysis Perot

During his 1992 presidential campaign speech in front of the NAACP, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Reform Party candidate Henry Ross Perot brought clarity onto the positions that he and his independent party took on the key issues that faced the average American at the time. He aptly uses anecdotal stories from his childhood along with ethos, logos, and pathos, to give the audience a sense of his credibility to deal with issues facing the many citizens of the African American community. Many experts believe that this combined with his naturally calm and prideful body language, may be what made him one of the most successful candidates presented by an independent party in American history. Midway through the speech Perot made a malaprop and mistakenly refers to the audience as “You People” when his intention was to refer to their people. Many audience members viewed this as a sign of concealed racism and
Clearly Perot is uncomfortable while giving this speech which could be for a variety of reasons. However one thing is clear, and that is Ross Perot’s dedication to the American Public. Perot’s use of pathos when he mentions “if I can't make the case for getting drugs out of this country any other way, as busy as all of you are, just go to the neonatal units and it will break your heart to look at those little children,” was effectively used to get the audience to look at the issue in a different light than the mainstream and realize the substance of his argument. This is important because the issue of drug use across America has caused hundreds of birth defects, both then and now and leads to a weaker population in general. Perot’s emotional attack on the issue only further his apparent willingness and desire to better the lives of the American general