The speech was an attempt to find spiritual causes to the nation's woes--the gas lines, inflation, the legions of shaggy-haired, stoned kids-- almost like a therapist would try to help cure your drinking problem by getting to the cause of your low self-esteem.
Now I am hardly a student of rhetoric, but off hand I can think of a couple obvious American political speechmaking no-nos:
(1) Do not imply the American people suck. Americans are the greatest and most decent and most hard-working people in the world! We are in no way complacent and lazy. Our problems are never the result of our values; our values are always the solution to the problem.
(2) Never admit you don't have a clue. Carter spent ten days in the wilderness of Camp David asking regular folks what he should do to fix the country. I don't know about you, but I am really too lazy and complacent to think about this stuff. Just make everything better.
(3) Do not appear to genuinely think. As president, you are a prophet armed with solutions of Biblical simplicity. Little pensées about the national spirit are vaguely French and offputting.
(4) Give Americans simple solutions to complex problems. In the speech, Carter outlined a series of far-reaching reforms that would have forced Americans to give up their dependency on foreign oil. He should have just offered tax cuts.
(5) The word "sacrifice" is appealing; actual sacrifice isn't. Make sure that you do not in any way infringe on American's right to keep buying lots of stuff.
Many say this speech represented the "nail on the coffin" of the Carter Administration, opening the door for a politian, Ronald Reagan, who well knew the rules of American political rhetoric.
This historical moment represents the last time an American president has attempted anything like leveling with the American people. It discredited the whole notion that a leader can be thoughtful, leading to the New Sociopathy of the 80s.
One wonders how much bloodshed and financial ruin could have been avoided had the American people actually had been as decent as their leader.
