The poor UHM-Dude. He didn’t get any applause after that seemingly sad excuse for a speech. “He can’t speak.” That’s the feedback I get when people first listen to the clip. But, actually, he can speak. He isn’t fluent. Articulation isn’t his best suit. You have experienced many flavours of that kind of speech. At weddings and conferences, I have often listened to ad-hoc speakers stumble and labour through every single word after they’ve been called to the stage.

But not the Fluent-Dude. No. After his speech, Fluent-Dude received a thunderous ovation. He was patted on the back. “On point, Sir, well said!”

Meaning breaks in many ways. It can even break within the fluent speech, or after it. Those same people who raised a glass to Fluent-Dude’s winged words would not admit that he really said very littl ...