However, it was the escalator in the United Nations building that failed on Tuesday that got our president peevish. I remembered the line from the late Mitch Hedberg that he loved escalators because, when they broke down, they became ... stairs. speech goes, well, he insulted the UN, most of our allies, all of Europe, and, of course, common sense. Basically, the speech was crude and stupid and greeted with an eight-kiloton silence. The speech was insulting.