Today marks the first anniversary of the killing of Charlie Kirk, one of the most prominent pro-American voices of his generation. How could such a young man, with no college degree and no formal institutional authority, make such a mark on the American conscience? The answer lies partly in what Kirk did so relentlessly: He talked. He platformed his opponents, defended his convictions in public, and insisted that the proper answer to a bad idea is a better one.

In his July 16 address on the resurgence of political terrorism, Secretary of State Marco Rubio showed how rare talking has become in political life. He identified a documented rise in violence from the radical Left and warned that the West has developed a blind spot toward this cancer. As he cataloged that violence across the United States and Europe, Rubio rightly brought his case to a crescendo with the assassination of Kirk.