The Trump rally at Madison Square Garden on Sunday was extraordinary for its size and location, in the middle of a deeply “blue” state trying to capture its homegrown main attraction, but the event itself was actually quite unusual.

There were plenty of forgettable speakers delivering talking points and enthusiastic spectators just happy to be in the room with like-minded allies. They applauded every time someone mentioned closing the border and jeered at the “fake news” press.

Most of it was predictable. There were some funny moments, like when former wrestling champion Hulk Hogan ripped off his shirt or when Congressman Byron Donalds from Florida jumped off the stage to a rap song.

Extraordinary moments at political rallies don’t happen often, by definition, but when they do, they’re unmistakable, and they always tell us something important about what the people really care about and why they’re really there.

The Trump rally had a few such moments, when a speaker stood up and reflected back to the crowd something essential in its consciousness, gave voice to it and unleashed authentic energy.

The crowd roared three times, and a roar is different from even the most enthusiastic cheer. It is a vocalization emitted from within when people feel determined and strong.

The volume was overwhelming as the entrepreneur and former presidential candidate, Vivek Ramaswamy, and the investor, CEO and future director of efficiency at the department, Elon Musk, were introduced.

It was even stronger when the former (and perhaps future) president, Donald Trump, came on stage.

These three political outsiders with business CVs and bold, forceful personalities have become symbols of MAGA’s mission to fight the establishment and bring back skill, competence, common sense and measurable results to public services.

Before either of these men said a word on stage, they created an extraordinary energy of outrageous confidence in an arena full of fighters looking for leadership. Critics of the rally decried the “raucous” atmosphere, but failed to understand the people’s yearning for strength.

Silence in a crowd of tens of thousands can be harder to achieve than deafening noise, and it can be distinguished from quiet. Dull performance of a scripted speech may elicit a polite, quiet, detached reaction from an audience, but silence occurs when people are fully engaged and moved to silence. I only heard it once when a man named David Rem took the microphone.

Mr. Rem recalled a childhood memory shortly after his father’s death in 1974. He opened his front door in Queens, New York to find Fred Trump, Donald’s father, standing in front of him.

He had stopped by to let Mrs. Rem know that he had paid her three children’s tuition so they could stay in their school. “Who would do that?” David emotionally asked the audience as he told the story. Everyone there knew the answer was not a government agency or program.

There was no sound or movement in the room that had an energy of its own. The audience had a moment of nostalgic silence, reminiscent of a time when community was not a digital experience, or a government-designated protected class based on immutable characteristics or sexual preferences.

It was a group of people who lived in a neighborhood and took care of each other. The people lack community.

Another energetic phenomenon occurred when both former presidential candidate, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and political commentator and author, Tucker Carlson, spoke.

It came as Mr Kennedy spoke of the left’s abandonment of free speech and civil liberties, and lamented its embrace of war.

It happened again towards the end of his remarks when he spoke about the health of the nation. His sincerity and passion simultaneously animated and subdued the listener. It’s the feeling you get when the truth is spoken by a truth teller: it energizes you and stops you at the same time.

The same sentiment echoed around the room as Carlson described why President Trump has garnered such broad support. “The release he has given us is the release from the obligation to lie,” he said. “Donald Trump has made it possible for the rest of us to tell the truth about the world around us.”

These sentences were at once both a jolt of restorative affirmation and a reassuring reassurance to the frustrated, betrayed and gaslighted. If you were in the room, you could feel that 20,000 souls hardly knew whether to shout “Amen” or close their eyes and take a deep breath of relief. The people want more honesty and less hypocrisy. They hate the lies.

Democrats can continue to pretend they see Hitler and fascist armies around every MAGA corner, but that history doesn’t allow them to see why so many people would pack an arena in New York City for Trump.

Maybe they don’t want to understand half the country and prefer to try to crush it. If they really want to understand it, they should look to the audience.

They, more than the headlines, reveal with every reaction, with every sound they make and don’t make, what their priorities and ambitions are. It is the extraordinary moments worth noting.