What does it mean when a journalist describes a speech as a “political rhetoric”? What does that mean? Is it a negative word or a positive word?

"the only completely stationary object in the room was an enormous couch on which two young women were buoyed up as though upon an anchored balloon. they were both in white and their dresses were rippling and fluttering as if they had just been blown back in after a short flight around the house."