On NBC's Meet The Press, General Colin Powell announced his support for Barack Obama, which is a really big deal given both his stature and his being a Republican serving as Secretary of State under President George W. Bush.
He gives a very clear and specific run-down on why he feels Obama would be a better president.
This is a huge deal in the blogosphere, and getting no shortage of headlines and analysis in the mainstream media.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Obama and McCain in Rare Comedic Form
Barack Obama and John McCain roast each other and appear in rare comedic form at the annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner in New York.
First, it's McCain's turn. He tears it up! (I had no idea he was so funny.)
Here's Part II:
And now it's Obama's turn:
And Part II:
First, it's McCain's turn. He tears it up! (I had no idea he was so funny.)
Here's Part II:
And now it's Obama's turn:
And Part II:
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Barack Obama On Letterman
Barack Obama makes a jovial and laugh-inducing appearance on the Late Night Show with David Letterman.
Here are the clips:
Part I
Part II:
Part III:
Here are the clips:
Part I
Part II:
Part III:
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Barack Obama Accepts Democratic Party's Nomination
After winning a long-fought campaign against Democratic competitors, and final challenger Hillary Rodham Clinton, Barack Obama wins the nomination of the Democratic Party as the party's candidate for the presidency.
Here he delivers his acceptance speech before 84,000 people at Mile High Stadium, in Denver, CO.
Here he delivers his acceptance speech before 84,000 people at Mile High Stadium, in Denver, CO.
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Obama Delivers Important Speech on Race
Fighting criticism over his association with his pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, who has made inflammatory comments, and speaking to the hot-button issue of race in the presidential campaign, Obama delivers this important and widely-watched speech.
Full Text of the Speech:
"We the people, in order to form a more perfect union."
Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America's improbable experiment in democracy. Farmers and scholars; statesmen and patriots who had traveled across an ocean to escape tyranny and persecution finally made real their declaration of independence at a Philadelphia convention that lasted through the spring of 1787.
The document they produced was eventually signed but ultimately unfinished. It was stained by this nation's original sin of slavery, a question that divided the colonies and brought the convention to a stalemate until the founders chose to allow the slave trade to continue for at least twenty more years, and to leave any final resolution to future generations.
Of course, the answer to the slavery question was already embedded within our Constitution - a Constitution that had at is very core the ideal of equal citizenship under the law; a Constitution that promised its people liberty, and justice, and a union that could be and should be perfected over time.
And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part - through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk - to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time.
This was one of the tasks we set forth at the beginning of this campaign - to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America. I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for of children and our grandchildren.
This belief comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people. But it also comes from my own American story.
I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton's Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I've gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world's poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners - an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.
It's a story that hasn't made me the most conventional candidate. But it is a story that has seared into my genetic makeup the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts - that out of many, we are truly one.
Throughout the first year of this campaign, against all predictions to the contrary, we saw how hungry the American people were for this message of unity. Despite the temptation to view my candidacy through a purely racial lens, we won commanding victories in states with some of the whitest populations in the country. In South Carolina, where the Confederate Flag still flies, we built a powerful coalition of African Americans and white Americans.
This is not to say that race has not been an issue in the campaign. At various stages in the campaign, some commentators have deemed me either "too black" or "not black enough." We saw racial tensions bubble to the surface during the week before the South Carolina primary. The press has scoured every exit poll for the latest evidence of racial polarization, not just in terms of white and black, but black and brown as well.
And yet, it has only been in the last couple of weeks that the discussion of race in this campaign has taken a particularly divisive turn.
On one end of the spectrum, we've heard the implication that my candidacy is somehow an exercise in affirmative action; that it's based solely on the desire of wide-eyed liberals to purchase racial reconciliation on the cheap. On the other end, we've heard my former pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, use incendiary language to express views that have the potential not only to widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation; that rightly offend white and black alike.
I have already condemned, in unequivocal terms, the statements of Reverend Wright that have caused such controversy. For some, nagging questions remain. Did I know him to be an occasionally fierce critic of American domestic and foreign policy? Of course. Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes. Did I strongly disagree with many of his political views? Absolutely - just as I'm sure many of you have heard remarks from your pastors, priests, or rabbis with which you strongly disagreed.
But the remarks that have caused this recent firestorm weren't simply controversial. They weren't simply a religious leader's effort to speak out against perceived injustice. Instead, they expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country - a view that sees white racism as endemic, and that elevates what is wrong with America above all that we know is right with America; a view that sees the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam.
As such, Reverend Wright's comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems - two wars, a terrorist threat, a falling economy, a chronic health care crisis and potentially devastating climate change; problems that are neither black or white or Latino or Asian, but rather problems that confront us all.
Given my background, my politics, and my professed values and ideals, there will no doubt be those for whom my statements of condemnation are not enough. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church? And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way
But the truth is, that isn't all that I know of the man. The man I met more than twenty years ago is a man who helped introduce me to my Christian faith, a man who spoke to me about our obligations to love one another; to care for the sick and lift up the poor. He is a man who served his country as a U.S. Marine; who has studied and lectured at some of the finest universities and seminaries in the country, and who for over thirty years led a church that serves the community by doing God's work here on Earth - by housing the homeless, ministering to the needy, providing day care services and scholarships and prison ministries, and reaching out to those suffering from HIV/AIDS.
In my first book, Dreams From My Father, I described the experience of my first service at Trinity:
"People began to shout, to rise from their seats and clap and cry out, a forceful wind carrying the reverend's voice up into the rafters....And in that single note - hope! - I heard something else; at the foot of that cross, inside the thousands of churches across the city, I imagined the stories of ordinary black people merging with the stories of David and Goliath, Moses and Pharaoh, the Christians in the lion's den, Ezekiel's field of dry bones. Those stories - of survival, and freedom, and hope - became our story, my story; the blood that had spilled was our blood, the tears our tears; until this black church, on this bright day, seemed once more a vessel carrying the story of a people into future generations and into a larger world. Our trials and triumphs became at once unique and universal, black and more than black; in chronicling our journey, the stories and songs gave us a means to reclaim memories that we didn't need to feel shame about...memories that all people might study and cherish - and with which we could start to rebuild."
That has been my experience at Trinity. Like other predominantly black churches across the country, Trinity embodies the black community in its entirety - the doctor and the welfare mom, the model student and the former gang-banger. Like other black churches, Trinity's services are full of raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing, clapping, screaming and shouting that may seem jarring to the untrained ear. The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and yes, the bitterness and bias that make up the black experience in America.
And this helps explain, perhaps, my relationship with Reverend Wright. As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions - the good and the bad - of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.
I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother - a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.
These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.
Some will see this as an attempt to justify or excuse comments that are simply inexcusable. I can assure you it is not. I suppose the politically safe thing would be to move on from this episode and just hope that it fades into the woodwork. We can dismiss Reverend Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated racial bias.
But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America - to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.
The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we've never really worked through - a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.
Understanding this reality requires a reminder of how we arrived at this point. As William Faulkner once wrote, "The past isn't dead and buried. In fact, it isn't even past." We do not need to recite here the history of racial injustice in this country. But we do need to remind ourselves that so many of the disparities that exist in the African-American community today can be directly traced to inequalities passed on from an earlier generation that suffered under the brutal legacy of slavery and Jim Crow.
Segregated schools were, and are, inferior schools; we still haven't fixed them, fifty years after Brown v. Board of Education, and the inferior education they provided, then and now, helps explain the pervasive achievement gap between today's black and white students.
Legalized discrimination - where blacks were prevented, often through violence, from owning property, or loans were not granted to African-American business owners, or black homeowners could not access FHA mortgages, or blacks were excluded from unions, or the police force, or fire departments - meant that black families could not amass any meaningful wealth to bequeath to future generations. That history helps explain the wealth and income gap between black and white, and the concentrated pockets of poverty that persists in so many of today's urban and rural communities.
A lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one's family, contributed to the erosion of black families - a problem that welfare policies for many years may have worsened. And the lack of basic services in so many urban black neighborhoods - parks for kids to play in, police walking the beat, regular garbage pick-up and building code enforcement - all helped create a cycle of violence, blight and neglect that continue to haunt us.
This is the reality in which Reverend Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up. They came of age in the late fifties and early sixties, a time when segregation was still the law of the land and opportunity was systematically constricted. What's remarkable is not how many failed in the face of discrimination, but rather how many men and women overcame the odds; how many were able to make a way out of no way for those like me who would come after them.
But for all those who scratched and clawed their way to get a piece of the American Dream, there were many who didn't make it - those who were ultimately defeated, in one way or another, by discrimination. That legacy of defeat was passed on to future generations - those young men and increasingly young women who we see standing on street corners or languishing in our prisons, without hope or prospects for the future. Even for those blacks who did make it, questions of race, and racism, continue to define their worldview in fundamental ways. For the men and women of Reverend Wright's generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician's own failings.
And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright's sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning. That anger is not always productive; indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems; it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity in our condition, and prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.
In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don't feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience - as far as they're concerned, no one's handed them anything, they've built it from scratch. They've worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they're told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.
Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren't always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.
Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze - a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns - this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.
This is where we are right now. It's a racial stalemate we've been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy - particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.
But I have asserted a firm conviction - a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people - that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.
For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances - for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans -- the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives - by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.
Ironically, this quintessentially American - and yes, conservative - notion of self-help found frequent expression in Reverend Wright's sermons. But what my former pastor too often failed to understand is that embarking on a program of self-help also requires a belief that society can change.
The profound mistake of Reverend Wright's sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It's that he spoke as if our society was static; as if no progress has been made; as if this country - a country that has made it possible for one of his own members to run for the highest office in the land and build a coalition of white and black; Latino and Asian, rich and poor, young and old -- is still irrevocably bound to a tragic past. But what we know -- what we have seen - is that America can change. That is true genius of this nation. What we have already achieved gives us hope - the audacity to hope - for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.
In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination - and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past - are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds - by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations. It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.
In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world's great religions demand - that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother's keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister's keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.
For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle - as we did in the OJ trial - or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright's sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she's playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.
We can do that.
But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we'll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.
That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, "Not this time." This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can't learn; that those kids who don't look like us are somebody else's problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.
This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don't have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.
This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn't look like you might take your job; it's that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.
This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should've been authorized and never should've been waged, and we want to talk about how we'll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.
I would not be running for President if I didn't believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation - the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.
There is one story in particularly that I'd like to leave you with today - a story I told when I had the great honor of speaking on Dr. King's birthday at his home church, Ebenezer Baptist, in Atlanta.
There is a young, twenty-three year old white woman named Ashley Baia who organized for our campaign in Florence, South Carolina. She had been working to organize a mostly African-American community since the beginning of this campaign, and one day she was at a roundtable discussion where everyone went around telling their story and why they were there.
And Ashley said that when she was nine years old, her mother got cancer. And because she had to miss days of work, she was let go and lost her health care. They had to file for bankruptcy, and that's when Ashley decided that she had to do something to help her mom.
She knew that food was one of their most expensive costs, and so Ashley convinced her mother that what she really liked and really wanted to eat more than anything else was mustard and relish sandwiches. Because that was the cheapest way to eat.
She did this for a year until her mom got better, and she told everyone at the roundtable that the reason she joined our campaign was so that she could help the millions of other children in the country who want and need to help their parents too.
Now Ashley might have made a different choice. Perhaps somebody told her along the way that the source of her mother's problems were blacks who were on welfare and too lazy to work, or Hispanics who were coming into the country illegally. But she didn't. She sought out allies in her fight against injustice.
Anyway, Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they're supporting the campaign. They all have different stories and reasons. Many bring up a specific issue. And finally they come to this elderly black man who's been sitting there quietly the entire time. And Ashley asks him why he's there. And he does not bring up a specific issue. He does not say health care or the economy. He does not say education or the war. He does not say that he was there because of Barack Obama. He simply says to everyone in the room, "I am here because of Ashley."
"I'm here because of Ashley." By itself, that single moment of recognition between that young white girl and that old black man is not enough. It is not enough to give health care to the sick, or jobs to the jobless, or education to our children.
But it is where we start. It is where our union grows stronger. And as so many generations have come to realize over the course of the two-hundred and twenty one years since a band of patriots signed that document in Philadelphia, that is where the perfection begins.
Transcript Source: HuffingtonPost.com
Full Text of the Speech:
"We the people, in order to form a more perfect union."
Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America's improbable experiment in democracy. Farmers and scholars; statesmen and patriots who had traveled across an ocean to escape tyranny and persecution finally made real their declaration of independence at a Philadelphia convention that lasted through the spring of 1787.
The document they produced was eventually signed but ultimately unfinished. It was stained by this nation's original sin of slavery, a question that divided the colonies and brought the convention to a stalemate until the founders chose to allow the slave trade to continue for at least twenty more years, and to leave any final resolution to future generations.
Of course, the answer to the slavery question was already embedded within our Constitution - a Constitution that had at is very core the ideal of equal citizenship under the law; a Constitution that promised its people liberty, and justice, and a union that could be and should be perfected over time.
And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part - through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk - to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time.
This was one of the tasks we set forth at the beginning of this campaign - to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America. I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for of children and our grandchildren.
This belief comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people. But it also comes from my own American story.
I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton's Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I've gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world's poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners - an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.
It's a story that hasn't made me the most conventional candidate. But it is a story that has seared into my genetic makeup the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts - that out of many, we are truly one.
Throughout the first year of this campaign, against all predictions to the contrary, we saw how hungry the American people were for this message of unity. Despite the temptation to view my candidacy through a purely racial lens, we won commanding victories in states with some of the whitest populations in the country. In South Carolina, where the Confederate Flag still flies, we built a powerful coalition of African Americans and white Americans.
This is not to say that race has not been an issue in the campaign. At various stages in the campaign, some commentators have deemed me either "too black" or "not black enough." We saw racial tensions bubble to the surface during the week before the South Carolina primary. The press has scoured every exit poll for the latest evidence of racial polarization, not just in terms of white and black, but black and brown as well.
And yet, it has only been in the last couple of weeks that the discussion of race in this campaign has taken a particularly divisive turn.
On one end of the spectrum, we've heard the implication that my candidacy is somehow an exercise in affirmative action; that it's based solely on the desire of wide-eyed liberals to purchase racial reconciliation on the cheap. On the other end, we've heard my former pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, use incendiary language to express views that have the potential not only to widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation; that rightly offend white and black alike.
I have already condemned, in unequivocal terms, the statements of Reverend Wright that have caused such controversy. For some, nagging questions remain. Did I know him to be an occasionally fierce critic of American domestic and foreign policy? Of course. Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes. Did I strongly disagree with many of his political views? Absolutely - just as I'm sure many of you have heard remarks from your pastors, priests, or rabbis with which you strongly disagreed.
But the remarks that have caused this recent firestorm weren't simply controversial. They weren't simply a religious leader's effort to speak out against perceived injustice. Instead, they expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country - a view that sees white racism as endemic, and that elevates what is wrong with America above all that we know is right with America; a view that sees the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam.
As such, Reverend Wright's comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems - two wars, a terrorist threat, a falling economy, a chronic health care crisis and potentially devastating climate change; problems that are neither black or white or Latino or Asian, but rather problems that confront us all.
Given my background, my politics, and my professed values and ideals, there will no doubt be those for whom my statements of condemnation are not enough. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church? And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way
But the truth is, that isn't all that I know of the man. The man I met more than twenty years ago is a man who helped introduce me to my Christian faith, a man who spoke to me about our obligations to love one another; to care for the sick and lift up the poor. He is a man who served his country as a U.S. Marine; who has studied and lectured at some of the finest universities and seminaries in the country, and who for over thirty years led a church that serves the community by doing God's work here on Earth - by housing the homeless, ministering to the needy, providing day care services and scholarships and prison ministries, and reaching out to those suffering from HIV/AIDS.
In my first book, Dreams From My Father, I described the experience of my first service at Trinity:
"People began to shout, to rise from their seats and clap and cry out, a forceful wind carrying the reverend's voice up into the rafters....And in that single note - hope! - I heard something else; at the foot of that cross, inside the thousands of churches across the city, I imagined the stories of ordinary black people merging with the stories of David and Goliath, Moses and Pharaoh, the Christians in the lion's den, Ezekiel's field of dry bones. Those stories - of survival, and freedom, and hope - became our story, my story; the blood that had spilled was our blood, the tears our tears; until this black church, on this bright day, seemed once more a vessel carrying the story of a people into future generations and into a larger world. Our trials and triumphs became at once unique and universal, black and more than black; in chronicling our journey, the stories and songs gave us a means to reclaim memories that we didn't need to feel shame about...memories that all people might study and cherish - and with which we could start to rebuild."
That has been my experience at Trinity. Like other predominantly black churches across the country, Trinity embodies the black community in its entirety - the doctor and the welfare mom, the model student and the former gang-banger. Like other black churches, Trinity's services are full of raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing, clapping, screaming and shouting that may seem jarring to the untrained ear. The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and yes, the bitterness and bias that make up the black experience in America.
And this helps explain, perhaps, my relationship with Reverend Wright. As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions - the good and the bad - of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.
I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother - a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.
These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.
Some will see this as an attempt to justify or excuse comments that are simply inexcusable. I can assure you it is not. I suppose the politically safe thing would be to move on from this episode and just hope that it fades into the woodwork. We can dismiss Reverend Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated racial bias.
But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America - to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.
The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we've never really worked through - a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.
Understanding this reality requires a reminder of how we arrived at this point. As William Faulkner once wrote, "The past isn't dead and buried. In fact, it isn't even past." We do not need to recite here the history of racial injustice in this country. But we do need to remind ourselves that so many of the disparities that exist in the African-American community today can be directly traced to inequalities passed on from an earlier generation that suffered under the brutal legacy of slavery and Jim Crow.
Segregated schools were, and are, inferior schools; we still haven't fixed them, fifty years after Brown v. Board of Education, and the inferior education they provided, then and now, helps explain the pervasive achievement gap between today's black and white students.
Legalized discrimination - where blacks were prevented, often through violence, from owning property, or loans were not granted to African-American business owners, or black homeowners could not access FHA mortgages, or blacks were excluded from unions, or the police force, or fire departments - meant that black families could not amass any meaningful wealth to bequeath to future generations. That history helps explain the wealth and income gap between black and white, and the concentrated pockets of poverty that persists in so many of today's urban and rural communities.
A lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one's family, contributed to the erosion of black families - a problem that welfare policies for many years may have worsened. And the lack of basic services in so many urban black neighborhoods - parks for kids to play in, police walking the beat, regular garbage pick-up and building code enforcement - all helped create a cycle of violence, blight and neglect that continue to haunt us.
This is the reality in which Reverend Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up. They came of age in the late fifties and early sixties, a time when segregation was still the law of the land and opportunity was systematically constricted. What's remarkable is not how many failed in the face of discrimination, but rather how many men and women overcame the odds; how many were able to make a way out of no way for those like me who would come after them.
But for all those who scratched and clawed their way to get a piece of the American Dream, there were many who didn't make it - those who were ultimately defeated, in one way or another, by discrimination. That legacy of defeat was passed on to future generations - those young men and increasingly young women who we see standing on street corners or languishing in our prisons, without hope or prospects for the future. Even for those blacks who did make it, questions of race, and racism, continue to define their worldview in fundamental ways. For the men and women of Reverend Wright's generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician's own failings.
And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright's sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning. That anger is not always productive; indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems; it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity in our condition, and prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.
In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don't feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience - as far as they're concerned, no one's handed them anything, they've built it from scratch. They've worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they're told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.
Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren't always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.
Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze - a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns - this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.
This is where we are right now. It's a racial stalemate we've been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy - particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.
But I have asserted a firm conviction - a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people - that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.
For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances - for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans -- the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives - by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.
Ironically, this quintessentially American - and yes, conservative - notion of self-help found frequent expression in Reverend Wright's sermons. But what my former pastor too often failed to understand is that embarking on a program of self-help also requires a belief that society can change.
The profound mistake of Reverend Wright's sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It's that he spoke as if our society was static; as if no progress has been made; as if this country - a country that has made it possible for one of his own members to run for the highest office in the land and build a coalition of white and black; Latino and Asian, rich and poor, young and old -- is still irrevocably bound to a tragic past. But what we know -- what we have seen - is that America can change. That is true genius of this nation. What we have already achieved gives us hope - the audacity to hope - for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.
In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination - and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past - are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds - by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations. It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.
In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world's great religions demand - that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother's keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister's keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.
For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle - as we did in the OJ trial - or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright's sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she's playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.
We can do that.
But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we'll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.
That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, "Not this time." This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can't learn; that those kids who don't look like us are somebody else's problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.
This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don't have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.
This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn't look like you might take your job; it's that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.
This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should've been authorized and never should've been waged, and we want to talk about how we'll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.
I would not be running for President if I didn't believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation - the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.
There is one story in particularly that I'd like to leave you with today - a story I told when I had the great honor of speaking on Dr. King's birthday at his home church, Ebenezer Baptist, in Atlanta.
There is a young, twenty-three year old white woman named Ashley Baia who organized for our campaign in Florence, South Carolina. She had been working to organize a mostly African-American community since the beginning of this campaign, and one day she was at a roundtable discussion where everyone went around telling their story and why they were there.
And Ashley said that when she was nine years old, her mother got cancer. And because she had to miss days of work, she was let go and lost her health care. They had to file for bankruptcy, and that's when Ashley decided that she had to do something to help her mom.
She knew that food was one of their most expensive costs, and so Ashley convinced her mother that what she really liked and really wanted to eat more than anything else was mustard and relish sandwiches. Because that was the cheapest way to eat.
She did this for a year until her mom got better, and she told everyone at the roundtable that the reason she joined our campaign was so that she could help the millions of other children in the country who want and need to help their parents too.
Now Ashley might have made a different choice. Perhaps somebody told her along the way that the source of her mother's problems were blacks who were on welfare and too lazy to work, or Hispanics who were coming into the country illegally. But she didn't. She sought out allies in her fight against injustice.
Anyway, Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they're supporting the campaign. They all have different stories and reasons. Many bring up a specific issue. And finally they come to this elderly black man who's been sitting there quietly the entire time. And Ashley asks him why he's there. And he does not bring up a specific issue. He does not say health care or the economy. He does not say education or the war. He does not say that he was there because of Barack Obama. He simply says to everyone in the room, "I am here because of Ashley."
"I'm here because of Ashley." By itself, that single moment of recognition between that young white girl and that old black man is not enough. It is not enough to give health care to the sick, or jobs to the jobless, or education to our children.
But it is where we start. It is where our union grows stronger. And as so many generations have come to realize over the course of the two-hundred and twenty one years since a band of patriots signed that document in Philadelphia, that is where the perfection begins.
Transcript Source: HuffingtonPost.com
Saturday, February 16, 2008
Four Reasons To Elect Barack Obama (Conclusion)
Fundamentally, I can relate to Barack. He feels real…honest…human. Which means he’s imperfect too…I’m concerned, for example, about how he intends to pay for his somewhat extravagant economic plan, and even more seriously, if and how at the same time he intends to address our nation’s budget and debt crisis, with Social Security and Medicare about to break the bank and some hard choices for us ahead.
But while Barack may not be the perfect candidate, there is no such thing, and he is absolutely, far and above, the best candidate in the field.
I urge you to believe again…in yourself, in our nation, and in our future. Hope alone may not bring home the bacon, but you’ll never get any bacon without it.
Imagine interviewing for a job without hope. Imagine getting married without hope. Imagine raising a child without hope. Imagine making a sales call, or starting a business, without hope. Imagine sending three astronauts to the moon for the first time without hope. Imagine the progress of the civil rights movement without hope. Imagine defeating the Nazis and the spread of fascism without hope. Imagine the day after 9/11 without hope. Imagine going from the stock crash of 1929 to the Marshall Plan of 1947 – a journey from poverty to global rebuilder – without hope. Imagine constructing the national highway system without hope. Imagine inventing an airplane and flying it across the ocean without hope. Imagine waging a defiant and risky Revolutionary War against mighty King George III, and birthing a nation founded on untested ideas, without hope. All of these things are impossible without hope.
Yes, we’ve been disappointed before. Yes, we’ve been cheated before. Yes, we’ve been lied to before. And nobody can promise it won’t happen again. But whenever you are disappointed, cheated, or lied to, what gets you going again?
Hope!
Hope does.
Hope gets you going again.
That positive and uplifting faith that we have in ourselves and in our future no matter what the circumstances – what we call hope – that is the fuel that fires and sustains our nation’s engines of innovation, prosperity, equality, freedom, and fidelity to our principles.
After being disappointed, cheated, and lied to for eight long years by the Bush administration, Barack Obama is that long-sought flame of hope that lights us up again, that reminds us that we are a great people, with great potential, and that together we can rise again and shine the bright light of America far and wide. Yes, we can!
Vote for Barack Obama. Long live our Republic.
But while Barack may not be the perfect candidate, there is no such thing, and he is absolutely, far and above, the best candidate in the field.
I urge you to believe again…in yourself, in our nation, and in our future. Hope alone may not bring home the bacon, but you’ll never get any bacon without it.
Imagine interviewing for a job without hope. Imagine getting married without hope. Imagine raising a child without hope. Imagine making a sales call, or starting a business, without hope. Imagine sending three astronauts to the moon for the first time without hope. Imagine the progress of the civil rights movement without hope. Imagine defeating the Nazis and the spread of fascism without hope. Imagine the day after 9/11 without hope. Imagine going from the stock crash of 1929 to the Marshall Plan of 1947 – a journey from poverty to global rebuilder – without hope. Imagine constructing the national highway system without hope. Imagine inventing an airplane and flying it across the ocean without hope. Imagine waging a defiant and risky Revolutionary War against mighty King George III, and birthing a nation founded on untested ideas, without hope. All of these things are impossible without hope.
Yes, we’ve been disappointed before. Yes, we’ve been cheated before. Yes, we’ve been lied to before. And nobody can promise it won’t happen again. But whenever you are disappointed, cheated, or lied to, what gets you going again?
Hope!
Hope does.
Hope gets you going again.
That positive and uplifting faith that we have in ourselves and in our future no matter what the circumstances – what we call hope – that is the fuel that fires and sustains our nation’s engines of innovation, prosperity, equality, freedom, and fidelity to our principles.
After being disappointed, cheated, and lied to for eight long years by the Bush administration, Barack Obama is that long-sought flame of hope that lights us up again, that reminds us that we are a great people, with great potential, and that together we can rise again and shine the bright light of America far and wide. Yes, we can!
Vote for Barack Obama. Long live our Republic.
Reason #4 To Elect Barack Obama: His Sincerity
Fourthly, I support Barack Obama for President because I believe in his sincerity. I believe in his sincerity because the man has been consistent in presenting who he is and what he stands for throughout his presidential campaign. He has said repeatedly that he is about hope, about uniting people around a common purpose, about changing and elevating the political discourse, about setting higher standards for ourselves in relation to our world and its troubles.
You may say that his message has been so consistent because his campaign has always been pretty successful the way it is; he hasn’t been forced to tweak it. If so, then that speaks to the value and appropriateness of his message to the American people. He speaks, and we respond. That says a lot about this being the right guy for us.
But I would also point out that as Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton changed places in the delegate chase in the primaries, Barack’s message remained consistent, when he was down and when he was up.
Now I fully support a politician’s right to change his or her mind about a particular policy or position as new facts come in (which is different than changing your stripes according to political expediency), but I admire Barack’s consistency in who he is and what he stands for. Barack says to us, “This is who I am, this is what I stand for, this is what you’ll get.” It’s a take-it-or-leave-it proposition, the same proposition that Joe Biden offered that made him my first choice for President before he dropped out of the primary race as a presidential candidate.
Well, I like who you are, Barack, and what you stand for, and I want more.
You may say that his message has been so consistent because his campaign has always been pretty successful the way it is; he hasn’t been forced to tweak it. If so, then that speaks to the value and appropriateness of his message to the American people. He speaks, and we respond. That says a lot about this being the right guy for us.
But I would also point out that as Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton changed places in the delegate chase in the primaries, Barack’s message remained consistent, when he was down and when he was up.
Now I fully support a politician’s right to change his or her mind about a particular policy or position as new facts come in (which is different than changing your stripes according to political expediency), but I admire Barack’s consistency in who he is and what he stands for. Barack says to us, “This is who I am, this is what I stand for, this is what you’ll get.” It’s a take-it-or-leave-it proposition, the same proposition that Joe Biden offered that made him my first choice for President before he dropped out of the primary race as a presidential candidate.
Well, I like who you are, Barack, and what you stand for, and I want more.
Reason #3 To Elect Barack Obama: His Political Pragmatism
The third aspect of Barack Obama’s candidacy that I want to address is his political pragmatism. This is not a quality often ascribed to Barack…he is often characterized as a blue-sky visionary, or less charitably, a dreamer or a promise-maker. But in fact, I find Barack to be very politically pragmatic, which means that he does have what it takes to get important things done in this country. Why do I say this?
The very ability Barack has to listen to multiple points of view and integrate them into a better idea, as he describes doing repeatedly in The Audacity of Hope, demonstrates a meaningful level of realistic, grounded pragmatism. You cannot listen to others and make compromises without this level of pragmatism.
He understands that everyone deserves to be heard, that even lobbyists deserve a seat at the table, and that passing a decent piece of legislation is better than doing without a perfect piece of legislation.
And in his book, he freely and openly discusses the regrets and wrong turns of his life, from his occasions of drug use in his youth to the burning resentment of his lonely wife during his early political campaigns. Most politicians try to hide this stuff as if it never happened, but that is fantasyland and contrary to real pragmatism.
Barack is pragmatic enough to own his life, to take responsibility for it, and to frankly share it with others so that he may communicate effectively and perhaps, benefit both himself and the listener through the exchange.
The very ability Barack has to listen to multiple points of view and integrate them into a better idea, as he describes doing repeatedly in The Audacity of Hope, demonstrates a meaningful level of realistic, grounded pragmatism. You cannot listen to others and make compromises without this level of pragmatism.
He understands that everyone deserves to be heard, that even lobbyists deserve a seat at the table, and that passing a decent piece of legislation is better than doing without a perfect piece of legislation.
And in his book, he freely and openly discusses the regrets and wrong turns of his life, from his occasions of drug use in his youth to the burning resentment of his lonely wife during his early political campaigns. Most politicians try to hide this stuff as if it never happened, but that is fantasyland and contrary to real pragmatism.
Barack is pragmatic enough to own his life, to take responsibility for it, and to frankly share it with others so that he may communicate effectively and perhaps, benefit both himself and the listener through the exchange.
Reason #2 To Elect Barack Obama: His Ability To Unite
The second aspect of Barack’s candidacy I’d like to highlight is his unique ability to unite people, even those of different minds, around a common purpose. Look at the way he gets Independents and Republicans to vote for him, in numbers no other candidate does. Or the way whites and blacks vote for him in overwhelming numbers, and now he’s starting to win the Latinos’ vote too. Young people and old people vote for him. Church-goers and atheists alike vote and cheer for him. And in the face of the adoration of these thousands, he openly calls out to the skeptics and cynics and says, “Hey, we’re not done. We need you too.” Those are the words of a uniter. While Hillary Clinton was focused on securing her base of female and blue-collar voters, Barack was busy wooing the hearts and minds of Democrats, independents, Republicans, and cynics. Those are the actions of a uniter.
I would say it’s just political theater, or clever campaigning, but in his book, The Audacity of Hope, Barack describes using the very same techniques I myself use when employing my own talents of interpersonal communication and collaboration in my work as a project manager. Barack’s approach reminds me of that famous quote by Rumi: “Out beyond right and wrong, there is a field. I’ll meet you there.” As I do, Barack anchors his relationships with others first in the common ground they share, and builds from there, always respecting and listening to differing points of view. Barack has the intellectual confidence to genuinely listen to an opposing viewpoint, and he is more interested in the quality of an idea than the political party of the person who expressed it.
Barack understands that lobbyists are people too and have a right to petition their elected officials, yet, as he said so eloquently in a speech, while “they deserve a seat at the table…they don’t get to buy all the chairs.”
Barack is willing to talk to world leaders that he doesn’t agree with, so that something positive can get accomplished. He is willing to abandon strategies that don’t work, such as our occupation of Iraq, while the administration (and candidate John McCain) will literally pay any price to avoid the appearance of defeat.
Barack understands that this election, in particular, is not about the candidates, but about the soul and character of our nation, and he knows that the future is to be written by all of us, together. That’s why he says, “We are the change we have been looking for.” He is bringing us all to the White House, and we are going to re-make this nation together.
This election is not about Barack Obama or John McCain. It is about us, the American people. It’s about who we are, what we stand for, how we represent ourselves to the world, what standards we hold for ourselves, whether we walk our talk when it comes to freedom, equality and prosperity for all.
What are we going to do about racism, poverty, war, genocide, famine and disease? Are we going to torture people we suspect of being, or know to be, terrorists in order to get information from them? Should the government finance stem cell research? What role, if any, should religion play in the government?
The Bush administration has led this country down a path of such conflict, unilateralism, and fracture by exploiting and exaggerating our fear of a new and different enemy, that we’ve lost sense of who we are, and we need to get it back.
In some ways, the philosophical divisions in our nation are very small. Two-thirds of Americans agree that George Bush is doing a lousy job as President. (http://www.pollingreport.com/BushJob.htm) But more broadly, most Americans believe in having robust national security, a vibrant economy, a modest or even limited role for government in our society and private lives, faithfulness to the fundamental principles of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and enjoying low levels of crime. We also share such values as freedom, equality, fairness, and opportunity, at least for all law-abiding, legal citizens.
But there are also some deep divisions in our nation: the balance of personal privacy versus national security, the role of government in religious initiatives, the place of prayer and “intelligent design” in our public schools, the morality of abortion and stem cell research, the legal recognition of same-sex marriages, what to do about illegal immigration, and how to save Social Security and Medicare before they force our country into bankruptcy.
As our nation heals from the domestic and foreign wreckage of the Bush administration, and tackles the daunting technological, environmental, ethical and national security questions facing us into the future, we need an intelligent, sensitive, confident leader with the intellectual and moral authority to inspire and guide the nation’s dialogue in constructive directions. I believe that Barack Obama is that kind of leader, and we desperately need his skill in this area. I may not always agree with Barack's decisions, but I'll know that he at least listened to me, took my views seriously, and I trust him to make the final decision.
Metaphorically speaking, George W. Bush got himself drunk, he and his friends went out and started several barroom brawls, and then they crashed the family car on their way home. It’s time to give the keys – the responsibility and the decision-making – back to a responsible adult. It can’t come soon enough.
I would say it’s just political theater, or clever campaigning, but in his book, The Audacity of Hope, Barack describes using the very same techniques I myself use when employing my own talents of interpersonal communication and collaboration in my work as a project manager. Barack’s approach reminds me of that famous quote by Rumi: “Out beyond right and wrong, there is a field. I’ll meet you there.” As I do, Barack anchors his relationships with others first in the common ground they share, and builds from there, always respecting and listening to differing points of view. Barack has the intellectual confidence to genuinely listen to an opposing viewpoint, and he is more interested in the quality of an idea than the political party of the person who expressed it.
Barack understands that lobbyists are people too and have a right to petition their elected officials, yet, as he said so eloquently in a speech, while “they deserve a seat at the table…they don’t get to buy all the chairs.”
Barack is willing to talk to world leaders that he doesn’t agree with, so that something positive can get accomplished. He is willing to abandon strategies that don’t work, such as our occupation of Iraq, while the administration (and candidate John McCain) will literally pay any price to avoid the appearance of defeat.
Barack understands that this election, in particular, is not about the candidates, but about the soul and character of our nation, and he knows that the future is to be written by all of us, together. That’s why he says, “We are the change we have been looking for.” He is bringing us all to the White House, and we are going to re-make this nation together.
This election is not about Barack Obama or John McCain. It is about us, the American people. It’s about who we are, what we stand for, how we represent ourselves to the world, what standards we hold for ourselves, whether we walk our talk when it comes to freedom, equality and prosperity for all.
What are we going to do about racism, poverty, war, genocide, famine and disease? Are we going to torture people we suspect of being, or know to be, terrorists in order to get information from them? Should the government finance stem cell research? What role, if any, should religion play in the government?
The Bush administration has led this country down a path of such conflict, unilateralism, and fracture by exploiting and exaggerating our fear of a new and different enemy, that we’ve lost sense of who we are, and we need to get it back.
In some ways, the philosophical divisions in our nation are very small. Two-thirds of Americans agree that George Bush is doing a lousy job as President. (http://www.pollingreport.com/BushJob.htm) But more broadly, most Americans believe in having robust national security, a vibrant economy, a modest or even limited role for government in our society and private lives, faithfulness to the fundamental principles of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and enjoying low levels of crime. We also share such values as freedom, equality, fairness, and opportunity, at least for all law-abiding, legal citizens.
But there are also some deep divisions in our nation: the balance of personal privacy versus national security, the role of government in religious initiatives, the place of prayer and “intelligent design” in our public schools, the morality of abortion and stem cell research, the legal recognition of same-sex marriages, what to do about illegal immigration, and how to save Social Security and Medicare before they force our country into bankruptcy.
As our nation heals from the domestic and foreign wreckage of the Bush administration, and tackles the daunting technological, environmental, ethical and national security questions facing us into the future, we need an intelligent, sensitive, confident leader with the intellectual and moral authority to inspire and guide the nation’s dialogue in constructive directions. I believe that Barack Obama is that kind of leader, and we desperately need his skill in this area. I may not always agree with Barack's decisions, but I'll know that he at least listened to me, took my views seriously, and I trust him to make the final decision.
Metaphorically speaking, George W. Bush got himself drunk, he and his friends went out and started several barroom brawls, and then they crashed the family car on their way home. It’s time to give the keys – the responsibility and the decision-making – back to a responsible adult. It can’t come soon enough.
Reason #1 To Elect Barack Obama: His Inspiring Vision
First of all, Barack brings us hope. His mesmerizing vision and charisma have motivated me and millions of others to believe again – in ourselves, in our leaders, in our future and potential as a people, and perhaps most importantly, in our ability to take back our nation from the war-makers, the fear-mongers, and the religious zealots. He has inspired us to believe that we can re-light our nation’s bright lamp, and return it to the mantle once again as the world’s beacon of freedom and prosperity.
Barack’s opponents like to criticize his charisma as a speaker and visionary. They say that he’s all talk and no action, that he’s full of promises and empty of solutions. We won’t know if that’s true until his time as President is finished. But make no mistake: the power of inspiration cannot be underestimated.
Going to the moon – from pipe dream to splashdown in nine short years – was an absurdly optimistic, even totally unrealistic, notion. And yet President John F. Kennedy lit the fires of our imaginations and aspirations as a nation of innovators and risk-takers, and thirty-eight years later we not only stand as the only nation to have ever accomplished this monstrous feat, but that program spawned entire new industries, millions of jobs, and decades of economic prosperity and engineering invention.
When Martin Luther King, Jr. proclaimed that he had a dream “that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,’” it WAS just a dream. But his moving rhetoric and courageous example inspired millions to demand an equality of opportunity and respect for all Americans that ultimately did our nation proud, and made our country stronger and truer to its ideals than it had been before, and more so than many at the time thought was possible.
In one of the televised debates during the primary campaign, Hillary Clinton criticized Barack Obama for relying too much on the power of “the word” to get meaningful things done. Unintimidated by her smug criticism, Barack countered by confidently and clearly re-asserting the power of the word to get meaningful things done, because he knows that ordinary people can do extraordinary things when a leader they trust motivates them to do so. Our own history proves it.
You see, after years of disillusionment, embarrassment, and alienation from the rest of the world under the Bush administration, the American electorate needs now – more than ever – a strong dose of hope. Hope and belief in ourselves that the last eight years are not who we are, or who we are destined to become. The Republicans offer us more fear, conflict, death, destruction, isolation, and erosion of our personal privacy and civil liberties. Barack offers us hope, optimism, a call to get out of the sewer and into the light, to get back to everything that makes this country great.
Like the great orators and visionaries before him, Barack has the power to heal and inspire our nation in a powerful, even game-changing way. Anyone who discounts the value of this unique ability – especially in dour times like these – lacks a singular understanding of our country and its state in the world.
There is no shortage of wonks, advisors and managers in Washington to define and implement policy details. What Washington singularly lacks is a strong, inspiring personality who can unite people around a common purpose – from Congress to Main Street to Wall Street – someone who can motivate them to believe in themselves again, convince them to trust in the promise of the world again, and guide them in returning this country to its founding principles of freedom, prosperity and equality.
Barack’s opponents like to criticize his charisma as a speaker and visionary. They say that he’s all talk and no action, that he’s full of promises and empty of solutions. We won’t know if that’s true until his time as President is finished. But make no mistake: the power of inspiration cannot be underestimated.
Going to the moon – from pipe dream to splashdown in nine short years – was an absurdly optimistic, even totally unrealistic, notion. And yet President John F. Kennedy lit the fires of our imaginations and aspirations as a nation of innovators and risk-takers, and thirty-eight years later we not only stand as the only nation to have ever accomplished this monstrous feat, but that program spawned entire new industries, millions of jobs, and decades of economic prosperity and engineering invention.
When Martin Luther King, Jr. proclaimed that he had a dream “that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,’” it WAS just a dream. But his moving rhetoric and courageous example inspired millions to demand an equality of opportunity and respect for all Americans that ultimately did our nation proud, and made our country stronger and truer to its ideals than it had been before, and more so than many at the time thought was possible.
In one of the televised debates during the primary campaign, Hillary Clinton criticized Barack Obama for relying too much on the power of “the word” to get meaningful things done. Unintimidated by her smug criticism, Barack countered by confidently and clearly re-asserting the power of the word to get meaningful things done, because he knows that ordinary people can do extraordinary things when a leader they trust motivates them to do so. Our own history proves it.
You see, after years of disillusionment, embarrassment, and alienation from the rest of the world under the Bush administration, the American electorate needs now – more than ever – a strong dose of hope. Hope and belief in ourselves that the last eight years are not who we are, or who we are destined to become. The Republicans offer us more fear, conflict, death, destruction, isolation, and erosion of our personal privacy and civil liberties. Barack offers us hope, optimism, a call to get out of the sewer and into the light, to get back to everything that makes this country great.
Like the great orators and visionaries before him, Barack has the power to heal and inspire our nation in a powerful, even game-changing way. Anyone who discounts the value of this unique ability – especially in dour times like these – lacks a singular understanding of our country and its state in the world.
There is no shortage of wonks, advisors and managers in Washington to define and implement policy details. What Washington singularly lacks is a strong, inspiring personality who can unite people around a common purpose – from Congress to Main Street to Wall Street – someone who can motivate them to believe in themselves again, convince them to trust in the promise of the world again, and guide them in returning this country to its founding principles of freedom, prosperity and equality.
Four Reasons To Elect Barack Obama
I'd like to share with you why I believe our nation desperately needs Barack Obama in the White House as President of the United States of America, and why I give him my full support to that end.
First, let me tell you a little about myself: I am a male, 36-year old, middle-upper class Democrat. I have a wife and young child, I am a U.S. government employee, and I live near San Jose, California. While I have voted in most general elections during my adult life, the national political scene has always felt relatively boring and unimportant to me.
But my apathy has changed after eight years of utterly disastrous domestic and foreign policies from the Bush administration that have failed us as a people, and weakened our nation economically, politically and morally.
After eight years of a long list of shockingly idiotic, disgusting, inflammatory, and in some cases flatly illegal policies, national politics has never seemed so important and compelling to me as it does now. And never have I felt so patriotic as I do now, after watching the steady destruction of our national character, our natural, fiscal and human resources, and our reputation around the world. I guess the freedoms and national pride that I always took for granted, I see now being thoroughly eroded and ground away by our nation’s behavior, and I am starting to genuinely fear for our future if we don’t make an immediate and substantial course correction.
So despite my historical apathy for political matters, I have been watching the 2008 primary campaign with a strong and daily fervor, reading the news, reading the candidates’ positions, watching the debates, and making my judgments about who can lead us back to the heritage, reputation and strength that we Americans have fought for, died for, and deserve to enjoy and pass on to our children. This election is so important that I’ve even done something I’ve never done before …contributed my own hard-earned money to two political campaigns, first Joe Biden’s, and now Barack Obama’s, which is a big deal for me.
But you see, after choking for eight years on Bush’s stench of fear, war, incompetence and swagger, Barack Obama is that desperately needed “fresh air” of American optimism, integrity, accountability, constructive engagement, unity, pragmatism, and healing that this nation – and by extension the world – so desperately needs.
I would like to point out four aspects of Barack Obama’s candidacy in particular that move me to fully support his candidacy: his ability to inspire, his ability to unite people of different minds around a common purpose, his political pragmatism, and his consistency in who he is and what he stands for.
In the next few posts, I'm going to address these four reasons in detail.
First, let me tell you a little about myself: I am a male, 36-year old, middle-upper class Democrat. I have a wife and young child, I am a U.S. government employee, and I live near San Jose, California. While I have voted in most general elections during my adult life, the national political scene has always felt relatively boring and unimportant to me.
But my apathy has changed after eight years of utterly disastrous domestic and foreign policies from the Bush administration that have failed us as a people, and weakened our nation economically, politically and morally.
After eight years of a long list of shockingly idiotic, disgusting, inflammatory, and in some cases flatly illegal policies, national politics has never seemed so important and compelling to me as it does now. And never have I felt so patriotic as I do now, after watching the steady destruction of our national character, our natural, fiscal and human resources, and our reputation around the world. I guess the freedoms and national pride that I always took for granted, I see now being thoroughly eroded and ground away by our nation’s behavior, and I am starting to genuinely fear for our future if we don’t make an immediate and substantial course correction.
So despite my historical apathy for political matters, I have been watching the 2008 primary campaign with a strong and daily fervor, reading the news, reading the candidates’ positions, watching the debates, and making my judgments about who can lead us back to the heritage, reputation and strength that we Americans have fought for, died for, and deserve to enjoy and pass on to our children. This election is so important that I’ve even done something I’ve never done before …contributed my own hard-earned money to two political campaigns, first Joe Biden’s, and now Barack Obama’s, which is a big deal for me.
But you see, after choking for eight years on Bush’s stench of fear, war, incompetence and swagger, Barack Obama is that desperately needed “fresh air” of American optimism, integrity, accountability, constructive engagement, unity, pragmatism, and healing that this nation – and by extension the world – so desperately needs.
I would like to point out four aspects of Barack Obama’s candidacy in particular that move me to fully support his candidacy: his ability to inspire, his ability to unite people of different minds around a common purpose, his political pragmatism, and his consistency in who he is and what he stands for.
In the next few posts, I'm going to address these four reasons in detail.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
The "Yes We Can" Viral Music Video
Artist will.i.am releases his moving and immensely popular music video, "Yes We Can".
Watch it here:
Watch it here:
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Obama Delivers Letterman's Top Ten List
Barack Obama gives his Top Ten campaign promises on Late Night with David Letterman.
Tuesday, January 1, 2008
Obama Delivers His "Yes We Can" Speech in New Hampshire
Watch the video:
Read the transcript, courtesy of the New York Times:
BARACK OBAMA: Thank you, New Hampshire. I love you back. Thank you. Thank you.
Well, thank you so much. I am still fired up and ready to go. (APPLAUSE)
Thank you. Thank you.
Well, first of all, I want to congratulate Senator Clinton on a hard-fought victory here in New Hampshire. She did an outstanding job. Give her a big round of applause.
(APPLAUSE)
You know, a few weeks ago, no one imagined that we'd have accomplished what we did here tonight in New Hampshire. No one could have imagined it.
For most of this campaign, we were far behind. We always knew our climb would be steep. But in record numbers, you came out, and you spoke up for change.
And with your voices and your votes, you made it clear that at this moment, in this election, there is something happening in America.
(APPLAUSE)
There is something happening when men and women in Des Moines and Davenport, in Lebanon and Concord, come out in the snows of January to wait in lines that stretch block after block because they believe in what this country can be.
There is something happening. There's something happening when Americans who are young in age and in spirit, who've never participated in politics before, turn out in numbers we have never seen because they know in their hearts that this time must be different.
There's something happening when people vote not just for party that they belong to, but the hopes that they hold in common.
And whether we are rich or poor, black or white, Latino or Asian, whether we hail from Iowa or New Hampshire, Nevada or South Carolina, we are ready to take this country in a fundamentally new direction.
That's what's happening in America right now; change is what's happening in America.
You, all of you who are here tonight, all who put so much heart and soul and work into this campaign, you can be the new majority who can lead this nation out of a long political darkness.
Democrats, independents and Republicans who are tired of the division and distraction that has clouded Washington, who know that we can disagree without being disagreeable, who understand that, if we mobilize our voices to challenge the money and influence that stood in our way and challenge ourselves to reach for something better, there is no problem we cannot solve, there is no destiny that we cannot fulfill. Our new American majority can end the outrage of unaffordable, unavailable health care in our time. We can bring doctors and patients, workers and businesses, Democrats and Republicans together, and we can tell the drug and insurance industry that, while they get a seat at the table, they don't get to buy every chair, not this time, not now.
(APPLAUSE)
Our new majority can end the tax breaks for corporations that ship our jobs overseas and put a middle-class tax cut in the pockets of working Americans who deserve it.
We can stop sending our children to schools with corridors of shame and start putting them on a pathway to success.
We can stop talking about how great teachers are and start rewarding them for their greatness by giving them more pay and more support. We can do this with our new majority.
We can harness the ingenuity of farmers and scientists, citizens and entrepreneurs to free this nation from the tyranny of oil and save our planet from a point of no return.
And when I am president of the United States, we will end this war in Iraq and bring our troops home.
(APPLAUSE)
We will end this war in Iraq. We will bring our troops home. We will finish the job -- we will finish the job against Al Qaida in Afghanistan. We will care for our veterans. We will restore our moral standing in the world.
And we will never use 9/11 as a way to scare up votes, because it is not a tactic to win an election. It is a challenge that should unite America and the world against the common threats of the 21st century: terrorism and nuclear weapons, climate change and poverty, genocide and disease.
All of the candidates in this race share these goals. All of the candidates in this race have good ideas and all are patriots who serve this country honorably.
(APPLAUSE)
But the reason our campaign has always been different, the reason we began this improbable journey almost a year ago is because it's not just about what I will do as president. It is also about what you, the people who love this country, the citizens of the United States of America, can do to change it.
That's what this election is all about.
That's why tonight belongs to you. It belongs to the organizers, and the volunteers, and the staff who believed in this journey and rallied so many others to join the cause.
We know the battle ahead will be long. But always remember that, no matter what obstacles stand in our way, nothing can stand in the way of the power of millions of voices calling for change.
We have been told we cannot do this by a chorus of cynics. And they will only grow louder and more dissonant in the weeks and months to come.
We've been asked to pause for a reality check. We've been warned against offering the people of this nation false hope. But in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope.
(APPLAUSE)
For when we have faced down impossible odds, when we've been told we're not ready or that we shouldn't try or that we can't, generations of Americans have responded with a simple creed that sums up the spirit of a people: Yes, we can. Yes, we can. Yes, we can.
It was a creed written into the founding documents that declared the destiny of a nation: Yes, we can.
It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists as they blazed a trail towards freedom through the darkest of nights: Yes, we can.
It was sung by immigrants as they struck out from distant shores and pioneers who pushed westward against an unforgiving wilderness: Yes, we can.
It was the call of workers who organized, women who reached for the ballot, a president who chose the moon as our new frontier, and a king who took us to the mountaintop and pointed the way to the promised land: Yes, we can, to justice and equality.
Yes, we can, to opportunity and prosperity. Yes, we can heal this nation. Yes, we can repair this world. Yes, we can.
And so, tomorrow, as we take the campaign south and west, as we learn that the struggles of the textile workers in Spartanburg are not so different than the plight of the dishwasher in Las Vegas, that the hopes of the little girl who goes to the crumbling school in Dillon are the same as the dreams of the boy who learns on the streets of L.A., we will remember that there is something happening in America, that we are not as divided as our politics suggest, that we are one people, we are one nation.
And, together, we will begin the next great chapter in the American story, with three words that will ring from coast to coast, from sea to shining sea: Yes, we can.
Thank you, New Hampshire. Thank you. Thank you.
Read the transcript, courtesy of the New York Times:
BARACK OBAMA: Thank you, New Hampshire. I love you back. Thank you. Thank you.
Well, thank you so much. I am still fired up and ready to go. (APPLAUSE)
Thank you. Thank you.
Well, first of all, I want to congratulate Senator Clinton on a hard-fought victory here in New Hampshire. She did an outstanding job. Give her a big round of applause.
(APPLAUSE)
You know, a few weeks ago, no one imagined that we'd have accomplished what we did here tonight in New Hampshire. No one could have imagined it.
For most of this campaign, we were far behind. We always knew our climb would be steep. But in record numbers, you came out, and you spoke up for change.
And with your voices and your votes, you made it clear that at this moment, in this election, there is something happening in America.
(APPLAUSE)
There is something happening when men and women in Des Moines and Davenport, in Lebanon and Concord, come out in the snows of January to wait in lines that stretch block after block because they believe in what this country can be.
There is something happening. There's something happening when Americans who are young in age and in spirit, who've never participated in politics before, turn out in numbers we have never seen because they know in their hearts that this time must be different.
There's something happening when people vote not just for party that they belong to, but the hopes that they hold in common.
And whether we are rich or poor, black or white, Latino or Asian, whether we hail from Iowa or New Hampshire, Nevada or South Carolina, we are ready to take this country in a fundamentally new direction.
That's what's happening in America right now; change is what's happening in America.
You, all of you who are here tonight, all who put so much heart and soul and work into this campaign, you can be the new majority who can lead this nation out of a long political darkness.
Democrats, independents and Republicans who are tired of the division and distraction that has clouded Washington, who know that we can disagree without being disagreeable, who understand that, if we mobilize our voices to challenge the money and influence that stood in our way and challenge ourselves to reach for something better, there is no problem we cannot solve, there is no destiny that we cannot fulfill. Our new American majority can end the outrage of unaffordable, unavailable health care in our time. We can bring doctors and patients, workers and businesses, Democrats and Republicans together, and we can tell the drug and insurance industry that, while they get a seat at the table, they don't get to buy every chair, not this time, not now.
(APPLAUSE)
Our new majority can end the tax breaks for corporations that ship our jobs overseas and put a middle-class tax cut in the pockets of working Americans who deserve it.
We can stop sending our children to schools with corridors of shame and start putting them on a pathway to success.
We can stop talking about how great teachers are and start rewarding them for their greatness by giving them more pay and more support. We can do this with our new majority.
We can harness the ingenuity of farmers and scientists, citizens and entrepreneurs to free this nation from the tyranny of oil and save our planet from a point of no return.
And when I am president of the United States, we will end this war in Iraq and bring our troops home.
(APPLAUSE)
We will end this war in Iraq. We will bring our troops home. We will finish the job -- we will finish the job against Al Qaida in Afghanistan. We will care for our veterans. We will restore our moral standing in the world.
And we will never use 9/11 as a way to scare up votes, because it is not a tactic to win an election. It is a challenge that should unite America and the world against the common threats of the 21st century: terrorism and nuclear weapons, climate change and poverty, genocide and disease.
All of the candidates in this race share these goals. All of the candidates in this race have good ideas and all are patriots who serve this country honorably.
(APPLAUSE)
But the reason our campaign has always been different, the reason we began this improbable journey almost a year ago is because it's not just about what I will do as president. It is also about what you, the people who love this country, the citizens of the United States of America, can do to change it.
That's what this election is all about.
That's why tonight belongs to you. It belongs to the organizers, and the volunteers, and the staff who believed in this journey and rallied so many others to join the cause.
We know the battle ahead will be long. But always remember that, no matter what obstacles stand in our way, nothing can stand in the way of the power of millions of voices calling for change.
We have been told we cannot do this by a chorus of cynics. And they will only grow louder and more dissonant in the weeks and months to come.
We've been asked to pause for a reality check. We've been warned against offering the people of this nation false hope. But in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope.
(APPLAUSE)
For when we have faced down impossible odds, when we've been told we're not ready or that we shouldn't try or that we can't, generations of Americans have responded with a simple creed that sums up the spirit of a people: Yes, we can. Yes, we can. Yes, we can.
It was a creed written into the founding documents that declared the destiny of a nation: Yes, we can.
It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists as they blazed a trail towards freedom through the darkest of nights: Yes, we can.
It was sung by immigrants as they struck out from distant shores and pioneers who pushed westward against an unforgiving wilderness: Yes, we can.
It was the call of workers who organized, women who reached for the ballot, a president who chose the moon as our new frontier, and a king who took us to the mountaintop and pointed the way to the promised land: Yes, we can, to justice and equality.
Yes, we can, to opportunity and prosperity. Yes, we can heal this nation. Yes, we can repair this world. Yes, we can.
And so, tomorrow, as we take the campaign south and west, as we learn that the struggles of the textile workers in Spartanburg are not so different than the plight of the dishwasher in Las Vegas, that the hopes of the little girl who goes to the crumbling school in Dillon are the same as the dreams of the boy who learns on the streets of L.A., we will remember that there is something happening in America, that we are not as divided as our politics suggest, that we are one people, we are one nation.
And, together, we will begin the next great chapter in the American story, with three words that will ring from coast to coast, from sea to shining sea: Yes, we can.
Thank you, New Hampshire. Thank you. Thank you.
Wednesday, May 2, 2007
Barack Obama Announces Candidacy for President
Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) announces his candidacy for president of the United States.
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