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Barack Obama:
Address Following February 12th Primaries
February 12, 2008
Following is the text
of Barack Obama's address, following the February 12, 2008 primaries, as
prepared for delivery, and provided by his campaign:
Today, the
change we seek swept through the Chesapeake and over the Potomac.
We won the state of Maryland. We won the Commonwealth of Virginia.
And though we won in Washington D.C., this movement won't stop until
there's change in Washington. And tonight, we're on our way.
But we know how much farther we have to go.
We know it takes more than one night – or even one election – to
overcome decades of money and the influence; bitter partisanship and
petty bickering that's shut you out, let you down and told you to
settle.
We know our road will not be easy.
But we also know that at this moment the cynics can no longer say
our hope is false.
We have now won east and west, north and south, and across the
heartland of this country we love. We have given young people a
reason to believe, and brought folks back to the polls who want to
believe again. And we are bringing together Democrats and
Independents and Republicans; blacks and whites; Latinos and Asians;
small states and big states; Red States and Blue States into a
United States of America.
This is the new American majority. This is what change looks like
when it happens from the bottom up. And in this election, your
voices will be heard.
Because at a time when so many people are struggling to keep up with
soaring costs in a sluggish economy, we know that the status quo in
Washington just won't do. Not this time. Not this year. We can't
keep playing the same Washington game with the same Washington
players and expect a different result – because it's a game that
ordinary Americans are losing.
It's a game where lobbyists write check after check and Exxon turns
record profits, while you pay the price at the pump, and our planet
is put at risk. That's what happens when lobbyists set the agenda,
and that's why they won't drown out your voices anymore when I am
President of the United States of America.
It's a game where trade deals like NAFTA ship jobs overseas and
force parents to compete with their teenagers to work for minimum
wage at Wal-Mart. That's what happens when the American worker
doesn't have a voice at the negotiating table, when leaders change
their positions on trade with the politics of the moment, and that's
why we need a President who will listen to Main Street – not just
Wall Street; a President who will stand with workers not just when
it's easy, but when it's hard.
It's a game where Democrats and Republicans fail to come together
year after year after year, while another mother goes without health
care for her sick child. That's why we have to put an end to the
division and distraction in Washington, so that we can unite this
nation around a common purpose, a higher purpose.
It's a game where the only way for Democrats to look tough on
national security is by talking, and acting and voting like
Bush-McCain Republicans, while our troops are sent to fight tour
after tour of duty in a war that should've never been authorized and
should've never been waged. That's what happens when we use 9/11 to
scare up votes, and that's why we need to do more than end a war –
we need to end the mindset that got us into war.
That's the choice in this primary. It's about whether we choose to
play the game, or whether we choose to end it; it's change that
polls well, or change we can believe in; it's the past versus the
future. And when I'm the Democratic nominee for President – that
will be the choice in November.
John McCain is an American hero. We honor his service to our nation.
But his priorities don't address the real problems of the American
people, because they are bound to the failed policies of the past.
George Bush won't be on the ballot this November, but his war and
his tax cuts for the wealthy will.
When I am the nominee, I will offer a clear choice. John McCain
won't be able to say that I ever supported this war in Iraq, because
I opposed it from the beginning. Senator McCain said the other day
that we might be mired for a hundred years in Iraq, which is reason
enough to not give him four years in the White House.
If we had chosen a different path, the right path, we could have
finished the job in Afghanistan, and put more resources into the
fight against bin Laden; and instead of spending hundreds of
billions of dollars in Baghdad, we could have put that money into
our schools and hospitals, our road and bridges – and that's what
the American people need us to do right now.
And I admired Senator McCain when he stood up and said that it
offended his "conscience" to support the Bush tax cuts for the
wealthy in a time of war; that he couldn't support a tax cut where
"so many of the benefits go to the most fortunate." But somewhere
along the road to the Republican nomination, the Straight Talk
Express lost its wheels, because now he's all for them.
Well I'm not. We can't keep spending money that we don't have in a
war that we shouldn't have fought. We can't keep mortgaging our
children's future on a mountain of debt. We can't keep driving a
wider and wider gap between the few who are rich and the rest who
struggle to keep pace. It's time to turn the page.
We need a new direction in this country. Everywhere I go, I meet
Americans who can't wait another day for change. They're not just
showing up to hear a speech – they need to know that politics can
make a difference in their lives, that it's not too late to reclaim
the American Dream.
It's a dream shared in big cities and small towns; across races,
regions and religions – that if you work hard, you can support a
family; that if you get sick, there will be health care you can
afford; that you can retire with the dignity and security and
respect that you have earned; that your kids can get a good
education, and young people can go to college even if they're not
rich. That is our common hope. That is the American Dream.
It's the dream of the father who goes to work before dawn and lies
awake at night wondering how he's going to pay the bills. He needs
us to restore fairness to our economy by putting a tax cut into the
pockets of working people, and seniors, and struggling homeowners.
It's the dream of the woman who told me she works the night shift
after a full day of college and still can't afford health care for a
sister who's ill. She needs us to finally come together to make
health care affordable and available for every American.
It's the dream of the senior I met who lost his pension when the
company he gave his life to went bankrupt. He doesn't need
bankruptcy laws that protect banks and big lenders. He needs us to
protect pensions, not CEO bonuses; and to do what it takes to make
sure that the American people can count on Social Security today,
tomorrow and forever.
It's the dream of the teacher who works at Dunkin Donuts after
school just to make ends meet. She needs better pay, and more
support, and the freedom to do more than just teach to the test. And
if her students want to go on to college, they shouldn't fear
decades of debt. That's why I'll make college affordable with an
annual $4,000 tax credit if you're willing to do community service,
or national service. We will invest in you, but we'll ask you to
invest in your country.
That is our calling in this campaign. To reaffirm that fundamental
belief – I am my brother's keeper, I am my sister's keeper – that
makes us one people, and one nation. It's time to stand up and reach
for what's possible, because together, people who love their country
can change it.
Now when I start talking like this, some folks tell me that I've got
my head in the clouds. That I need a reality check. That we're still
offering false hope. But my own story tells me that in the United
States of America, there has never been anything false about hope.
I should not be here today. I was not born into money or status. I
was born to a teenage mom in Hawaii, and my dad left us when I was
two. But my family gave me love, they gave me education, and most of
all they gave me hope – hope that in America, no dream is beyond our
grasp if we reach for it, and fight for it, and work for it.
Because hope is not blind optimism. I know how hard it will be to
make these changes. I know this because I fought on the streets of
Chicago as a community organizer to bring jobs to the jobless in the
shadow of a shuttered steel plant. I've fought in the courts as a
civil rights lawyer to make sure people weren't denied their rights
because of what they looked like or where they came from. I've
fought in the legislature to take power away from lobbyists. I've
won some of those fights, but I've lost some of them too. I've seen
good legislation die because good intentions weren't backed by a
mandate for change.
The politics of hope does not mean hoping things come easy. Because
nothing worthwhile in this country has ever happened unless
somebody, somewhere stood up when it was hard; stood up when they
were told – no you can't, and said yes we can.
And where better to affirm our ideals than here in Wisconsin, where
a century ago the progressive movement was born. It was rooted in
the principle that the voices of the people can speak louder than
special interests; that citizens can be connected to their
government and to one another; and that all of us share a common
destiny, an American Dream.
Yes we can reclaim that dream.
Yes we can heal this nation.
The voices of the American people have carried us a great distance
on this improbable journey, but we have much further to go. Now we
carry our message to farms and factories across this state, and to
the cities and small towns of Ohio, to the open plains deep in the
heart of Texas, and all the way to Democratic National Convention in
Denver; it's the same message we had when we were up, and when were
down; that out of many, we are one; that our destiny will not be
written for us, but by us; and that we can cast off our doubts and
fears and cynicism because our dream will not be deferred; our
future will not be denied; and our time for change has come. |
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