With profound gratitude and great humility, I accept your nomination
for the presidency of the United States.
Let
me express my thanks to the historic slate of candidates who
accompanied me on this journey, and especially the one who traveled the
farthest - a champion for working Americans and an inspiration to my
daughters and to yours -- Hillary Rodham Clinton. To President
Clinton, who last night made the case for change as only he can make
it; to Ted Kennedy, who embodies the spirit of service; and to the next
Vice President of the United States, Joe Biden, I thank you. I am
grateful to finish this journey with one of the finest statesmen of our
time, a man at ease with everyone from world leaders to the conductors
on the Amtrak train he still takes home every night.
To the love
of my life, our next First Lady, Michelle Obama, and to Sasha and Malia
- I love you so much, and I'm so proud of all of you.
Four years
ago, I stood before you and told you my story - of the brief union
between a young man from Kenya and a young woman from Kansas who
weren't well-off or well-known, but shared a belief that in America,
their son could achieve whatever he put his mind to.
It is
that promise that has always set this country apart - that through hard
work and sacrifice, each of us can pursue our individual dreams but
still come together as one American family, to ensure that the next
generation can pursue their dreams as well.
That's why I stand
here tonight. Because for two hundred and thirty two years, at
each
moment when that promise was in jeopardy, ordinary men and women -
students and soldiers, farmers and teachers, nurses and janitors --
found the courage to keep it alive.
We meet at one of those
defining moments - a moment when our nation is at war, our economy is
in turmoil, and the American promise has been threatened once more.
Tonight,
more Americans are out of work and more are working harder for
less.
More of you have lost your homes and even more are watching your home
values plummet. More of you have cars you can't afford to drive,
credit card bills you can't afford to pay, and tuition that's beyond
your reach.
These challenges are not all of government's
making. But the failure to respond is a direct result of a broken
politics in Washington and the failed policies of George W. Bush.
America, we are better than these last eight years. We are a
better country than this.
This
country is more decent than one where a woman in Ohio, on the brink of
retirement, finds herself one illness away from disaster after a
lifetime of hard work.
This country is more generous than one
where a man in Indiana has to pack up the equipment he's worked on for
twenty years and watch it shipped off to China, and then chokes up as
he explains how he felt like a failure when he went home to tell his
family the news.
We are more compassionate than a government
that lets veterans sleep on our streets and families slide into
poverty; that sits on its hands while a major American city drowns
before our eyes.
Tonight, I say to the American people, to
Democrats and Republicans and Independents across this great land -
enough! This moment - this election - is our chance to keep, in
the
21st century, the American promise alive. Because next week, in
Minnesota, the same party that brought you two terms of George Bush and
Dick Cheney will ask this country for a third. And we are here
because
we love this country too much to let the next four years look like the
last eight. On November 4th, we must stand up and say: "Eight is
enough."
Now let there be no doubt. The Republican nominee,
John McCain, has worn the uniform of our country with bravery and
distinction, and for that we owe him our gratitude and respect.
And
next week, we'll also hear about those occasions when he's broken with
his party as evidence that he can deliver the change that we need.
But
the record's clear: John McCain has voted with George Bush ninety
percent of the time. Senator McCain likes to talk about judgment,
but
really, what does it say about your judgment when you think George Bush
has been right more than ninety percent of the time? I don't know
about you, but I'm not ready to take a ten percent chance on change.
The
truth is, on issue after issue that would make a difference in your
lives - on health care and education and the economy - Senator McCain
has been anything but independent. He said that our economy has
made
"great progress" under this President. He said that the
fundamentals
of the economy are strong. And when one of his chief advisors -
the
man who wrote his economic plan - was talking about the anxiety
Americans are feeling, he said that we were just suffering from a
"mental recession," and that we've become, and I quote, "a nation of
whiners."
A nation of whiners? Tell that to the proud auto
workers at a Michigan plant who, after they found out it was closing,
kept showing up every day and working as hard as ever, because they
knew there were people who counted on the brakes that they made.
Tell
that to the military families who shoulder their burdens silently as
they watch their loved ones leave for their third or fourth or fifth
tour of duty. These are not whiners. They work hard and
give back and
keep going without complaint. These are the Americans that I know.
Now,
I don't believe that Senator McCain doesn't care what's going on in the
lives of Americans. I just think he doesn't know. Why else
would he
define middle-class as someone making under five million dollars a
year? How else could he propose hundreds of billions in tax
breaks for
big corporations and oil companies but not one penny of tax relief to
more than one hundred million Americans? How else could he offer
a
health care plan that would actually tax people's benefits, or an
education plan that would do nothing to help families pay for college,
or a plan that would privatize Social Security and gamble your
retirement?
It's not because John McCain doesn't care. It's because John
McCain doesn't get it.
For
over two decades, he's subscribed to that old, discredited Republican
philosophy - give more and more to those with the most and hope that
prosperity trickles down to everyone else. In Washington, they
call
this the Ownership Society, but what it really means is - you're on
your own. Out of work? Tough luck. No health
care? The market will
fix it. Born into poverty? Pull yourself up by your own
bootstraps -
even if you don't have boots. You're on your own.
Well it's time for them to own their failure. It's time for us
to change America.
You see, we Democrats have a very different measure of what constitutes
progress in this country.
We
measure progress by how many people can find a job that pays the
mortgage; whether you can put a little extra money away at the end of
each month so you can someday watch your child receive her college
diploma. We measure progress in the 23 million new jobs that were
created when Bill Clinton was President - when the average American
family saw its income go up $7,500 instead of down $2,000 like it has
under George Bush.
We measure the strength of our economy not by
the number of billionaires we have or the profits of the Fortune 500,
but by whether someone with a good idea can take a risk and start a new
business, or whether the waitress who lives on tips can take a day off
to look after a sick kid without losing her job - an economy that
honors the dignity of work.
The fundamentals we use to measure
economic strength are whether we are living up to that fundamental
promise that has made this country great - a promise that is the only
reason I am standing here tonight.
Because in the faces of those
young veterans who come back from Iraq and Afghanistan, I see my
grandfather, who signed up after Pearl Harbor, marched in Patton's
Army, and was rewarded by a grateful nation with the chance to go to
college on the GI Bill.
In the face of that young student who
sleeps just three hours before working the night shift, I think about
my mom, who raised my sister and me on her own while she worked and
earned her degree; who once turned to food stamps but was still able to
send us to the best schools in the country with the help of student
loans and scholarships.
When I listen to another worker tell me
that his factory has shut down, I remember all those men and women on
the South Side of Chicago who I stood by and fought for two decades ago
after the local steel plant closed.
And when I hear a woman talk
about the difficulties of starting her own business, I think about my
grandmother, who worked her way up from the secretarial pool to
middle-management, despite years of being passed over for promotions
because she was a woman. She's the one who taught me about hard
work.
She's the one who put off buying a new car or a new dress for herself
so that I could have a better life. She poured everything she had
into
me. And although she can no longer travel, I know that she's
watching
tonight, and that tonight is her night as well.
I don't know
what kind of lives John McCain thinks that celebrities lead, but this
has been mine. These are my heroes. Theirs are the stories
that
shaped me. And it is on their behalf that I intend to win this
election and keep our promise alive as President of the United States.
What is that promise?
It's
a promise that says each of us has the freedom to make of our own lives
what we will, but that we also have the obligation to treat each other
with dignity and respect.
It's a promise that says the market
should reward drive and innovation and generate growth, but that
businesses should live up to their responsibilities to create American
jobs, look out for American workers, and play by the rules of the road.
Ours
is a promise that says government cannot solve all our problems, but
what it should do is that which we cannot do for ourselves - protect us
from harm and provide every child a decent education; keep our water
clean and our toys safe; invest in new schools and new roads and new
science and technology.
Our government should work for us, not
against us. It should help us, not hurt us. It should
ensure
opportunity not just for those with the most money and influence, but
for every American who's willing to work.
That's the promise of
America - the idea that we are responsible for ourselves, but that we
also rise or fall as one nation; the fundamental belief that I am my
brother's keeper; I am my sister's keeper.
That's the promise we
need to keep. That's the change we need right now. So let
me spell
out exactly what that change would mean if I am President.
Change
means a tax code that doesn't reward the lobbyists who wrote it, but
the American workers and small businesses who deserve it.
Unlike
John McCain, I will stop giving tax breaks to corporations that ship
jobs overseas, and I will start giving them to companies that create
good jobs right here in America.
I will eliminate capital gains
taxes for the small businesses and the start-ups that will create the
high-wage, high-tech jobs of tomorrow.
I will cut taxes - cut
taxes - for 95% of all working families. Because in an economy
like
this, the last thing we should do is raise taxes on the middle-class.
And
for the sake of our economy, our security, and the future of our
planet, I will set a clear goal as President: in ten years, we will
finally end our dependence on oil from the Middle East.
Washington's
been talking about our oil addiction for the last thirty years, and
John McCain has been there for twenty-six of them. In that time,
he's
said no to higher fuel-efficiency standards for cars, no to investments
in renewable energy, no to renewable fuels. And today, we import
triple the amount of oil as the day that Senator McCain took office.
Now
is the time to end this addiction, and to understand that drilling is a
stop-gap measure, not a long-term solution. Not even close.
As
President, I will tap our natural gas reserves, invest in clean coal
technology, and find ways to safely harness nuclear power. I'll
help
our auto companies re-tool, so that the fuel-efficient cars of the
future are built right here in America. I'll make it easier for
the
American people to afford these new cars. And I'll invest 150
billion
dollars over the next decade in affordable, renewable sources of energy
- wind power and solar power and the next generation of biofuels; an
investment that will lead to new industries and five million new jobs
that pay well and can't ever be outsourced.
America, now is not the time for small plans.
Now
is the time to finally meet our moral obligation to provide every child
a world-class education, because it will take nothing less to compete
in the global economy. Michelle and I are only here tonight
because we
were given a chance at an education. And I will not settle for an
America where some kids don't have that chance. I'll invest in
early
childhood education. I'll recruit an army of new teachers, and
pay
them higher salaries and give them more support. And in exchange,
I'll
ask for higher standards and more accountability. And we will
keep our
promise to every young American - if you commit to serving your
community or your country, we will make sure you can afford a college
education.
Now is the time to finally keep the promise of
affordable, accessible health care for every single American. If
you
have health care, my plan will lower your premiums. If you don't,
you'll be able to get the same kind of coverage that members of
Congress give themselves. And as someone who watched my mother
argue
with insurance companies while she lay in bed dying of cancer, I will
make certain those companies stop discriminating against those who are
sick and need care the most.
Now is the time to help families
with paid sick days and better family leave, because nobody in America
should have to choose between keeping their jobs and caring for a sick
child or ailing parent.
Now is the time to change our bankruptcy
laws, so that your pensions are protected ahead of CEO bonuses; and the
time to protect Social Security for future generations.
And now
is the time to keep the promise of equal pay for an equal day's work,
because I want my daughters to have exactly the same opportunities as
your sons.
Now, many of these plans will cost money, which is
why I've laid out how I'll pay for every dime - by closing corporate
loopholes and tax havens that don't help America grow. But I will
also
go through the federal budget, line by line, eliminating programs that
no longer work and making the ones we do need work better and cost less
- because we cannot meet twenty-first century challenges with a
twentieth century bureaucracy.
And Democrats, we must also admit
that fulfilling America's promise will require more than just
money.
It will require a renewed sense of responsibility from each of us to
recover what John F. Kennedy called our "intellectual and moral
strength." Yes, government must lead on energy independence, but
each
of us must do our part to make our homes and businesses more efficient.
Yes, we must provide more ladders to success for young men who fall
into lives of crime and despair. But we must also admit that
programs
alone can't replace parents; that government can't turn off the
television and make a child do her homework; that fathers must take
more responsibility for providing the love and guidance their children
need.
Individual responsibility and mutual responsibility - that's the
essence of America's promise.
And
just as we keep our promise to the next generation here at home, so
must we keep America's promise abroad. If John McCain wants
to have a
debate about who has the temperament, and judgment, to serve as the
next Commander-in-Chief, that's a debate I'm ready to have.
For
while Senator McCain was turning his sights to Iraq just days after
9/11, I stood up and opposed this war, knowing that it would distract
us from the real threats we face. When John McCain said we could
just
"muddle through" in Afghanistan, I argued for more resources and more
troops to finish the fight against the terrorists who actually attacked
us on 9/11, and made clear that we must take out Osama bin Laden and
his lieutenants if we have them in our sights. John McCain likes
to
say that he'll follow bin Laden to the Gates of Hell - but he won't
even go to the cave where he lives.
And today, as my call for a
time frame to remove our troops from Iraq has been echoed by the Iraqi
government and even the Bush Administration, even after we learned that
Iraq has a $79 billion surplus while we're wallowing in deficits, John
McCain stands alone in his stubborn refusal to end a misguided war.
That's
not the judgment we need. That won't keep America safe. We
need a
President who can face the threats of the future, not keep grasping at
the ideas of the past.
You don't defeat a terrorist network that
operates in eighty countries by occupying Iraq. You don't protect
Israel and deter Iran just by talking tough in Washington. You
can't
truly stand up for Georgia when you've strained our oldest
alliances.
If John McCain wants to follow George Bush with more tough talk and bad
strategy, that is his choice - but it is not the change we need.
We
are the party of Roosevelt. We are the party of Kennedy. So
don't
tell me that Democrats won't defend this country. Don't tell me
that
Democrats won't keep us safe. The Bush-McCain foreign policy has
squandered the legacy that generations of Americans -- Democrats and
Republicans - have built, and we are here to restore that legacy.
As
Commander-in-Chief, I will never hesitate to defend this nation, but I
will only send our troops into harm's way with a clear mission and a
sacred commitment to give them the equipment they need in battle and
the care and benefits they deserve when they come home.
I will
end this war in Iraq responsibly, and finish the fight against al Qaeda
and the Taliban in Afghanistan. I will rebuild our military to
meet
future conflicts. But I will also renew the tough, direct
diplomacy
that can prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons and curb Russian
aggression. I will build new partnerships to defeat the threats
of the
21st century: terrorism and nuclear proliferation; poverty and
genocide; climate change and disease. And I will restore our
moral
standing, so that America is once again that last, best hope for all
who are called to the cause of freedom, who long for lives of peace,
and who yearn for a better future.
These are the policies I will pursue. And in the weeks ahead, I
look forward to debating them with John McCain.
But
what I will not do is suggest that the Senator takes his positions for
political purposes. Because one of the things that we have to
change
in our politics is the idea that people cannot disagree without
challenging each other's character and patriotism.
The times are
too serious, the stakes are too high for this same partisan playbook.
So let us agree that patriotism has no party. I love this
country, and
so do you, and so does John McCain. The men and women who serve
in our
battlefields may be Democrats and Republicans and Independents, but
they have fought together and bled together and some died together
under the same proud flag. They have not served a Red America or
a
Blue America - they have served the United States of America.
So I've got news for you, John McCain. We all put our country
first.
America,
our work will not be easy. The challenges we face require tough
choices, and Democrats as well as Republicans will need to cast off the
worn-out ideas and politics of the past. For part of what has
been
lost these past eight years can't just be measured by lost wages or
bigger trade deficits. What has also been lost is our sense of
common
purpose - our sense of higher purpose. And that's what we have to
restore.
We may not agree on abortion, but surely we can agree
on reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies in this country.
The
reality of gun ownership may be different for hunters in rural Ohio
than for those plagued by gang-violence in Cleveland, but don't tell me
we can't uphold the Second Amendment while keeping AK-47s out of the
hands of criminals. I know there are differences on same-sex
marriage,
but surely we can agree that our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters
deserve to visit the person they love in the hospital and to live lives
free of discrimination. Passions fly on immigration, but I don't
know
anyone who benefits when a mother is separated from her infant child or
an employer undercuts American wages by hiring illegal workers.
This
too is part of America's promise - the promise of a democracy where we
can find the strength and grace to bridge divides and unite in common
effort.
I know there are those who dismiss such beliefs as happy
talk. They claim that our insistence on something larger,
something
firmer and more honest in our public life is just a Trojan Horse for
higher taxes and the abandonment of traditional values. And
that's to
be expected. Because if you don't have any fresh ideas, then you use
stale tactics to scare the voters. If you don't have a record to
run
on, then you paint your opponent as someone people should run from.
You make a big election about small things.
And
you know what - it's worked before. Because it feeds into the
cynicism
we all have about government. When Washington doesn't work, all
its
promises seem empty. If your hopes have been dashed again and
again,
then it's best to stop hoping, and settle for what you already know.
I
get it. I realize that I am not the likeliest candidate for this
office. I don't fit the typical pedigree, and I haven't spent my
career in the halls of Washington.
But I stand before you
tonight because all across America something is stirring. What
the
nay-sayers don't understand is that this election has never been about
me. It's been about you.
For eighteen long months, you have
stood up, one by one, and said enough to the politics of the
past. You
understand that in this election, the greatest risk we can take is to
try the same old politics with the same old players and expect a
different result. You have shown what history teaches us - that
at
defining moments like this one, the change we need doesn't come from
Washington. Change comes to Washington. Change happens
because the
American people demand it - because they rise up and insist on new
ideas and new leadership, a new politics for a new time.
America, this is one of those moments.
I
believe that as hard as it will be, the change we need is coming.
Because I've seen it. Because I've lived it. I've seen it
in
Illinois, when we provided health care to more children and moved more
families from welfare to work. I've seen it in Washington, when
we
worked across party lines to open up government and hold lobbyists more
accountable, to give better care for our veterans and keep nuclear
weapons out of terrorist hands.
And I've seen it in this
campaign. In the young people who voted for the first time, and
in
those who got involved again after a very long time. In the
Republicans who never thought they'd pick up a Democratic ballot, but
did. I've seen it in the workers who would rather cut their hours
back
a day than see their friends lose their jobs, in the soldiers who
re-enlist after losing a limb, in the good neighbors who take a
stranger in when a hurricane strikes and the floodwaters rise.
This
country of ours has more wealth than any nation, but that's not what
makes us rich. We have the most powerful military on Earth, but
that's
not what makes us strong. Our universities and our culture are
the
envy of the world, but that's not what keeps the world coming to our
shores.
Instead, it is that American spirit - that American
promise - that pushes us forward even when the path is uncertain; that
binds us together in spite of our differences; that makes us fix our
eye not on what is seen, but what is unseen, that better place around
the bend.
That promise is our greatest inheritance. It's a
promise I make to my daughters when I tuck them in at night, and a
promise that you make to yours - a promise that has led immigrants to
cross oceans and pioneers to travel west; a promise that led workers to
picket lines, and women to reach for the ballot.
And it is that
promise that forty five years ago today, brought Americans from every
corner of this land to stand together on a Mall in Washington, before
Lincoln's Memorial, and hear a young preacher from Georgia speak of his
dream.
The men and women who gathered there could've heard many
things. They could've heard words of anger and discord.
They could've
been told to succumb to the fear and frustration of so many dreams
deferred.
But what the people heard instead - people of every
creed and color, from every walk of life - is that in America, our
destiny is inextricably linked. That together, our dreams can be
one.
"We
cannot walk alone," the preacher cried. "And as we walk, we must
make
the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back."
America,
we cannot turn back. Not with so much work to be done. Not
with so
many children to educate, and so many veterans to care for. Not
with
an economy to fix and cities to rebuild and farms to save. Not
with so
many families to protect and so many lives to mend. America, we
cannot
turn back. We cannot walk alone. At this moment, in this
election, we
must pledge once more to march into the future. Let us keep that
promise - that American promise - and in the words of Scripture hold
firmly, without wavering, to the hope that we confess.
Thank you, God Bless you, and God Bless the United States of America.