Obama Ipsum

He told me he'd joined the Marines, and was heading to Iraq the following week. The hope of a millworker's son who dares to defy the odds. To the Joshua generation, these challenges seem momentous - and they are. 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. That is why I intend to personally pursue this outcome with all the patience that the task requires.

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. Anyway, Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they're supporting the campaign. But that same principle must apply to Muslim perceptions of America.

Their experience is the immigrant experience - as far as they're concerned, no one's handed them anything, they've built it from scratch. 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. 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. Together, you represent the harmony between tradition and progress. Much has been made of the fact that an African-American with the name Barack Hussein Obama could be elected President.

We shouldn't use the obstacles we face as an excuse for cynicism. For centuries, black people in America suffered the lash of the whip as slaves and the humiliation of segregation.

They're ready to turn the page on the old politics and the old policies - whether it's the war in Iraq or the health care crisis we're in, or a school system that's leaving too many kids behind despite the slogans. 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. Ironically, this quintessentially American - and yes, conservative - notion of self-help found frequent expression in Reverend Wright's sermons. 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. For eighteen long months, you have stood up, one by one, and said enough to the politics of the past.

Thank you. And may God's peace be upon you.