The most presidential lorem ipsum in history.
And that it's not enough to just believe this - we have to do our part to make it a reality. 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. 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. We would gladly bring every single one of our troops home if we could be confident that there were not violent extremists in Afghanistan and Pakistan determined to kill as many Americans as they possibly can. But this much is clear: governments that protect these rights are ultimately more stable, successful and secure. I am emphasizing such investments within my country.
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. Because I've lived it. And when the first Muslim-American was recently elected to Congress, he took the oath to defend our Constitution using the same Holy Koran that one of our Founding Fathers - Thomas Jefferson - kept in his personal library. Islam has a proud tradition of tolerance. Our daughters can contribute just as much to society as our sons, and our common prosperity will be advanced by allowing all humanity - men and women - to reach their full potential.
I thought of the 900 men and women - sons and daughters, husbands and wives, friends and neighbors, who won't be returning to their own hometowns. John Kerry calls on us to hope. 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. I'll help our auto companies re-tool, so that the fuel-efficient cars of the future are built right here in America.
The skeptical bent of my mind didn't suddenly vanish. Our conscience cannot rest so long as nearly 45 million Americans don't have health insurance and the millions more who do are going bankrupt trying to pay for it. 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. 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? If you don't, you'll be able to get the same kind of coverage that members of Congress give themselves. Because I've lived it.
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. 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. And it is my first duty as President to protect the American people. But privately, many Muslims recognize that Israel will not go away.
Thank you. And may God's peace be upon you.