iNTELLiBOOK.net - Reclaiming the American Dream

Barack Obama

Reclaiming the American Dream - Unique document
[ABSTRACT by dream]

We have been made to believe that differences of race and region; wealth and gender; party and religion have separated us into warring factions; into Red States and Blue states made up of individuals with opposing wants and needs; with conflicting hopes and dreams.

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In a time of great uncertainty and anxiety, my grandparents held on to a simple dream - that they could raise my mother in a land of boundless opportunity; that their generation's struggle and sacrifice could give her the freedom to be what she wanted to be; to live how she wanted to live.

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I am standing here today because that dream was realized - because my grandfather got the chance to go to school on the GI Bill, buy a house through the Federal Housing Authority, and move his family west - all the way to Hawaii - where my mother would go to college and one day fall in love with a young student from Kenya.

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I am here because that dream made my parents' love possible, even then; because it meant that after my father left, when my mother struggled as a single parent, and even turned to food stamps for a time, she was still able to send my sister and me to the best schools in the country.

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And I'm here because years later, when I found my own love in a place far away called Chicago, she told me of a similar dream. Michelle grew up in a working-class family on the South Side during the 1960s. Her father had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis at just thirty years old. And yet, every day of his life, even when he had to rely on a walker to get him there, Fraser Robinson went to work at the local water filtration plant while his wife stayed home with the children. And on that single salary, he was able to send Michelle and her brother to Princeton.

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Our family's story is one that spans miles and generations; races and realities. It's the story of farmers and soldiers; city workers and single moms. It takes place in small towns and good schools; in Kansas and Kenya; on the shores of Hawaii and the streets of Chicago. It's a varied and unlikely journey, but one that's held together by the same simple dream.

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That's why I believe that we are not as divided as our politics suggests; that the dream we share is more powerful than the differences we have - because I am living proof of that ideal.

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But the biggest divide in America today is not between its people, it is between its people and their leaders in Washington, DC. That is where our collective dream has been deferred. That's where the money and influence of lobbyists kill our plans to make health care more affordable or energy cleaner year after year after year. That's where campaign promises to keep jobs in America or put tax cuts in the pockets of working families are cast aside to make room for the politics of the moment. And that's where politicians would rather demonize each other to score points than come together to solve our common challenges.

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Because as we face another time of anxiety and uncertainty - a time where foreclosures sweep the nation and families struggle to stay afloat; where loved ones leave for war and parents wonder what kind of world their children will inherit - I believe that this nation can rally around the simple dream that my grandparents held on to even in the darkest of days.

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It's a dream that we can find a job with wages that support a family. That we can have health care that's affordable for when we get sick. That we can retire with dignity and security. And that we can provide our children with education and opportunity - so that they can be what they want to be and live how they want to live. They are the common dreams that can finally unite a nation around a common purpose.

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This election is our chance - our moment - to restore the simple dream of those who came before us for another generation of Americans. But only if we can come together and like previous generations did and close that divide between a people and its leaders in Washington.

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In the face of war and depression; through great struggle and tremendous sacrifice, that is the future that my grandparents' generation forged for their children. It is why that little girl who was born at Fort Leavenworth could dream as big as the Kansas sky. And it is why I stand before you today - because there are two little girls I tuck in at night who deserve a world in which they can dream those same big dreams; in which they can have the same chances as any other child living any other place. It is a dream I share for your children and all of our children, and that is why it's American - always hoping, always reaching, always striving for that better day ahead. I hope you'll join me on that journey, and I thank you for welcoming me back to the place my family called home.

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