Cory Booker: “When ignorance and bigotry is allied with power, it's a dangerous force in our country”, response to Kirstjen Nielsen amnesia about Trump’s ‘shithole’ remarks - 2018

16 January 2018, Washington DC, Senate Committee, USA

I wanna just turn, though, and you'll have to forgive me. Listening to the testimony has changed my line of questioning a bit, because this is very personal to me. I sit here right now because when good white people in this country heard bigotry, or hatred, they stood up.

Cory BookerMoving into my home community, we were denied housing because of the colour of our skin. There was white Americans from Burgon County who banded together to fight against racism, to fight against hate speech. To fight against people who had broad brush generalities about people based upon their ethnicity, based upon their origin, based upon their religion.

What went on in the White House, what went on in the Oval Office, is profoundly disturbing to me. I'll tell you this, I heard about it when I was in Puerto Rico, when it happened. Here I was, there, trying to help a community dealing with savage challenges. I can't tell you how many Puerto Ricans brought up that conversation in the White House.

I returned to Atlanta, to go to the King Centre Awards. And from the greatest luminaries from the Civil Rights Movement, down to average Americans, this was on their mind.

I returned to Newark New Jersey, and I talked to African-Americans, from Africa. I talked to Central American Americans. I talked to regular Newarkers. This was top on their mind.

Yesterday I talked to the Ambassador from Haiti. And to see all that they're doing as a result of this conversation. I've been in the Oval Office many times. When the Commander in Chief speaks, I listened. I don't have amnesia on conversations I had in the Oval Office going back months, and months, and months. I've had individual meetings with the President, and I've had group conversations where there was, as you said, crosstalk.

Why is this so important? Why is this so disturbing for me? Why am I, frankly, seething with anger? We have this incredible nation, where we have been taught that it does not matter where you're from. It doesn't matter your colour, your race, or religion. It's about the content of your character. It's about your values and your ideals. And yet, we have language that from Dick Durbin, to Lindsey Graham, they seem to have a much better recollection of what went on.

You're under oath. You, and others in that room that suddenly cannot remember. It was Martin Luther King that said, "There's nothing in this world more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity." And so here we are in the United States of America, and we have a history that is beautiful, and grand, and also ugly. Where from this nation to others, we know what happens when people sit by and are bystanders and say nothing.

When Oval Office rhetoric sounds like social engineering, we know from human history the dangers of that. Our greatest heroes in this country spoke out about people who have convenient amnesia, or who are bystanders.

King said, "A man dies when he refuses to stand up for that which is right. A man dies when he refuses to stand up for justice. A man dies when he refuses to stand."

Elie Weisel says, "We must take side. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented."

Gandhi said, "Silence becomes cowardice." Cowardice, when we the occasion demands speaking out like Lindsey Graham did, and acting accordingly.

This idea that the Commander of Chief of this country could, with broad brushes talk about certain nations, and thus cast a shadow over the millions of Americans who are from those communities, and that you could even say in your testimony, the Norwegians were preferenced by him because they're so hardworking.

K. Nielsen I didn't say-

Excuse, let me finish.

K. Nielsen Happy to.

Let me just draw a connection of why that matters. I'm sure you remember the six words from our President, the six words that he said after Charleston Virginia, last summer. People marching with tiki torches and hate. When he said, "There are very fine people on both sides." "Very fine people on both sides."

When the Commander in Chief speaks, or refuses to speak, those words just don't dissipate like mist in the air. They fester. They become poison. They give licence to bigotry and hate in our country.

I know you're aware of a 2017 GAO report that found, and I quote, "Out of the 85 violent extremist incidences that resulted in deaths in September 12, 2001, far right wing violent extremist groups were responsible for 73%." When I go through the Black Belt in the south, Atlanta, black churches in Newark, they're concerned about Jihadist Islamic Terrorism. We watched the Twin Towers from Newark go down. But since 9/11, 85 violent incidents, 73% were with people that hold bigoted, hateful ideas about minorities.

One American, killed in Charleston Virginia, dozens injured. Nine Americans killed in a church shooting in Charleston South Carolina by a white supremacist. An American killed, and another wounded in Kansas after a white supremacist targeted them for their ethnicity, saying, "Get out of my country." Six Americans killed, and four others wounded in Wisconsin, where white supremacists targeted individuals for their religion.

The Commander in Chief, in an Oval Office Meeting, referring to people from African countries, and Haitians, with the most vile and vulgar language. That language festers. When ignorance and bigotry is allied with power, it is a dangerous force in our country.

Your silence and your amnesia is complicity. Right now, in our nation, we have a problem. I don't know if 73% of your time is spent on whit supremacist hate groups. I don't know if 73% of your time is spent concerned about the people in fear in communities in this country: Sikh Americans, Muslim Americans, Black Americans.The fact pattern is clear of the threats in this country.

I hurt. When Dick Durbin called me, I had tears of rage when I heard about this experience in that meeting. And for you not to feel that hurt, and that pain, and to dismiss some of the questions of my colleagues, saying "I've already answered that line of questions," when tens of millions of Americans are hurting right now, because of what they're worried about would happen in the White House. That's unacceptable to me.

There are threats in this country. People plotting. I receive enough death threats to know the reality. Cond receives enough death threats to know the reality. Maisie receives enough death threats to know the reality. And I've got a President of the United States, whose office I respect, who talks about the country's origins of my fellow citizens, in the most despicable of manner.

You don't remember. You can't remember the words of your Commander in Chief.

Source: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/1733277

Lidia Thorpe: 'Being Aboriginal is not all I am, but it's the centre of who I am', maiden speech - 2017

29 November 2017, Victorian Parliament, Melbourne, Australia

Lidia Thorpe, MP Northcote, is the first aboriginal woman to be elected to a lower house seat in the Parliament of Victoria.

I would like to acknowledge the Wurundjeri Willam and Yalukit Willam clans - two of 300 clans and 38 language groups in Victoria who have never ceded sovereignty. I stand before you today a proud Gunnai-Gunditjmara woman, living on Wurundjeri country. For an Aboriginal kid who grew up in public housing and left school at 14, taking my seat in this chamber is something I was told could never happen. Too many of our kids grow up believing this. Their lives are debated but not reflected in our political system. As long as those voices are missing from the heart of our democracy, we limit our children's potential. They cannot be what they cannot see. This is why today matters. It is a moment 161 years in the making, and it does not only belong to me. I have been inundated with messages from Aboriginal people across the country. I speak today on behalf of them. I am honoured to be the first Aboriginal woman elected to the Victorian Parliament. We have sustained and protected this land for thousands of years, and now in Victoria we finally have a say in how our land is governed.

I am also proud to embark on this journey as a Greens MP, a party that shares my passion for social justice, protecting country and giving voice to those who would otherwise not have one. And I am honoured to represent Northcote, a diverse and compassionate community of vibrant multiculturalism, youthful innovation and a real sense of optimism. From the peak of Ruckers Hill all the way to the waterways that surround us on three sides - the Darebin and Merri creeks to the east and west and the mighty Birrarung flowing to the south - Northcote is a place of natural beauty, and I am so proud to call it home. I want to take this opportunity to say to every resident of Northcote, Thornbury, Alphington, Fairfield, Preston South and West Preston: whether you voted for me or not, I promise I will not let you down.

I also want to acknowledge that the road to this moment came about in tragic circumstances after the untimely passing of Fiona Richardson. I extend my heartfelt condolences to her family, friends and colleagues. As a survivor of domestic violence I am personally grateful to Fiona for the work she has done in increasing protections for women.

The possum skin cloak I wore when I walked into Parliament today was made for me by the Loddon Campaspe Indigenous family violence action group and the Centre for Non-Violence. It was hand sewn by a community who share my country and presented to me this week by Aunty Beryl, a Gunnai-Gunditjmara elder from the Victorian Aboriginal embassy.

I stand here on the shoulders of my ancestors. None of this would have been possible without the strong line of Aboriginal women before me. They taught me resilience, self-determination and the importance of standing up against injustice. My nan, Alma Previous HitThorpeNext Hit, who is here today, has worked her whole life for grassroots community change. Raised in Fitzroy, she left school at 12 to work in a shoe factory and support her family. Her mum, my great-grandmother Edna, came to the area after being forced off the Framlingham Aboriginal reserve near Warrnambool as part of the White Australia assimilation policy during the Great Depression. The house Nan grew up in was run-down and often had no electricity. Everyone had to do their bit. But she never looked for pity.

Self-determination was at the heart of everything she taught me. Her motto has always been 'You get up and you have a go', and she did. After the 1967 referendum gave Aboriginal people the right to vote she applied for a loan that helped her and my nan Edna set up the Victorian Aboriginal Health Service. That service saved lives and helped hundreds of thousands of people across this country. To this day it continues to be a vital community hub.

Growing up, Nan's house was a magnet for political discussion. I would listen to the tough conversations our elders had about how they could improve the lives of Aboriginal people. It was not just talk; my family's activism started at home. Nan took in countless people and offered them a safe place to live - like Uncle Lou, a soldier who grew up on an Aboriginal mission where he contracted tuberculosis. If it was not for Nan, he would have had nowhere to go.

It was this upbringing that taught me community is everything. They say it takes a village to raise a child, and that is the life I have known. Growing up in a public housing estate I knew everyone. When mum was out working I would go downstairs to the homework club with the other kids and feel that sense of safety and belonging. Later in life as a young single mum, public housing gave my son and I stability and community. It helped shape the father he is today. From the Turkish neighbour who brought us homemade pizza to the elderly lollipop man who lived on the ground floor, people in public housing communities took care of each other. We cannot remove the only support and security these people have.

At Walker Street in Northcote, one of nine public housing sites across Melbourne being sold to developers, I recently met a family who came to Australia from Somalia. They were anxious that being forced from the community they love will make it harder for their young Muslim son to be accepted. One of the most important jobs in this Parliament is to look after the vulnerable in our community. We cannot marginalise these families. Everyone deserves a safe place to call home, and that is why we must do politics differently. The profits of developers cannot be put before people. Gambling companies must not be allowed to destroy our communities with pokie machines. The system is rigged against the little guy because of dodgy donations flowing into politics. It has to stop.

We need fairness and we need transparency. We need leaders who understand the importance of protecting country, have the guts to tackle climate change and will stand up to the mining companies poisoning our land. We need to protect our native forests from logging and create a great forest national park. As a young woman I led the protest to save the Nowa Nowa gorge from a pipeline that would have destroyed one of the most beautiful places in our state.

I have stood in front of bulldozers, and I will continue to stand up for our communities and our environment. There is a fire in my belly for justice, equality and protecting country. I will bring that to this Parliament. Nan always said politics was my destiny. I cannot separate my culture from my politics. When your people have fought for centuries to survive, it teaches you how to face up to those who hold power.

Being Aboriginal is not all I am, but it is the centre of who I am. My mother's family lived their lives as refugees in their own country on Gunnai land in Gippsland. They were poisoned, shot and herded off cliffs in one of the most ruthless and systematic attempted genocides the world has ever seen. The survivors were rounded up onto Lake Tyers mission and imprisoned on rations. Decisions made in this very chamber took our language away, removed children from our families and forced us from our land. Those scars run deep for all Aboriginal people.

But despite the deep sense of loss, I grew up surrounded by people who refused to give in to hopelessness. Nan Alma taught me to stand up for our community and always stay true to myself: 'Never forget where you come from. Never forget our people'. So I fought hard for my identity. At school, where my cousin and I were the only two black kids, I was picked on by students and teachers for being Aboriginal. It only made me more determined. I never felt for one moment that I could be beaten down. It does not matter where you come from or who you are, education should be accessible for everyone. Today we are joined by Aboriginal students from schools across the Northcote electorate and my daughter, who is going into year 12. I promise that I will fight for you to have the opportunities that I never had. And I look forward to seeing the school funding you have been promised delivered in full.

Although I left school early, I went to work straightaway. I have not stopped working since. Every job I have had, in health, housing, employment and land rights, has been about empowering those who have been denied opportunity. As Victorian NAIDOC chair, I was proud we delivered a calendar of inclusive events, including NAIDOC's first-ever Pride Awards.

Bringing community together is at the core of who I am. I have always been a fighter, but it breaks my heart to think of all the Aboriginal people who have lost that will to survive. There is trauma passed down through generations and entrenched by society that does not see our humanity and treats us only as a problem to be fixed. Many of the kids I grew up with are gone, lost to drugs and alcohol, chronic illness and suicide. I have been to too many funerals for someone my age and I do not want my nine-year-old daughter to have to go through the same. Something has to change.

In Victoria in 2017 Aboriginal children are still being removed from families, our literacy rates are amongst the lowest in the state and our people are locked up at a rate 11 times higher than the general population. This is not because of fundamental flaws in their character but because of a system that has written them off. For some of the elders in our community it has led to a sense of profound despair. They see the extreme poverty, the forced closures of Aboriginal communities and skyrocketing suicide rates, and they ask, 'Has anything really changed since our ancestors were wiped from this land?'.

Clinton Pryor, a young Aboriginal man, walked 6000 kilometres across the country out of a sense of desperation. He walked and gathered stories, many of them soul-destroying. It was a heavy burden for a young man, but he listened - and that is what politicians must do. Our First People must be at the centre of decision-making processes. We need a clan-based treaty to ensure self-determination is at the heart of our future. We are not a problem to be fixed. We are the custodians of this land and the oldest living culture in the world. We must be heard. For those who feel they are not being counted, for those who have lost the will to fight and for those who are no longer with us, I will be that voice. I will fight for you. You have my word, and I will never sell you out.

I extend this promise to all the people of Northcote. Whatever your heritage or cultural background, you are part of a community that I am so proud to call home. My commitment to you is to act with integrity. I will have the courage to put our community first, even when those decisions are tough. And I will respect and protect this land which we all share. Together we can walk forward to a more hopeful future for our kids and grandkids.

I am grateful to many people for getting me here today: firstly, to my ancestors, whose spirit of strength and guidance I feel with me every day of this journey; to my elders, my family and my friends; to the staunch black activists who paved the way for a kid from the commission flats to make it all the way to the Victorian Parliament; to the Greens, who had faith in me from the beginning; to my parliamentary colleagues, for their support; to my campaign team and my wonderful volunteers, I will never be able to thank you enough for you hard work, dedication and passion; and to my children and my grandchildren, I know the work I do has come at a cost to you.

I want to finish today with a story that sums up what this moment means. It is a story of a seven-year-old Aboriginal boy with autism called Eli from Penders Grove Primary School in Thornbury. After the by-election results came in, his mum sent me a video she had taken of his reaction when he found out I had won. It moved me to tears. 'What do you think of that?', she asked him. 'Well,' Eli said, 'Aunty Previous HitLidia'sNext Document got the key that's going to open the door to all Aboriginal people'.

I feel so very honoured to have been given that key. My job now is to keep the door open and to make sure it never closes again. Thank you.

 

Tim Watts: 'While I'm glad to be able to vote for this bill, I cannot take joy from it', Marriage Amendment Bill - 2017

5 December 2017, Canberra, Australia

I want to begin my remarks tonight by saying to all LGBTI Australians that I'm sorry. I'm sorry that the Marriage Amendment (Definition and Religious Freedoms) Bill 2017 took so long. Every day that a person is forced to live in our society with lesser rights than their neighbour is an injustice. We perpetuated and perpetrated an injustice on LGBTIQ Australians for far, far too long.

It is right that the parliament will this week vote to extend equality before the law to LGBTIQ couples and their families. It is right that elected members of this place will vote to afford the most basic of dignities to LGBTIQ Australians: the recognition that their relationships are just as loving, that their relationships are just as meaningful and that their relationships are just as committed as anyone else's.

I'm sorry, too, for what this parliament put LGBTIQ Australians through to get to this vote. I take responsibility for the inaction of previous Labor governments on this issue during our time in office, recognising the efforts of the member for Whitlam in introducing the 2012 marriage equality private member's bill and the 42 members of parliament, including the Leader of the Opposition, who voted for it. I recognise also the extraordinary work of people like Senator Penny Wong, who worked assiduously within party forums for many years to change Labor Party policy on this issue so that when marriage equality passes in this parliament this week it will do so with more votes from the Labor Party than any other party—but recognising our responsibility for failing to get it done in the past.

I'm sorry that LGBTIQ Australians were forced by this parliament to submit themselves, to submit their rights as equal members of our society, to a national public debate and opinion poll before we could get them to this point in this place. For these reasons, while I'm glad to be able to vote for this bill, I cannot take joy from it. Historians will note the public celebrations following the announcement of the results of this survey, celebrations that the Prime Minister had the good sense to realise that he would not be welcome at. But, in doing so, they will miss a deeper truth of this period in our history. Australians who support justice, equality and human dignity celebrated this result because the alternative would have been unimaginably painful. We celebrate it because a process that inflicted totally unnecessary pain and suffering on LGBTIQ Australians and their families would have re-traumatised these Australians had the result been in the negative. We celebrate it because the next generation of LGBTIQ kids will not have to go through a similar national debate on the worth of themselves and their families.

But these celebrations obscured the hurt, confusion and anxiety that I saw my LGBTIQ friends and family had been put through in this ghoulish process. History should record the repulsion that many of us felt at seeing the Prime Minister take credit for these celebrations while denying the suffering that he chose to inflict on LGBTIQ Australians and their families. I want to give these deeply mixed feelings a voice in this debate today. To this end I want the Hansard to record for posterity the reflections of a comedian who I admire, Rebecca Shaw, and her experience of this process. Bec wrote:

I thought that hearing that the Yes side had won would make me feel happy; that perhaps the months of tension and anger that had built up in my body would dissipate. But the instant I heard those words, I felt my stomach knot further. I turned to my group, more subdued than most of the people around me. I hugged my friends, holding on quietly and for a long time. One looked at me from under her glasses; her face was solemn, but I saw tears streaming down her face. Another was shaking their head angrily. Around me, people were smiling and hugging; … I saw an old couple embrace tearfully. I cried a bit, then – how could I not? But the knot didn't budge.

I can't speak on the perspective of an LGBTIQ person myself, but I can feel this knot in my stomach in this debate today, and I could feel it coming in the lead-up to the results.

I knew I wouldn't be in the mood to celebrate on the day of the results, so I had accepted an invitation to speak at the graduation ceremony of my old high school on the day before. I was optimistic for my old school in regional Queensland, in Toowoomba, which, it was clear to me, was far more enlightened today than it was when I was there 20 years ago. The school now had LGBTIQ kids and transitioning kids, things that were simply denied when I was at the school. But my optimism turned to bitterness when, watching the results, a 'no' result was returned for the seat of Groom in the survey. I felt for those kids as the 'no' result was returned. How did this unnecessary public process of judgement make them feel, this public confirmation of their worst fears about the community that they lived in? What message does this send to an LGBTIQ kid in that community?

It is clear we still have a long path to walk to ensuring that all LGBTIQ Australians throughout our country are afforded recognition as fully equal members of our society. For those who inflicted this process on Australia, I can only express my hope that future governments have the good sense and the political courage not to let it loose on the human rights of other groups. Regardless, the Prime Minister and the Liberal Party will have to live with the question of why they forced LGBTIQ Australians to submit their rights, their equality as citizens, to a national debate when no other race or religious group has been forced to do the same without constitutional requirement. This is the Prime Minister's legacy in this debate.

All of us in this place should make amends for the way that we have failed LGBTIQ Australians leading up to this bill by ensuring that we do not perpetrate similar injustices in future, that we do not commit similar failures of empathy. The relationships of future generations of LGBTIQ Australians won't be subject to legal discrimination, but we will need to continue to ensure that they do not confront social and other forms of discrimination. The reactionaries in our society who seek to exploit and accentuate anxieties about people who are perceived to be different will move on to a new target.

The parliament and the public have so clearly rejected homophobia. The tiny minority of people who think that religion is like a toy plastic sheriff's badge to wave at other people rather than a source of personal moral reflection will be tutting their fingers at someone else soon enough. Indeed, it is clear from the way that the 'no' campaign desperately tried to make the marriage equality survey about anything other than marriage between LGBTIQ Australians that the reactionaries have already chosen their new target—trans kids. The disgracefully dishonest and fact-free campaign against the Safe Schools program comprehensively detailed by Ben Law in his tour de force quarterly essay is a sign of things to come on this front. So, to the MPs who are professing to a Damoclean conversion on marriage equality and recognising the equal human dignity of gay and lesbian Australians in the chamber this week: I implore you not to make the same mistake over again with trans Australians. To the trans Australians and their families watching this debate with trepidation, I want to say that I see you and I will not abandon you.

I have a few happier words to end on. I want to thank and pay tribute to all of the campaigners who ensured that Australia said yes in this survey. Thank you to The Equality Campaign, Australians for Marriage Equality, GetUp! and the Australian trade union movement, particularly the Victorian Trades Hall Council. I want to particularly acknowledge the work of a constituent of mine, Wil Stracke, who led the trades hall campaign and acquired the most famous fence in Australia in the process. Your mum would have been proud, mate. Also I want to thank Raymond Pham for coordinating my office's 'yes' campaign in Gellibrand. In a perfect world, we could have done without their good deeds, but we are thankful for them regardless.

Finally, I want to thank all of those LGBTIQ Australians who lost people that they loved during the long, long wait for this day. When the Western Bulldogs won the flag after a 62-year drought, one of the most common things that I heard at the family day at Whitten Oval the day after the premiership was people wishing that they could have shared this long-anticipated moment of happiness with a loved one who never got to see the day. Lovers, family and friends will be feeling the same way about the vote in this parliament: lovers who never got to propose to the person they love; parents who never got to walk their child down the aisle; children who didn't have a parent there to walk them down the aisle; and friends who never believed that this day of equality would come. The happiness of the breakthrough moment after so long makes the feeling of these losses freshly painful. Many people in the LGBTIQ community and their family members will be feeling this way at the moment. I know I'm feeling this way. I'm thinking of those members of my family who are in the same boat.

Source: http://www.openaustralia.org.au/debates/?i...

Jesse Jackson: 'Old wine skins must make room for new wine', DNC - 1984

Tonight we come together bound by our faith in a mighty God, with genuine respect and love for our country, and inheriting the legacy of a great Party, the Democratic Party, which is the best hope for redirecting our nation on a more humane, just, and peaceful course.

This is not a perfect party. We are not a perfect people. Yet, we are called to a perfect mission. Our mission: to feed the hungry; to clothe the naked; to house the homeless; to teach the illiterate; to provide jobs for the jobless; and to choose the human race over the nuclear race.

We are gathered here this week to nominate a candidate and adopt a platform which will expand, unify, direct, and inspire our Party and the nation to fulfill this mission. My constituency is the desperate, the damned, the disinherited, the disrespected, and the despised. They are restless and seek relief. They have voted in record numbers. They have invested the faith, hope, and trust that they have in us. The Democratic Party must send them a signal that we care. I pledge my best not to let them down.

There is the call of conscience, redemption, expansion, healing, and unity. Leadership must heed the call of conscience, redemption, expansion, healing, and unity, for they are the key to achieving our mission. Time is neutral and does not change things. With courage and initiative, leaders change things.

No generation can choose the age or circumstance in which it is born, but through leadership it can choose to make the age in which it is born an age of enlightenment, an age of jobs, and peace, and justice. Only leadership -- that intangible combination of gifts, the discipline, information, circumstance, courage, timing, will and divine inspiration -- can lead us out of the crisis in which we find ourselves. Leadership can mitigate the misery of our nation. Leadership can part the waters and lead our nation in the direction of the Promised Land. Leadership can lift the boats stuck at the bottom.

I have had the rare opportunity to watch seven men, and then two, pour out their souls, offer their service, and heal and heed the call of duty to direct the course of our nation. There is a proper season for everything. There is a time to sow and a time to reap. There's a time to compete and a time to cooperate.

I ask for your vote on the first ballot as a vote for a new direction for this Party and this nation -- a vote of conviction, a vote of conscience. But I will be proud to support the nominee of this convention for the Presidency of the United States of America. Thank you.

I have watched the leadership of our party develop and grow. My respect for both Mr. Mondale and Mr. Hart is great. I have watched them struggle with the crosswinds and crossfires of being public servants, and I believe they will both continue to try to serve us faithfully.

I am elated by the knowledge that for the first time in our history a woman, Geraldine Ferraro, will be recommended to share our ticket.

Throughout this campaign, I've tried to offer leadership to the Democratic Party and the nation. If, in my high moments, I have done some good, offered some service, shed some light, healed some wounds, rekindled some hope, or stirred someone from apathy and indifference, or in any way along the way helped somebody, then this campaign has not been in vain.

For friends who loved and cared for me, and for a God who spared me, and for a family who understood, I am eternally grateful.

If, in my low moments, in word, deed or attitude, through some error of temper, taste, or tone, I have caused anyone discomfort, created pain, or revived someone's fears, that was not my truest self. If there were occasions when my grape turned into a raisin and my joy bell lost its resonance, please forgive me. Charge it to my head and not to my heart. My head -- so limited in its finitude; my heart, which is boundless in its love for the human family. I am not a perfect servant. I am a public servant doing my best against the odds. As I develop and serve, be patient: God is not finished with me yet.

This campaign has taught me much; that leaders must be tough enough to fight, tender enough to cry, human enough to make mistakes, humble enough to admit them, strong enough to absorb the pain, and resilient enough to bounce back and keep on moving.

For leaders, the pain is often intense. But you must smile through your tears and keep moving with the faith that there is a brighter side somewhere.

I went to see Hubert Humphrey three days before he died. He had just called Richard Nixon from his dying bed, and many people wondered why. And I asked him. He said, "Jesse, from this vantage point, the sun is setting in my life, all of the speeches, the political conventions, the crowds, and the great fights are behind me now. At a time like this you are forced to deal with your irreducible essence, forced to grapple with that which is really important to you. And what I've concluded about life," Hubert Humphrey said, "When all is said and done, we must forgive each other, and redeem each other, and move on."

Our party is emerging from one of its most hard fought battles for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination in our history. But our healthy competition should make us better, not bitter. We must use the insight, wisdom, and experience of the late Hubert Humphrey as a balm for the wounds in our Party, this nation, and the world. We must forgive each other, redeem each other, regroup, and move one. Our flag is red, white and blue, but our nation is a rainbow -- red, yellow, brown, black and white -- and we're all precious in God's sight.

America is not like a blanket -- one piece of unbroken cloth, the same color, the same texture, the same size. America is more like a quilt: many patches, many pieces, many colors, many sizes, all woven and held together by a common thread. The white, the Hispanic, the black, the Arab, the Jew, the woman, the native American, the small farmer, the businessperson, the environmentalist, the peace activist, the young, the old, the lesbian, the gay, and the disabled make up the American quilt.

Even in our fractured state, all of us count and fit somewhere. We have proven that we can survive without each other. But we have not proven that we can win and make progress without each other. We must come together.

From Fannie Lou Hamer in Atlantic City in 1964 to the Rainbow Coalition in San Francisco today; from the Atlantic to the Pacific, we have experienced pain but progress, as we ended American apartheid laws. We got public accommodations. We secured voting rights. We obtained open housing, as young people got the right to vote. We lost Malcolm, Martin, Medgar, Bobby, John, and Viola. The team that got us here must be expanded, not abandoned.

Twenty years ago, tears welled up in our eyes as the bodies of Schwerner, Goodman, and Chaney were dredged from the depths of a river in Mississippi. Twenty years later, our communities, black and Jewish, are in anguish, anger, and pain. Feelings have been hurt on both sides. There is a crisis in communications. Confusion is in the air. But we cannot afford to lose our way. We may agree to agree; or agree to disagree on issues; we must bring back civility to these tensions.

We are co-partners in a long and rich religious history -- the Judeo-Christian traditions. Many blacks and Jews have a shared passion for social justice at home and peace abroad. We must seek a revival of the spirit, inspired by a new vision and new possibilities. We must return to higher ground. We are bound by Moses and Jesus, but also connected with Islam and Mohammed. These three great religions, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, were all born in the revered and holy city of Jerusalem.

We are bound by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rabbi Abraham Heschel, crying out from their graves for us to reach common ground. We are bound by shared blood and shared sacrifices. We are much too intelligent, much too bound by our Judeo-Christian heritage, much too victimized by racism, sexism, militarism, and anti-Semitism, much too threatened as historical scapegoats to go on divided one from another. We must turn from finger pointing to clasped hands. We must share our burdens and our joys with each other once again. We must turn to each other and not on each other and choose higher ground.

Twenty years later, we cannot be satisfied by just restoring the old coalition. Old wine skins must make room for new wine. We must heal and expand. The Rainbow Coalition is making room for Arab Americans. They, too, know the pain and hurt of racial and religious rejection. They must not continue to be made pariahs. The Rainbow Coalition is making room for Hispanic Americans who this very night are living under the threat of the Simpson-Mazzoli bill; and farm workers from Ohio who are fighting the Campbell Soup Company with a boycott to achieve legitimate workers' rights.

The Rainbow is making room for the Native American, the most exploited people of all, a people with the greatest moral claim amongst us. We support them as they seek the restoration of their ancient land and claim amongst us. We support them as they seek the restoration of land and water rights, as they seek to preserve their ancestral homeland and the beauty of a land that was once all theirs. They can never receive a fair share for all they have given us. They must finally have a fair chance to develop their great resources and to preserve their people and their culture.

The Rainbow Coalition includes Asian Americans, now being killed in our streets -- scapegoats for the failures of corporate, industrial, and economic policies.

The Rainbow is making room for the young Americans. Twenty years ago, our young people were dying in a war for which they could not even vote. Twenty years later, young America has the power to stop a war in Central America and the responsibility to vote in great numbers. Young America must be politically active in 1984. The choice is war or peace. We must make room for young America.

The Rainbow includes disabled veterans. The color scheme fits in the Rainbow. The disabled have their handicap revealed and their genius concealed; while the able-bodied have their genius revealed and their disability concealed. But ultimately, we must judge people by their values and their contribution. Don't leave anybody out. I would rather have Roosevelt in a wheelchair than Reagan on a horse.

The Rainbow is making room for small farmers. They have suffered tremendously under the Reagan regime. They will either receive 90 percent parity or 100 percent charity. We must address their concerns and make room for them. The Rainbow includes lesbians and gays. No American citizen ought be denied equal protection from the law.

We must be unusually committed and caring as we expand our family to include new members. All of us must be tolerant and understanding as the fears and anxieties of the rejected and the party leadership express themselves in many different ways. Too often what we call hate -- as if it were some deeply-rooted philosophy or strategy -- is simply ignorance, anxiety, paranoia, fear, and insecurity. To be strong leaders, we must be long-suffering as we seek to right the wrongs of our Party and our nation. We must expand our Party, heal our Party, and unify our Party. That is our mission in 1984.

We are often reminded that we live in a great nation -- and we do. But it can be greater still. The Rainbow is mandating a new definition of greatness. We must not measure greatness from the mansion down, but the manger up. Jesus said that we should not be judged by the bark we wear but by the fruit that we bear. Jesus said that we must measure greatness by how we treat the least of these.

President Reagan says the nation is in recovery. Those 90,000 corporations that made a profit last year but paid no federal taxes are recovering. The 37,000 military contractors who have benefited from Reagan's more than doubling of the military budget in peacetime, surely they are recovering. The big corporations and rich individuals who received the bulk of a three-year, multibillion tax cut from Mr. Reagan are recovering. But no such recovery is under way for the least of these.

Rising tides don't lift all boats, particularly those stuck at the bottom. For the boats stuck at the bottom there's a misery index. This Administration has made life more miserable for the poor. Its attitude has been contemptuous. Its policies and programs have been cruel and unfair to working people. They must be held accountable in November for increasing infant mortality among the poor. In Detroit one of the great cities of the western world, babies are dying at the same rate as Honduras, the most underdeveloped nation in our hemisphere. This Administration must be held accountable for policies that have contributed to the growing poverty in America. There are now 34 million people in poverty, 15 percent of our nation. 23 million are White; 11 million Black, Hispanic, Asian, and others -- mostly women and children. By the end of this year, there will be 41 million people in poverty. We cannot stand idly by. We must fight for a change now.

Under this regime we look at Social Security. The '81 budget cuts included nine permanent Social Security benefit cuts totaling 20 billion over five years. Small businesses have suffered under Reagan tax cuts. Only 18 percent of total business tax cuts went to them; 82 percent to big businesses. Health care under Mr. Reagan has already been sharply cut. Education under Mr. Reagan has been cut 25 percent. Under Mr. Reagan there are now 9.7 million female head families. They represent 16 percent of all families. Half of all of them are poor. 70 percent of all poor children live in a house headed by a woman, where there is no man. Under Mr. Reagan, the Administration has cleaned up only 6 of 546 priority toxic waste dumps. Farmers' real net income was only about half its level in 1979.

Many say that the race in November will be decided in the South. President Reagan is depending on the conservative South to return him to office. But the South, I tell you, is unnaturally conservative. The South is the poorest region in our nation and, therefore, [has] the least to conserve. In his appeal to the South, Mr. Reagan is trying to substitute flags and prayer cloths for food, and clothing, and education, health care, and housing.

Mr. Reagan will ask us to pray, and I believe in prayer. I have come to this way by the power of prayer. But then, we must watch false prophecy. He cuts energy assistance to the poor, cuts breakfast programs from children, cuts lunch programs from children, cuts job training from children, and then says to an empty table, "Let us pray." Apparently, he is not familiar with the structure of a prayer. You thank the Lord for the food that you are about to receive, not the food that just left. I think that we should pray, but don't pray for the food that left. Pray for the man that took the food to leave. We need a change. We need a change in November.

Under Mr. Reagan, the misery index has risen for the poor. The danger index has risen for everybody. Under this administration, we've lost the lives of our boys in Central America and Honduras, in Grenada, in Lebanon, in nuclear standoff in Europe. Under this Administration, one-third of our children believe they will die in a nuclear war. The danger index is increasing in this world. All the talk about the defense against Russia; the Russian submarines are closer, and their missiles are more accurate. We live in a world tonight more miserable and a world more dangerous.

While Reaganomics and Reaganism is talked about often, so often we miss the real meaning. Reaganism is a spirit, and Reaganomics represents the real economic facts of life. In 1980, Mr. George Bush, a man with reasonable access to Mr. Reagan, did an analysis of Mr. Reagan's economic plan. Mr. George Bush concluded that Reagan's plan was ''voodoo economics.'' He was right. Third-party candidate John Anderson said "a combination of military spending, tax cuts, and a balanced budget by '84 would be accomplished with blue smoke and mirrors." They were both right.

Mr. Reagan talks about a dynamic recovery. There's some measure of recovery. Three and a half years later, unemployment has inched just below where it was when he took office in 1981. There are still 8.1 million people officially unemployed; 11 million working only part-time. Inflation has come down, but let's analyze for a moment who has paid the price for this superficial economic recovery.

Mr. Reagan curbed inflation by cutting consumer demand. He cut consumer demand with conscious and callous fiscal and monetary policies. He used the Federal budget to deliberately induce unemployment and curb social spending. He then weighed and supported tight monetary policies of the Federal Reserve Board to deliberately drive up interest rates, again to curb consumer demand created through borrowing. Unemployment reached 10.7 percent. We experienced skyrocketing interest rates. Our dollar inflated abroad. There were record bank failures, record farm foreclosures, record business bankruptcies; record budget deficits, record trade deficits.

Mr. Reagan brought inflation down by destabilizing our economy and disrupting family life. He promised -- he promised in 1980 a balanced budget. But instead we now have a record 200 billion dollar budget deficit. Under Mr. Reagan, the cumulative budget deficit for his four years is more than the sum total of deficits from George Washington to Jimmy Carter combined. I tell you, we need a change.

How is he paying for these short-term jobs? Reagan's economic recovery is being financed by deficit spending -- 200 billion dollars a year. Military spending, a major cause of this deficit, is projected over the next five years to be nearly 2 trillion dollars, and will cost about 40,000 dollars for every taxpaying family. When the Government borrows 200 billion dollars annually to finance the deficit, this encourages the private sector to make its money off of interest rates as opposed to development and economic growth.

Even money abroad, we don't have enough money domestically to finance the debt, so we are now borrowing money abroad, from foreign banks, governments and financial institutions: 40 billion dollars in 1983; 70-80 billion dollars in 1984 -- 40 percent of our total; over 100 billion dollars -- 50 percent of our total -- in 1985. By 1989, it is projected that 50 percent of all individual income taxes will be going just to pay for interest on that debt. The United States used to be the largest exporter of capital, but under Mr. Reagan we will quite likely become the largest debtor nation.

About two weeks ago, on July the 4th, we celebrated our Declaration of Independence, yet every day supply-side economics is making our nation more economically dependent and less economically free. Five to six percent of our Gross National Product is now being eaten up with President Reagan's budget deficits. To depend on foreign military powers to protect our national security would be foolish, making us dependent and less secure. Yet, Reaganomics has us increasingly dependent on foreign economic sources. This consumer-led but deficit-financed recovery is unbalanced and artificial. We have a challenge as Democrats to point a way out.

Democracy guarantees opportunity, not success.

Democracy guarantees the right to participate, not a license for either a majority or a minority to dominate.

The victory for the Rainbow Coalition in the Platform debates today was not whether we won or lost, but that we raised the right issues. We could afford to lose the vote; issues are non-negotiable. We could not afford to avoid raising the right questions. Our self-respect and our moral integrity were at stake. Our heads are perhaps bloody, but not bowed. Our back is straight. We can go home and face our people. Our vision is clear.

When we think, on this journey from slave-ship to championship, that we have gone from the planks of the Boardwalk in Atlantic City in 1964 to fighting to help write the planks in the platform in San Francisco in '84, there is a deep and abiding sense of joy in our souls in spite of the tears in our eyes. Though there are missing planks, there is a solid foundation upon which to build. Our Party can win, but we must provide hope which will inspire people to struggle and achieve; provide a plan that shows a way out of our dilemma and then lead the way.

In 1984, my heart is made to feel glad because I know there is a way out -- justice. The requirement for rebuilding America is justice. The linchpin of progressive politics in our nation will not come from the North; they, in fact, will come from the South. That is why I argue over and over again. We look from Virginia around to Texas, there's only one black Congressperson out of 115. Nineteen years later, we're locked out of the Congress, the Senate and the Governor's mansion. What does this large black vote mean? Why do I fight to win second primaries and fight gerrymandering and annexation and at-large [elections]. Why do we fight over that? Because I tell you, you cannot hold someone in the ditch unless you linger there with them. Unless you linger there.

 If you want a change in this nation, you enforce that Voting Rights Act. We'll get 12 to 20 Black, Hispanics, female and progressive congresspersons from the South. We can save the cotton, but we've got to fight the boll weevils. We've got to make a judgment. We've got to make a judgment.

It is not enough to hope ERA will pass. How can we pass ERA? If Blacks vote in great numbers, progressive Whites win. It's the only way progressive Whites win. If Blacks vote in great numbers, Hispanics win. When Blacks, Hispanics, and progressive Whites vote, women win. When women win, children win. When women and children win, workers win. We must all come up together. We must come up together.

Thank you.

For all of our joy and excitement, we must not save the world and lose our souls. We should never short-circuit enforcing the Voting Rights Act at every level.  When one of us rise[s], all of us will rise. Justice is the way out. Peace is the way out. We should not act as if nuclear weaponry is negotiable and debatable.

In this world in which we live, we dropped the bomb on Japan and felt guilty, but in 1984 other folks [have] also got bombs. This time, if we drop the bomb, six minutes later we, too, will be destroyed. It's not about dropping the bomb on somebody. It is about dropping the bomb on everybody. We must choose to develop minds over guided missiles, and think it out and not fight it out. It's time for a change.

Our foreign policy must be characterized by mutual respect, not by gunboat diplomacy, big stick diplomacy, and threats. Our nation at its best feeds the hungry. Our nation at its worst, at its worst, will mine the harbors of Nicaragua, at its worst will try to overthrow their government, at its worst will cut aid to American education and increase the aid to El Salvador; at its worst, our nation will have partnerships with South Africa. That's a moral disgrace. It's a moral disgrace. It's a moral disgrace.

We look at Africa. We cannot just focus on Apartheid in Southern Africa. We must fight for trade with Africa, and not just aid to Africa. We cannot stand idly by and say we will not relate to Nicaragua unless they have elections there, and then embrace military regimes in Africa overthrowing democratic governments in Nigeria and Liberia and Ghana. We must fight for democracy all around the world and play the game by one set of rules.

Peace in this world. Our present formula for peace in the Middle East is inadequate. It will not work. There are 22 nations in the Middle East. Our nation must be able to talk and act and influence all of them. We must build upon Camp David, and measure human rights by one yard stick. In that region we have too many interests and too few friends.

There is a way out -- jobs. Put America back to work. When I was a child growing up in Greenville, South Carolina, the Reverend Sample used to preach every so often a sermon relating to Jesus. And he said, "If I be lifted up, I'll draw all men unto me." I didn't quite understand what he meant as a child growing up, but I understand a little better now. If you raise up truth, it's magnetic. It has a way of drawing people.

With all this confusion in this Convention, the bright lights and parties and big fun, we must raise up the simple proposition: If we lift up a program to feed the hungry, they'll come running; if we lift up a program to study war no more, our youth will come running; if we lift up a program to put America back to work, and an alternative to welfare and despair, they will come working.

If we cut that military budget without cutting our defense, and use that money to rebuild bridges and put steel workers back to work, and use that money and provide jobs for our cities, and use that money to build schools and pay teachers and educate our children and build hospitals and train doctors and train nurses, the whole nation will come running to us.

As I leave you now, we vote in this convention and get ready to go back across this nation in a couple of days. In this campaign, I've tried to be faithful to my promise. I lived in old barrios, ghettos, and reservations and housing projects. I have a message for our youth. I challenge them to put hope in their brains and not dope in their veins. I told them that like Jesus, I, too, was born in the slum. But just because you're born in the slum does not mean the slum is born in you, and you can rise above it if your mind is made up.

I told them in every slum there are two sides. When I see a broken window -- that's the slummy side. Train some youth to become a glazier -- that's the sunny side. When I see a missing brick -- that's the slummy side. Let that child in the union and become a brick mason and build -- that's the sunny side. When I see a missing door -- that's the slummy side. Train some youth to become a carpenter -- that's the sunny side. And when I see the vulgar words and hieroglyphics of destitution on the walls -- that's the slummy side. Train some youth to become a painter, an artist -- that's the sunny side.

We leave this place looking for the sunny side because there's a brighter side somewhere. I'm more convinced than ever that we can win. We will vault up the rough side of the mountain. We can win. I just want young America to do me one favor, just one favor. Exercise the right to dream. You must face reality -- that which is. But then dream of a reality that ought to be -- that must be. Live beyond the pain of reality with the dream of a bright tomorrow. Use hope and imagination as weapons of survival and progress. Use love to motivate you and obligate you to serve the human family.

Young America, dream. Choose the human race over the nuclear race. Bury the weapons and don't burn the people. Dream -- dream of a new value system. Teachers who teach for life and not just for a living; teach because they can't help it. Dream of lawyers more concerned about justice than a judgeship. Dream of doctors more concerned about public health than personal wealth. Dream of preachers and priests who will prophesy and not just profiteer. Preach and dream!

Our time has come. Our time has come. Suffering breeds character. Character breeds faith. In the end, faith will not disappoint.

Our time has come. Our faith, hope, and dreams will prevail. Our time has come. Weeping has endured for nights, but now joy cometh in the morning.

Our time has come. No grave can hold our body down. Our time has come. No lie can live forever.

Our time has come. We must leave racial battle ground and come to economic common ground and moral higher ground. America, our time has come. We come from disgrace to amazing grace.

Our time has come. Give me your tired, give me your poor, your huddled masses who yearn to breathe free and come November, there will be a change because our time has come.

Source: http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/j...