Here is the video clip of Barack Obama's
Yes, We Can speech.
Scroll down for the transcript.
It follows the transcript of
Senator Barack Obama's New Hampshire Primary
Speech, aka the Yes, We Can speech, delivered at
the Nashua High School South, Nashua, New Hampshire, on
January 8, 2008.
Thank you, New
Hampshire. I love you back.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Well, thank you so much. I am still fired up and
ready to go. (APPLAUSE)
Thank you. Thank you.
Well, first of all, I want to congratulate
Senator Clinton on a hard-fought victory here in
New Hampshire. She did an outstanding job. Give
her a big round of applause.
(APPLAUSE)
You know, a few weeks ago, no one imagined that
we'd have accomplished what we did here tonight
in New Hampshire. No one could have imagined it.
For most of this campaign, we were far behind.
We always knew our climb would be steep. But in
record numbers, you came out, and you spoke up
for change.
And with your voices and your votes, you made it
clear that at this moment, in this election,
there is something happening in America.
(APPLAUSE)
There is something happening when men and women
in Des Moines and Davenport, in Lebanon and
Concord, come out in the snows of January to
wait in lines that stretch block after block
because they believe in what this country can
be.
There is something happening. There's something
happening when Americans who are young in age
and in spirit, who've never participated in
politics before, turn out in numbers we have
never seen because they know in their hearts
that this time must be different.
There's something happening when people vote not
just for party that they belong to, but the
hopes that they hold in common.
And whether we are rich or poor, black or white,
Latino or Asian, whether we hail from Iowa or
New Hampshire, Nevada or South Carolina, we are
ready to take this country in a fundamentally
new direction.
That's what's happening in America right now;
change is what's happening in America.
You, all of you who are here tonight, all who
put so much heart and soul and work into this
campaign, you can be the new majority who can
lead this nation out of a long political
darkness.
Democrats, independents and Republicans who are
tired of the division and distraction that has
clouded Washington, who know that we can
disagree without being disagreeable, who
understand that, if we mobilize our voices to
challenge the money and influence that stood in
our way and challenge ourselves to reach for
something better, there is no problem we cannot
solve, there is no destiny that we cannot
fulfill.
Our new American majority can end the outrage of
unaffordable, unavailable health care in our
time.
We can bring doctors and patients, workers and
businesses, Democrats and Republicans together,
and we can tell the drug and insurance industry
that, while they get a seat at the table, they
don't get to buy every chair, not this time, not
now.
(APPLAUSE)
Our new majority can end the tax breaks for
corporations that ship our jobs overseas and put
a middle-class tax cut in the pockets of working
Americans who deserve it.
We can stop sending our children to schools with
corridors of shame and start putting them on a
pathway to success.
We can stop talking about how great teachers are
and start rewarding them for their greatness by
giving them more pay and more support. We can do
this with our new majority.
We can harness the ingenuity of farmers and
scientists, citizens and entrepreneurs to free
this nation from the tyranny of oil and save our
planet from a point of no return.
And when I am president of the United States, we
will end this war in Iraq and bring our troops
home.
(APPLAUSE)
We will end this war in Iraq. We will bring our
troops home. We will finish the job -- we will
finish the job against Al Qaida in Afghanistan.
We will care for our veterans. We will restore
our moral standing in the world.
And we will never use 9/11 as a way to scare up
votes, because it is not a tactic to win an
election. It is a challenge that should unite
America and the world against the common threats
of the 21st century: terrorism and nuclear
weapons, climate change and poverty, genocide
and disease.
All of the candidates in this race share these
goals. All of the candidates in this race have
good ideas and all are patriots who serve this
country honorably.
(APPLAUSE)
But the reason our campaign has always been
different, the reason we began this improbable
journey almost a year ago is because it's not
just about what I will do as president. It is
also about what you, the people who love this
country, the citizens of the United States of
America, can do to change it.
That's what this election is all about.
That's why tonight belongs to you. It belongs to
the organizers, and the volunteers, and the
staff who believed in this journey and rallied
so many others to join the cause.
We know the battle ahead will be long. But
always remember that, no matter what obstacles
stand in our way, nothing can stand in the way
of the power of millions of voices calling for
change.
We have been told we cannot do this by a chorus
of cynics. And they will only grow louder and
more dissonant in the weeks and months to come.
We've been asked to pause for a reality check.
We've been warned against offering the people of
this nation false hope. But in the unlikely
story that is America, there has never been
anything false about hope.
(APPLAUSE)
For when we have faced down impossible odds,
when we've been told we're not ready or that we
shouldn't try or that we can't, generations of
Americans have responded with a simple creed
that sums up the spirit of a people: Yes, we
can. Yes, we can. Yes, we can.
It was a creed written into the founding
documents that declared the destiny of a nation:
Yes, we can.
It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists as
they blazed a trail towards freedom through the
darkest of nights: Yes, we can.
It was sung by immigrants as they struck out
from distant shores and pioneers who pushed
westward against an unforgiving wilderness: Yes,
we can.
It was the call of workers who organized, women
who reached for the ballot, a president who
chose the moon as our new frontier, and a king
who took us to the mountaintop and pointed the
way to the promised land: Yes, we can, to
justice and equality.
Yes, we can, to opportunity and prosperity. Yes,
we can heal this nation. Yes, we can repair this
world. Yes, we can.
And so, tomorrow, as we take the campaign south
and west, as we learn that the struggles of the
textile workers in Spartanburg are not so
different than the plight of the dishwasher in
Las Vegas, that the hopes of the little girl who
goes to the crumbling school in Dillon are the
same as the dreams of the boy who learns on the
streets of L.A., we will remember that there is
something happening in America, that we are not
as divided as our politics suggest, that we are
one people, we are one nation.
And, together, we will begin the next great
chapter in the American story, with three words
that will ring from coast to coast, from sea to
shining sea: Yes, we can.
Also called the
Persian Wars, the Greco-Persian Wars were
fought for almost half a century from 492 BC -
449 BC. Greece won against enormous odds. Here
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