The American Promise

Click here for video and the full manuscript of Barack Obama's inspiring acceptance speech:

"The times are too serious, the stakes are too high for this same partisan playbook. So let us agree that patriotism has no party. I love this country, and so do you, and so does John McCain. The men and women who serve in our battlefields may be Democrats and Republicans and Independents, but they have fought together and bled together and some died together under the same proud flag. They have not served a Red America or a Blue America – they have served the United States of America.

So I’ve got news for you, John McCain. We all put our country first.

America, our work will not be easy. The challenges we face require tough choices, and Democrats as well as Republicans will need to cast off the worn-out ideas and politics of the past. For part of what has been lost these past eight years can’t just be measured by lost wages or bigger trade deficits. What has also been lost is our sense of common purpose – our sense of higher purpose. And that’s what we have to restore."

I am not a very political person, and I won't be filling this blog with political opinion. Last night's speech, however, was not only an inspiring speech, but it was also an historical one. It was a momentous night, one that made me proud to be an American, as hokey as that sounds. And I wanted to direct people who may have missed it to where they could find it.