Text of Governor Patrick's Endorsement of Barack Obama
Senator Obama, welcome to Red Sox Nation. Around here we know how to come from behind and win -- and that's just what we're going to help you do.
Democrats are feeling heady these days. We are sensing victory. Control of the White House is again within our grasp. And we have good reason to feel that way.
Democrats control the House and the Senate.
A majority of the nation's governors are Democrats, including the first Democratic governor in Massachusetts in 16 years.
And the national Republican Party seems in disarray.
I don't know if you've been watching any of the Republican debates, but the candidates seem to be trying to out-Bush Bush. But they are aligning themselves with failure.
The same folks who claim to believe in small government and fiscal restraint are responsible for the largest increase in the federal deficit and the biggest expansion in the size of government in American history.
The same folks who say religious fundamentalism is a danger to us abroad are busy promoting it at home.
The same folks who say that government should have as little impact as possible in the lives of private citizens are responsible for the greatest encroachment on personal freedoms in a generation, the biggest presidential power grab in history. Remember, these are the same folks who brought the full weight of the federal government to the hospital bedside of Terry Schiavo at the end of her life.
The field of Republican candidates is trying to "out-Bush" the very President who brought us a failed response to Hurricane Katrina and a failed strategy in Iraq.
No wonder Democrats are heady. We know a lot of people -- Democrats, Independents and Republicans, too -- are unwilling to entrust government next time to people who fundamentally don't believe in government in the first place.
But beware, my friends: because discontent with Republicans is not enough to assure Democratic victory. Nor should it be. Indeed, I believe the challenges before us as a Nation transcend partisan politics.
The truth is, we don't just need a Democrat. We need a leader.
Our nation has been on its economic and social knees before. In an earlier generation, we faced a dangerous foreign threat and deep domestic suffering. Our leadership did more than develop new policies. Our leaders reclaimed American values, and called on a generation to serve and to sacrifice. And that generation -- the so-called "greatest generation" -- saw it as their patriotic duty to step up.
That generation is the generation that fought and beat the Nazis; that rebuilt Europe; that built the federal highway system and the great public universities; that expanded the middle class and spawned the civil rights revolution.
And the rest of us have been supported, enabled, even enriched by their service and their sacrifice for a very long time.
But look around, my friends. Look into the eyes of your neighbors. Listen to the anxiety in their voices.
Glance out of the windows of your car as you commute to work at the number of empty shops and "for sale" signs.
Look up from your paper or your iPod play list on the bus ride home at the homeless woman and her kids who ride from one end of the line to the other to stay dry on a wet day.
Take a minute to consider how much of your family's budget (let alone the state's budget) you spend on health insurance.
Consider for a minute that the bridge in Minneapolis that collapsed this summer is but one of thousands of bridges and roads here in Massachusetts and elsewhere whose repair and refurbishment is long overdue.
Connect up the breakdown in families and the elimination of the assault weapons ban to the shooting of a 13-year-old boy right here in Dorchester who did everything right, and the loss of boys and girls like him in urban centers all over this country.
Think about what it means in schooling and social services and criminal justice tomorrow to veto the S-CHIP program today and deny basic health care services to needy children.
Consider how all those poor people abandoned on those rooftops after Katrina were abandoned before that storm, and how many remain so even today.
So much damage has been done to our country, to her infrastructure, her spirit, her standing in the world, under George Bush's brand of Republican leadership. The truth is we have a mess on our hands. And cleaning that up will depend on more than good government policies and programs or partisan politics. It will depend on us.
Sometimes I wonder if we get so discouraged that we cannot even imagine what a whole, functioning, peaceful national community could be like. But just imagine:
Imagine a nation where young people find love and companionship in a neighborhood instead of a gang.
Imagine a nation where public schools instill a love of learning and a respect for achievement, not just success on a test.
Imagine a nation where we make things again, because our investments in new industries like clean energy and life sciences produce a cleaner environment and good jobs too.
Imagine a nation that addresses the causes of crime and violence, instead of just warehousing offenders so they come out more dangerous than they were when they went in.
Imagine a nation that makes health care work for the sake of healthy lives and competitive companies, instead of a nation where the president vetoes programs we can afford like S-CHIP.
Imagine a nation at peace, vigilant but without fear, whose position as a force for good in the world is restored.
Imagine a nation with safe bridges and smooth roads and convenient rails and fuel efficient cars and a livable environment.
Imagine a nation where Democrats and Republicans and Independents work together to solve problems instead of hurling insults back and forth.
These are all great challenges. Each involves hard choices. But how we choose will say much about not just our conditions but our values as a Nation. Just as in an earlier time when we faced defining choices, we need a leader who is ready to make a claim on our service and our sacrifice.
This election is not just about who we want but about who we are. I want a president who understands that. That's why I am with Barack Obama.
For once, I want a campaign that's not about the candidate but about us.
Not about a resume, but about character.
Not about connections or convenience, but about conviction.
Not about smearing the competition, but about lifting us all up.
Not about the right and the left, but about right and wrong.
Not about yesterday, but about tomorrow.
I don't care if the next President is a Washington insider. I care about what's inside his heart.
I don't care whether the next President has experience in the White House. I care whether he understands life in your house.
I don't care whether the next President has already met foreign heads of state. I care whether he knows something about how people live and think in distant cities and villages and will bear in mind that our actions affect them, too.
I don't care whether the next President is the first black President or the first woman President or the first whatever, to tell you the truth. I care that the next President has moral courage, a political backbone, the humility to admit what he doesn't know, and the wisdom to learn from others.
There will be many hard decisions in the next four years. I want a President who will make the right decision, not the expedient one.
If there must be war, I want a President who will never lead us into battle on false pretenses or use dangers abroad to frighten me into accepting a flawed agenda at home.
I want a President -- we need a President -- who makes us want to stand up tall, to be proud of the moral and visionary leadership of the United States, who makes us feel a part of something bigger and more meaningful than our own narrow interests, who is showing us again to look ahead with vigilance and confidence instead of with fear and misgivings.
I want Barack Obama to be our President.
You know this man. Book smart and street smart. He has lived with and learned from people all over the world. He has studied with the elite and worked for the vulnerable. He is at home in the halls of power and in the halls of a neighborhood school. He is at ease with the meek and the mighty -- and perhaps most especially with himself. He listens.
As a Democrat, I am proud that the field of Democratic contenders is so strong. Many are friends and colleagues with whom I have worked over the years. But frankly, I believe the importance of this election transcends friendships and party. I believe we need unifying, visionary leadership. I believe we need someone who makes a claim on our times for service and sacrifice. I believe we need a President who will level with the American people. I believe we need Barack Obama.
You know this will not be easy. You know that the status quo is a powerful force. A lot of people like things the way they are already, and would rather not have anybody rock the boat. It's hard to make change and hard for some to accept that change comes only through struggle. A lot of people in our age of instant results consider that too much to ask and so sit it out. That's why I always say that we get the leadership we deserve.
But I know we deserve better. We need better. And we proved here in Massachusetts that you have all the power you need to change the status quo -- if you are willing to work for it. And if we want the kind of leadership our times demand, we are going to have to go work again in Iowa, in New Hampshire and all across the Nation. We are going to have to work the phones and walk the neighborhoods and take down names and numbers and make the case. We are going to have to ask our friends to take a chance -- not on a skinny kid with a funny name from Chicago, but on our own aspirations for a better, more decent America. We are most admired in the world not because of our military might or our material wealth. We are most admired in the world for our commitment to certain civic values. And we have defined those values over time and through struggle as equality, opportunity and fair play.
If you want those values back in your government and in your lives, if you want your leadership to lay claim again to your citizenship and to ask you to bring the best that you are and the best that you have to a renewed American cause, if you want the next generation to say that we in our times faced our challenges remembering who we are as Americans, if you want more than a campaign for president but a cause to redeem American values and aspirations, if you are willing to "hope for the best and work for it," then join me in welcoming my friend and yours, the next president of the United States, Barack Obama.