The most presidential lorem ipsum in history.
He told me he'd joined the Marines, and was heading to Iraq the following week. Do we participate in a politics of cynicism or do we participate in a politics of hope? But I also get the sense that there's a hunger that's deeper than that - a hunger that goes beyond any single cause or issue. It is agonizing for America to lose our young men and women. We see it in the history of Andalusia and Cordoba during the Inquisition.
But my journey is part of a larger journey - one shared by all who've ever sought to apply the values of their faith to our society. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church? And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way It's a promise that says each of us has the freedom to make of our own lives what we will, but that we also have the obligation to treat each other with dignity and respect. I'll make it easier for the American people to afford these new cars. We must always examine the ways in which we protect it. And we will match promising Muslim students with internships in America; invest in on-line learning for teachers and children around the world; and create a new online network, so a teenager in Kansas can communicate instantly with a teenager in Cairo.
They know they have to work hard to get ahead - and they want to. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton's Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. Not with an economy to fix and cities to rebuild and farms to save. troops and civilians.
Moreover, the sweeping change brought by modernity and globalization led many Muslims to view the West as hostile to the traditions of Islam. America respects the right of all peaceful and law-abiding voices to be heard around the world, even if we disagree with them.
The skeptical bent of my mind didn't suddenly vanish. It's the wisdom Moses imparted to those who would succeed him. If John McCain wants to have a debate about who has the temperament, and judgment, to serve as the next Commander-in-Chief, that's a debate I'm ready to have. Of course, recognizing our common humanity is only the beginning of our task. We did not go by choice, we went because of necessity. Without these ingredients, elections alone do not make true democracy.
God bless you.