Obama Ipsum

And you know what - it's worked before. I've seen it in Illinois, when we provided health care to more children and moved more families from welfare to work.

The hope of a young naval lieutenant bravely patrolling the Mekong Delta. I'd been inspired by the civil rights movement - by all the clear-eyed, straight-backed, courageous young people who'd boarded buses and traveled down South to march and sit at lunch counters, and lay down their lives in some cases for freedom. And I think they recognized a part of themselves in me too. To the Joshua generation, these challenges seem momentous - and they are. Let's come together - Protestant and Catholic, Muslim and Hindu and Jew, believer and non-believer alike.

We have to do what we can, knowing it's hard and not swinging from a naive idealism to a bitter defeatism - but rather, accepting the fact that we're not going to solve every problem overnight, but we can still make a difference. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should've been authorized and never should've been waged, and we want to talk about how we'll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned. But privately, many Muslims recognize that Israel will not go away.

E pluribus unum. And it puts the lie to the notion that the separation of church and state in America means faith should have no role in public life. America, we cannot turn back. Instead, it must be a cause for action to help the Palestinian people develop the institutions that will sustain their state; to recognize Israel's legitimacy; and to choose progress over a self-defeating focus on the past.

I learned that everyone's got a sacred story when you take the time to listen. And in the weeks ahead, I look forward to debating them with John McCain.

Thank you, and God bless America.