Barack Obama

“ Even if we succeed in making housing and homeownership affordable for all, if we don't help strengthen the families that live inside those homes, then those bullets will make the American house crumble from the inside out. We have to do more to help families balance work and take care of one another. Let's help 17 million children by extending the child tax credit to low-income workers. Let's stop spending $275 million a day in Iraq and pass some tax cuts that people actually need.
If we want stronger families in America, then we have to confront the tough issues. ”

“ If you had gone to any street corner in Chicago or Baton Rouge or Selma or Trenton or Arcola, Mississippi — you would have found the same young men and women without hope, without prospects, and without a sense of destiny other than life on the edge — the edge of the law, the edge of the economy, the edge of family structures and communities. ”

“ Let's finally make a quality education accessible to every American child so that every student can graduate from high school ready for college and work in a knowledge-based economy.
To begin the great transformation in our schools, we need to invest in the most important part of a child's education: the man or woman standing at the head of the classroom. As President, I will recruit hundreds of thousands of new teachers and principals. ”

“ But while we're at it, what good is an education and a job, if there are only million dollar mansions and quarter million dollar condos and you can't afford a place to live? When our children are being priced out of the neighborhoods and towns they grew up in and when families cannot find safe places to live near their job, that's a bullet that's got to come out too.
We have to invest in housing again. In too many communities low-income families are priced out of the housing market. ”

“ Despair takes hold and young people all across this country look at the way the world is and believe that things are never going to get any better. You tell yourself, my school will always crumble. There will never be a good job waiting for me to excel at. There will never be a place that I can be proud of and I can afford to call my home. That despair quietly simmers and makes it impossible to build strong communities and neighborhoods. ”

“ We're never going to forget there is always hope — there is always light in the midst of desperate days — that a baby can be born even with a bullet in her arm. And we can come together as one people and transform this nation. ”

“ Those increases have priced out more than 200,000 students in 2004. And for what it costs to fund the Iraq War for three weeks, we could provide each student with four years at a public college or university.
We all know how important education is. It's a passport to a better life. But millions of children are not given an equal chance to realize their own potential. And for too long, our kids — not "those kids," but our kids — have been asked to settle for mediocrity simply because of their zip code, the color of their skin, and how much their parents earn. ”

“ I want our young people to imagine and build the next great inventions. If we finally have a president who deals with this challenge, we could not only make our country safer, we could save the planet and create jobs throughout all our communities. We must meet this challenge. We must take the bullet out that's stopped our progress for all these years and bring more economic opportunities to every community. ”

“ This war never should have been authorized by Congress and it never should have been waged. And it's time, once and for all, to bring our troops home. It's time to recognize that American soldiers can't solve Iraq's political differences or ethnic rivalries. ”

“ But everyone here knows the disaster and the poverty happened long before that hurricane hit. All the hurricane did was make bare what we ignore each and every day which is that there are whole sets of communities that are impoverished, that don't have meaningful opportunity, that don't have hope and they are forgotten. ”

“ What's stopped us from meeting these challenges and taking these bullets out is not the absence of sound policies and sensible plans. What's stopped us is the failure of leadership and absence of urgency and a belief that if we ignore our problems like discrimination and poverty that they will someone how go away. ”

“ We must take this bullet out if America is to remain the leading force for good and creativity and innovation in this world.
But we can't stop at education if we want stronger communities. We need to provide economic opportunity in every corner of our country if we want to take the bullet out.
We know what it takes to develop our communities economically. Right now, the Iraq War is set to cost us $2 trillion dollars — that's more than enough to lay broadband lines from " Columbia South Carolina to Portland Oregon." ”

“ In another study about another effective program at the Perry Preschool, which served low-income black children in Michigan, kids needed special education less often, and they were three times as likely to own their own home and half as likely to go on welfare. That early childhood program even helped the next generation.
So we know what it takes to improve our schools. We know that if children are learning in dilapidated buildings with teachers that are underpaid and textbooks that are 20 years old, they will not learn. ”

“ Much of what we saw on our television screens 15 years ago was Los Angeles expressing a lingering, ongoing, pervasive legacy — a tragic legacy out of the tragic history this country has never fully come to terms with. ”

“ In New Orleans, the murder rate was one of the highest in the country — ten times the national average — well before the hurricane hit. Young men died far more frequently from gunshot wounds than they did from anything else. The schools were failing long before the levees broke. The city's poverty rate was twice the national average. ”

“ Those "quiet riots" that take place every day are born from the same place as the fires and the destruction and the police decked out in riot gear and the deaths. They happen when a sense of disconnect settles in and hope dissipates. ”

“ What good is the Information Super Highway when too many towns and cities are still riding around in dial-up. We must connect the disconnected so economic opportunity is there for everyone — not just everyone who can afford it. ”

“ I want to support teachers at all stages of their careers by increasing salaries across the board, improving incentives to get the best teachers to work in our rural areas and our most challenging cities, providing more resources so that teachers have more security and control over their classrooms, and by providing more opportunities for professional development.
There are models of excellence in many communities that show when you put a great teacher in a classroom, students can learn. ”

“ There was a team that got the bullet out of that baby girl 15 years ago. She's got a scar on her arm, always will, but she survived.
America is going to survive. We won't forget where we came from. We won't forget what happened 19 months ago, 15 years ago, 200 years ago. We're going to pull out bullet after bullet. ”

“ And if we don't do something soon, more Katrina's are going to happen and we know which communities will bear the brunt of those storms.
When it comes to global climate change and developing the fuels for the 21st century, America must lead. I want our farmers to grow the renewable fuels and produce biofuels. ”

“ A recent report found that the housing market experienced its worst sales-month in 18 years and foreclosures are up 47% compared to last year. Right now, too many people are caught in a nightmare caused by mortgage fraud and predatory lending. ”

“ Of course, the federal response after Katrina was similar to the response after the riots in Los Angeles. People in Washington wake up and are surprised that there's poverty in our midst, and that others were frustrated and angry. ”

“ This would help lift more people out of poverty and into the middle class.
There are models all across this country for how for how we can rebuild our cities and communities. There's a new idea coming for the Gulf Coast and the New Orleans area. Congressman Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, Emanuel Cleaver, the former mayor of Kansas City and head of the National Conference of Black Mayors, and other members of the Congressional Black Caucus will soon introduce legislation that creates a Gulf Coast recovery and empowerment initiative. ”

“ That money will go directly to children and their mothers. But let's be honest, government alone can't solve the breakdown of our families. This is something we have to look to ourselves so that fathers become parents too. ”

“ This plan will also provide mentoring opportunities and let case workers help men and women make difficult transitions. It will coordinate with local employers, community colleges, and community organizations so that job training programs are actually connected to good paying jobs with the opportunity for career growth. ”