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In The Wake Of 9/11, My Meetings With Arab And Pakistani Americans, For Example, Have A More Urgent Quality, For The Stories Of Detentions And Fbi Questioning And Hard Stares From Neighbors Have Shaken Their Sense Of Security And Belonging. They Have Been Reminded That The History Of Immigration In This Country Has A Dark Underbelly; They Need Specific Reassurances That Their Citizenship Really Means Something, That America Has Learned The Right Lessons From The Japanese Internments During World War Ii, And That I Will Stand With Them Should The Political Winds Shift In An Ugly Direction.

-Barack Obama

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In The Wake Of

Barack Obama

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In The Wake Of 9/11, My Meetings With Arab And Pakistani Americans, For Example, Have A More Urgent Quality, For The Stories Of Detentions And Fbi Questioning And Hard Stares From Neighbors Have Shaken Their Sense Of Security And Belonging. They Have Been Reminded That The History Of Immigration In This Country Has A Dark Underbelly; They Need Specific Reassurances That Their Citizenship Really Means Something, That America Has Learned The Right Lessons From The Japanese Internments During World War Ii, And That I Will Stand With Them Should The Political Winds Shift In An Ugly Direction.

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The Boarded-up Homes, The Decaying Storefronts, The Aging Church Rolls, Kids From Unknown Families Who Swaggered Down The Streets - Loud Congregations Of Teenage Boys, Teenage Girls Feeding Potato Chips To Crying Toddlers, The Discarded Wrappers Tumbling Down The Block - All Of It Whispered Painful Truths.

The Only Resolution Is For The Aspirations Of Both Sides To Be Met Through Two States, Where Israelis And Palestinians Each Live In Peace And Security. ... Israelis Must Acknowledge That Just As Israel's Right To Exist Cannot Be Denied, Neither Can Palestine's. The United States Does Not Accept The Legitimacy Of Continued Israeli Settlements.

My Parents Shared Not Only An Improbable Love, They Shared An Abiding Faith In The Possibilities Of This Nation. They Would Give Me An African Name, Barack, Or Blessed, Believing That In A Tolerant America Your Name Is No Barrier To Success.

Our Enemies Are Also Seeking The Abilities To Sabotage Our Power Grid, Our Financial Institutions, Our Air Traffic Control Systems.

I Want My Children - I Want Malia And Sasha - To Understand That They've Got Responsibilities Beyond Just What They Themselves Have Done. That They Have A Responsibility To The Larger Community And The Larger Nation, That They Should Be Sensitive To And Extra Thoughtful About The Plight Of People Who Have Been Oppressed In The Past, Are Oppressed Currently.

I Am Very Proud Of The Fact I Do Not Cheat When I'm Playing Golf.

The Young Are Going To Be The Messengers Of This Continued Strengthening Of The Diversity In America.

Nobody Gets To Threaten The Full Faith And Credit Of The United States Just To Extract Political Concessions.

That's Part Of What I Tried To Describe To My Team And Supporters After The Election, There Was A Lot Of Disappointment.

We Are Not Entitled To Success We Have To Earn It

The Ability Of Republican Leaders To Rile Up Their Base - Helped Along By Folks Like Rush Limbaugh, Some Commentators On Fox News - I Think Created An Environment In Which Republican Voters Would Punish Republicans For Cooperating With Me. That Hothouse Of Back-and-forth Argument And - And Really Sharp Partisanship I Think Has Been Harmful To America.

America Must Always Lead On The World Stage. If We Don't, No One Else Will. The Military That You Have Joined Is, And Always Will Be, The Backbone Of That Leadership. But U.s. Military Action Cannot Be The Only - Or Even Primary - Component Of Our Leadership In Every Instance. Just Because We Have The Best Hammer Does Not Mean That Every Problem Is A Nail.

Our Objective Is Clear: We Will Degrade, And Ultimately Destroy, Isil Through A Comprehensive And Sustained Counter-terrorism Strategy.

This Massacre In Orlando Is Therefore A Further Reminder Of How Easy It Is For Someone To Get Their Hands On A Weapon That Lets Them Shoot People In A School Or In A House Of Worship Or A Movie Theater Or In A Nightclub. And We Have To Decide If That's The Kind Of Country We Want To Be. And To Actively Do Nothing Is A Decision, As Well.

One Of The Things I've Learned About Being President Is That We'll Work On Issues For Long Periods Of Time, Sometimes In Obscurity.

It's Not Surprising Then They Get Bitter, They Cling To Guns Or Religion Or Antipathy To People Who Aren't Like Them, Or Anti-immigrant Sentiment, Or Anti-trade Sentiment, As A Way To Explain Their Frustrations.

With Singapore's Partnership, The United States In Engaging More Deeply Across South-east Asia And Asean, Which Is Central To The Region's Peace And Prosperity. Singapore Is An Anchor For The Us Presence In The Region, Which Is A Foundation Of Stability And Peace.

As Has Been Well Documented, I Smoked Pot As A Kid, And I View It As A Bad Habit And A Vice, Not Very Different From The Cigarettes That I Smoked As A Young Person Up Through A Big Chunk Of My Adult Life. I Don't Think It Is More Dangerous Than Alcohol.

I Do Think That There Is A Big Difference Between Family Farms And Agri-business, And One Of The Distressing Things That I Think Has Occurred Is With Consolidation Of Farm Lands. You've Seen Large Agri-businesses Benefit From Enormous Profits From Existing Farm Programs, And I Think We Should Be Focusing Most Of Those Programs On Those Family Farmers.

The Time To Fix Our Broken Immigration System Is Now... We Need Stronger Enforcement On The Border And At The Workplace... But For Reform To Work, We Also Must Respond To What Pulls People To America... Where We Can Reunite Families, We Should. Where We Can Bring In More Foreign-born Workers With The Skills Our Economy Needs, We Should.

What I Want To Try To Do Is Unify The Two Wings Of The Democratic Party. What's Considered The More Progressive Wing Of The Democratic Party - The More Centrist Wing Of The Party. I Think We Can Craft An Approach That Is More American, Pro-worker, Pro-business, Pro-growth.

I Know That There Are Millions Of Americans Who Are Content With Their Health Care Coverage - They Like Their Plan And, Most Importantly, They Value Their Relationship With Their Doctor.

Reading Makes All Other Learning Possible. We Have To Get Books Into Our Children's Hands Early And Often.

The American People Are Not Expecting Miracles. I Think If You Talk To The Average Person Right Now That They Would Say, 'well, Look, You Know Well, We're Having A Tough Time Right Now. We've Had Tough Times Before.' 'and You Know, We Don't Expect A New President Can Snap His Fingers And Suddenly Everything Is Gonna Be Okay. But What We Do Expect Is That The Guy Is Gonna Be Straight With Us. We Do Expect That He's Gonna Be Working Really Hard For Us.'

On Every Front There Are Clear Answers Out There That Can Make This Country Stronger, But We're Going To Break Through The Fear And The Frustration People Are Feeling. Our Job Is To Make Sure That Even As We Make Progress, That We Are Also Giving People A Sense Of Hope And Vision For The Future.

We Can't Discount How Scary And Shaken Not Just The Turkish Government Is, But Turkish Society Is. Imagine If You Had Some Rump Group Of Military Officials Here In The United States Who Started Flying Off With F-16s Or Other Artillery And Were Taking Shots At Government Buildings, And People Were Killed And Injured. People Would Be Scared And Rightfully So.

We've Subsidized Oil Companies For A Century. That's Long Enough. It's Time To End The Taxpayer Giveaways To An Industry That Rarely Has Been More Profitable, And Double-down On A Clean Energy Industry That Never Has Been More Promising. Pass Clean Energy Tax Credits. Create These Jobs.

I Will Call Not Just On Israel, But On The Palestinians, On The Arab States, And The International Community To Join Us In This Effort, Because The Burden Of Making Hard Choices Must Not Be Israel’s Alone.

If In Fact The Republicans Make Some Modifications [of Obamacare], Some Of Which I May Have Been Seeking Previously, But They Wouldn't Cooperate Because They Didn't Wanna Make The System Work, And Re-label It As Trumpcare, I'm Fine With That.

I'm Not A Particularly Ideological Person. There's Things, Some Values I Feel Passionately About.

We Can Seize This Future Together Because We Are Not As Divided As Our Politics Suggests.

Futures Together

I Will Continue To Urge Creditors To Take The Steps Needed To Put Greece On A Path Towards A Durable Economic Recovery Because It's In All Of Our Interests That Greece Succeeds.

Michelle, I Love You. The Other Night, I Think The Entire Country Saw Just How Lucky I Am. Malia And Sasha, You Make Me So Proud…but Don't Get Any Ideas, You're Still Going To Class Tomorrow. And Joe Biden, Thank You For Being The Best Vice President I Could Ever Hope For.

My Central Focus Is What Are We Doing To Protect The American People And The American Homeland? Afghanistan And Pakistan Are Critical Elements In That Process.

I Get A Thick Book Full Of Death, Destruction, Strife, And Chaos. That's What I Take With My Morning Tea.

Clearly, Iran Has Influence In Iraq. Iraq Has A Majority Shi'a Population, They Have Relationships To Iran. Some Are Natural.

Because This Is A Country Where Everyone Deserves The Same Freedom And Opportunities To Fulfill Their Dreams.

I've Called On Congress To Repeal The So-called Defense Of Marriage Act To Help End Discrimination To Help End Discrimination Against Same-sex Couples In This Country. Now, I Want To Add We Have A Duty To Uphold Existing Law, But I Believe We Must Do So In A Way That Does Not Exacerbate Old Divides. And Fulfilling This Duty In Upholding The Law In No Way Lessens My Commitment To Reversing This Law. I've Made That Clear.

Jerusalem Will Remain The Capital Of Israel And It Must Remain Undivided."truth: Obama Later Said, "this Was An Example Where We Had Some Poor Phrasing In The Speech And We Immediately Tried To Correct The Interpretation That Was Given. The Point We Were Simply Making Was, Is That We Don't Want Barbed Wire Running Through Jerusalem.

I Don't Buy The Hype When Everybody Is Saying How Wonderful Things Are And How Great I Am, And I Don't Get Too Down When People Say, "this Is A Disaster And He's Done For."

I Am Confident That We Will One Day End The Scourge Of Modern Slavery, Because I Believe In Those Committed To This Issue.

Slowly, But Surely, We Are Moving In The Right Direction. We're On The Right Track. The Economy Is Getting Stronger

We Will Respond To The Threat Of Climate Change

Lincoln Basically Pulled In All The People Who Had Been Running Against Him Into His Cabinet Because, Whatever Personal Feelings There Were, The Issue Was 'how Can We Get This Country Through This Time Of Crisis?'

I Don't Think The Democrats Should Think In Narrow Tactical Terms About Mid-term Elections.

Cutting The Deficit By Gutting Our Investments In Innovation And Education Is Like Lightening An Overloaded Airplane By Removing Its Engine. It May Make You Feel Like You're Flying High At First, But It Won't Take Long Before You Feel The Impact.

I Had Said From The Start That I Thought Iraq Was A Mistake, That We Should Have Stayed Focused On Afghanistan. I Think It Was The Right Decision Because The Taliban At That Point Had Gotten A Lot Of Momentum Before I'd Gotten Into Office, Partly Because We Hadn't Been Paying Attention As Much As We Needed To To Afghanistan.

In A Summer Marked By Instability In The Middle East And Eastern Europe, I Know The World Also Took Notice Of The Small American City Of Ferguson, Missouri - Where A Young Man Was Killed, And A Community Was Divided. So Yes, We Have Our Own Racial And Ethnic Tensions.

If We Don’t Uphold Our Constitution And Our Values, That Over Time, That Will Make Us Less Safe And That Will Be A Recruitment Tool For Organizations Like Al Qaeda. That’s What I Have To Keep My Eye On.

But Something Stirred Across The Country Because Of What Happened In Selma, Alabama, Because Some Folks Were Willing To March Across A Bridge. And So They [my Parents] Got Together, Barack Obama Jr. Was Born. So Don't Tell Me I Don't Have A Claim On Selma, Alabama. Don't Tell Me I'm Not Coming Home When I Come To Selma, Alabama.

My Life Story Is Something Obviously That Belongs To Me Very Personally. And The Fact Of The Matter Is That I Had Choices And Chances And Opportunities That Were Provided To Me, Based On The Way I Was Able To Direct My Own Decision-making. And What I'm Working To Fight For Is To Make Sure That All Women Have The Ability To Do That.

One Voice Can Change A Room, And If One Voice Can Change A Room, Then It Can Change A City, And If It Can Change A City, It Can Change A State, And If It Change A State, It Can Change A Nation, And If It Can Change A Nation, It Can Change The World. Your Voice Can Change The World.

Any So-called Leader Who Does Not Take This Issue (climate Change) Seriously Or Treats It Like A Joke Is Not Fit To Lead

Cool, Logical, Big-eared And Level-headed, The Center Of Star Trek's Optimistic, Inclusive Vision Of Humanity's Future. I Loved Spock.

[the Americans] Believe In The Idea That Jamal And Johnny Should Be Treated Equally.

We Are The Party Of Roosevelt. We Are The Party Of Kennedy. So Don't Tell Me That Democrats Won't Defend This Country. Don't Tell Me That Democrats Won't Keep Us Safe.

The President Of The United States Is Supposed To Lead The Free World And Not Follow It. Other Nations Have Been More Outspoken. So, I Hope That We'll Hear More Of This Because Young Men And Women Taking To The Streets In Tehran Need Our Support. The Signs Are In English. They're Basically Asking For Us To Speak Up On Their Behalf.

To All Those Watching Tonight From Beyond Our Shores, From Parliaments And Palaces, To Those Who Are Huddled Around Radios In The Forgotten Corners Of The World, Our Stories Are Singular, But Our Destiny Is Shared, And A New Dawn Of American Leadership Is At Hand.

One Of The Things I Think I Can Bring To The Presidency Is To Make Government And Public Service Cool Again.

I Think Sometimes Europe May Take For Granted The Extraordinary Progress That's Been Made Over The Last 40, 50 Years. I Recognize That Sometimes There Is Great Frustration That Arises Out Of The Euro Zone Or Out Of The Eu.

The Countries Who Out-educate Us Today Will Out-compete Us Tomorrow.

So If Somebody Wants To Build A Coal-powered Plant, They Can; It's Just That It Will Bankrupt Them Because They're Going To Be Charged A Huge Sum For All That Greenhouse Gas That's Being Emitted.

This Is The Moment When We Must Come Together To Save This Planet. Let Us Resolve That We Will Not Leave Our Children A World Where The Oceans Rise And Famine Spreads And Terrible Storms Devastate Our Lands.

Theoretically, You Can Make, Obviously, A Powerful Argument That Centuries Of Slavery, Jim Crow, Discrimination Are The Primary Cause For All Those Gaps. That Those Were Wrongs Done To The Black Community As A Whole, And Black Families Specifically, And That In Order To Close That Gap, A Society Has A Moral Obligation To Make A Large, Aggressive Investment, Even If It's Not In The Form Of Individual Reparations Checks, But In The Form Of A Marshall Plan, In Order To Close Those Gaps. It Is Easy To Make That Theoretical Argument.

I Know Many Of You Are Hurting And Angry About The Economy, And I Don't Blame You. It's The Worst Economy Since The Great Depression. When Consumers Can't Buy And Businesses Won't Expand For Lack Of Customers, The Government Has To Be The Purchaser And Employer Of Last Resort. We Learned That In The Great Depression, But Republicans Obviously Didn't - And They've Blocked Every Jobs Program I've Offered.

Great Depression

No U.s. Soldier Ever Dies In Vain Because They're Carrying Out The Missions Of Their Commander In Chief. And We Honor All The Service That They've Provided. Our Troops Have Performed Brilliantly. The Question Is For The Next President, Are We Making Good Judgments About How To Keep America Safe Precisely Because Sending Our Military Into Battle Is Such An Enormous Step.

Only A Handful Of Men And Women Leave An Imprint On The Conscience Of A Nation And On The History That They Helped Shape.

I Think, As You Get Older, That's When Your Ambitions Become "peculiar".

Sometimes It May Seem As If Progress Is Stalled But What History Of Post-war Germany Shows Is That Strength And Determination And Focus And Adherence To The Values That We Care About Will Result In A Better Future For Our Children And Our Grandchildren.

That's Why I Stand Here Tonight. Because For Two Hundred And Thirty Two Years, At Each Moment When That Promise Was In Jeopardy, Ordinary Men And Women - Students And Soldiers, Farmers And Teachers, Nurses And Janitors - Found The Courage To Keep It Alive.

America Is, Is No Longer, Uh, What It, Uh, Could Be, Uh, What It Was Once Was, Uh, And I Say To Myself, Uh, I Don't Want That Future, Uh, For My Children.

I Don't Wanna Preempt An Announcement Next Week. And There's A Lot Of Technical Aspects To It. And If I - Say - That We're Doing One Thing. Then The Markets Might Interpret It Differently From What It Ends Up Being.

What We Have Done Though Is Consistently Looked For Additional Opportunities To Get Stuff Done. Wherever We See A Possibility Of Increasing Wages, Creating More Jobs, Making Sure That More People Are Able To Access Opportunity, We're Gonna Seize It.

I Do Love The Waldorf-astoria, Though. You Know, I Hear That From The Doorstep You Can See All The Way To The Russian Tea Room.

When It Comes To Immigration, I Have Actually Put More Money, Under My Administration, Into Border Security Than Any Other Administration Previously. We've Got More Security Resources At The Border - More National Guard, More Border Guards, You Name It - Than The Previous Administration. So We've Ramped Up Significantly The Issue Of Border Security.

There Is A Certain Percentage Of The White Population ... If They Started Having More Middle-class Black Kids Who Are Friends With Their Kids, Eating Cheerios In Their Kitchen, Their Attitudes Start Changing.

This Is What I Would Call Old Politics. This Is The Stuff We're Trying To Get Rid Of. Because The Problem Is, When We Start Breaking Down Into Conservative And Liberal, And We've Got A Bunch Of Set Predispositions, Whether It's On Gun Control, Or Its' On Health Care, Any Attempt To Do Health Care Is Socialized Medicine.

We Know Hackers Steal People's Identities And Infiltrate Private E-mails. We Know Foreign Countries And Companies Swipe Our Corporate Secrets.

To Sustain A Governing Majority, That Requires An Ability For Republicans And Democrats To Find Some Common Ground. And Right Now, The Structure Of The System Is Such Where It Makes It Really Hard For People To Work Together.

Working Together

Our Enemies Are Fully Aware That They Can Use Oil As A Weapon Against America. And If We Don't Take This Threat As Seriously As The Bombs They Build Or The Guns They Buy, We Will Be Fighting The War On Terror With One Hand Tied Behind Our Back.

We Have To Focus On How Do We Ensure The Economy Works For Everybody, And Not Just A Few.

They Say I Need To Be Seasoned; They Say I Need To Be Stewed. They Say, 'we Need To Boil All The Hope Out Of Him -- Like Us -- And Then He'll Be Ready.'

I Always Tell My Staff, "better Is Good." I'll Take Better Every Time, Because Better Is Hard.

Now, I Know That He's Taken Some Flak Lately, But No One Is Prouder To Put This Birth Certificate To Rest Than The Donald. Now He Can Get To Focusing On The Issues That Matter. Like, Did We Fake The Moon Landing? What Really Happened In Roswell? And Where Are Biggie And Tupac?

Throughout History, Islam Has Demonstrated Through Words And Deeds The Possibilities Of Religious Tolerance And Racial Equality.

Usually, I'm Pretty Good About Sorting Through The Options And Then Making Decisions That I'm Confident Are The Best Decisions In That Moment, Given The Information We Have. But There Are Times Where I Think I Wish I Could Have Imagined A Different Level Of Insight.

Why Hang Out With Celebrities When I Can Hang Out With The People Who Made Me One?

Non-islamic, Non-foreign-motivated Terrorist Actions Have Killed At Least As Many Americans On American Soil As Those Who Were Promoted By Jihadists. But What We Have Also Seen Is Isil Evolve, Because Of The Sophistication Of Their Social Media, To A Point Where They May Be Inspiring More Attacks - Even If They're Self-initiated, Even If They Don't Involve Complex Planning - Than We Would Have Seen Some Time Ago.

Without A Deal [with Iran], The International Sanctions Regime Will Unravel With Little Ability To Reimpose Them. With This Deal, We Have The Possibility Of Peacefully Resolving A Major Threat To Regional And International Security. Without A Deal, We Risk Even More War In The Middle East And Other Countries In The Region Would Feel Compelled To Pursue Their Own Nuclear Programs, Threatening A Nuclear Arms Race In The Most Volatile Region In The World.

Part Of What Makes Me Most Optimistic Is If You Look At The Attitudes Of Young People. Across The Board, Young People Are Much More Comfortable With Respecting Differences. They Are Much More Comfortable With Diversity.

Everybody Potentially Can Make The Claim That We Should All Be Treated Fairly.

Ours Is A Nation Of Laws: Of Citizens Who Live Under Them And For The Citizens Who Enforce Them. So, To A Community In Ferguson That Is Rightly Hurting And Looking For Answers, Let Me Call Once Again For Us To Seek Some Understanding Rather Than Simply Holler At Each Other. Let's Seek To Heal Rather Than To Wound Each Other.

American Leadership Is Not Simply A Matter Of Going It Alone And Bearing All Of The Burden Ourselves.

If We Want To Really Reduce Foreign Influence On Our Elections, Then We Better Think About How To Make Sure That Our Political Process, Our Political Dialogue Is Stronger Than It's Been.

Our Journey Is Not Complete Until We Find A Better Way To Welcome The Striving, Hopeful Immigrants Who Still See America As A Land Of Opportunity, Until Bright Young Students And Engineers Are Enlisted In Our Workforce Rather Than Expelled From Our Country.

We Still Have Sanctions On Iran For Its Violations Of Human Rights, For Its Support Of Terrorism And For Its Ballistic Missile Program. And We Will Continue To Enforce These Sanctions Vigorously. Iran's Recent Missile Test, For Example, Was A Violation Of Its International Obligations.

No Party Has A Monopoly On Wisdom. No Democracy Works Without Compromise.

The Quicker You Resolve The Problems With Banks And There's Transparency In That Process, The Faster They Recapitalize And Are Able To Make Investments.

Of All The Rocks Upon Which We Build Our Lives, We Are Reminded Today That Family Is The Most Important.

I Mentioned Charter Schools, And Experimenting With Our School System, To Make It Work. I Think That's Something We Really Have To Pay Attention To.

There's A Little Perspiration Involved In Bringing About Change Too.

It's True That I Have Not Been Able To Completely Close Guantanamo, But We've Drastically Reduced The Population From 700 Or So To Around 60 Now.

If You Look At How I've Tried To And How I'll Continue To Try To Govern, I'm Not Driven By Some Ideological Agenda. I'm A Pretty Practical Guy And I Just Want To Make Sure That Things Work.

So While An Incredible Amount Of Progress Has Been Made, On This Fifth Anniversary, I Wanted To Come Here And Tell The People Of This City Directly: My Administration Is Going To Stand With You - And Fight Alongside You - Until The Job Is Done. Until New Orleans Is All The Way Back, All The Way.

If We Win All Those Fights, And Now Let's Say The Income Gap, And The Wealth Gap, And The Education Gap Have For The Most Part Been Closed - Let's Say Hypothetically, , First Of All, America As A Whole Would Be A Lot Richer.

I Am A Little Jet Lagged From My Trip To Malaysia...the Lengths We Have To Go To To Get Cnn Coverage These Days.

The Public School System Is Not About Educating Black Children. Never Has Been. Inner-city Schools Are About Social Control. Period. They’re Operated As Holding Pens—miniature Jails, Really. It’s Only When Black Children Start Breaking Out Of Their Pens And Bothering White People That Society Even Pays Any Attention To The Issue Of Whether These Children Are Being Educated.

So My Biggest Fun Has Been Watching My Daughters Grow Up. Now, Unfortunately They're Hitting The Age Where They Still Love Me, But They Think I'm Completely Boring. And So They'll Come In, Pat Me On The Head, Talk To Me For 10 Minutes, And Then They're Gone All Weekend. Right? They Break My Heart! So Now I've Got To Start Thinking, Well What's Going To Replace That Fun?

Yes, This Is Hard. But There Should Be No Question That The United States Of America Is Stepping Up To The Plate. We Recognize Our Role In Creating This Problem; We Embrace Our Responsibility To Combat It. We Will Do Our Part, And We Will Help Developing Nations Do Theirs. But We Can Only Succeed In Combating Climate Change If We Are Joined In This Effort By Every Nation - Developed And Developing Alike. Nobody Gets A Pass.

[the Americans] Believe In The Idea That A Child Shouldn't Be Consigned To Poverty Just Because Of Circumstances Of Their Birth.

The Program Grew Out Of A Desire To Address A Gap Identified After 9/11 ... The Program Does Not Involve The Nsa Examining The Phone Records Of Ordinary Americans. Rather, It Consolidates These Records Into A Database That The Government Can Query If It Has A Specific Lead - Phone Records That The Companies Already Retain For Business Purposes.

We Are Still The America That Does The Hard Things, That Does The Great Things. We're The Nation That Always Dared To Dream. We're The Nation That Dared To Take Risks.

Letting The Free Market Do Whatever It Wants. That's Not Been Historically How We Grow. We Have To Invest In Education, In Rebuilding Broadband Lines And Roads And Runways, And It's Important That We Bring Back American Manufacturing And Regulations To Prevent Consumers From Being Cheated.

That Bright Blue Ball Rising Over The Moon's Surface, Containing Everything We Hold Dear - The Laughter Of Children, A Quiet Sunset, All The Hopes And Dreams Of Posterity - That's What's At Stake. That's What We're Fighting For. And If We Remember That, I'm Absolutely Sure We'll Succeed.

We're Going To Have To Come Together And Take Meaningful Action To Prevent More Tragedies Like This, Regardless Of The Politics.

It's My Job As President And Congress’s Job To Maker Sure That There’s Some Rules Of The Road That People Are Going To Abide By And That We’ve Got Transparency And Accountability That This Stuff Is Being Posted And One Of The Things That We Are Going To Do Is Put Together An Independent Board On The Recovery Package…

This Is Not Class Warfare. It’s Math.

So I'm Not Proposing Anything Radical. I Just Believe That Anybody Making Over $250,000 A Year Should Go Back To The Income Tax Rates We Were Paying Under Bill Clinton. Back When Our Economy Created Nearly 23 Million New Jobs, The Biggest Budget Surplus In History, And Plenty Of Millionaires To Boot. ... At The Same Time, Most People Agree That We Should Not Raise Taxes On Middle-class Families Or Small Businesses -- Not When So Many Folks Are Just Trying To Get By.

We Cannot Tolerate A Nuclear Iran. It Would Be A Game Changer. Not Only Would It Threaten Israel, A Country That Is Our Stalwart Ally, But It Would Also Create An Environment In Which You Could Set Off An Arms Race In This Middle East.

In An Age Where There's So Much Active Misinformation And Its Packaged Very Well And It Looks The Same When You See It On A Facebook Page Or You Turn On Your Television. Where Some Overzealousness On The Part Of, You Know, A U.s. Official Is Equated With Constant And Severe Repression Elsewhere.

And I Will Do Everything That I Can As Long As I Am President Of The United States To Remind The American People That We Are One Nation Under God, And We May Call That God Different Names But We Remain One Nation.

Now Is The Time To Keep The Promise Of Equal Pay For An Equal Day's Work, Because I Want My Daughters To Have Exactly The Same Opportunities As Your Sons.

Palestinians Will Never Realize Their Independence By Denying The Right Of Israel To Exist.

We're Not Going To Deputize A Whole Bunch Of American Citizens To Start Grabbing People Or Turning Them In, In Part Because The Ordinary American Citizen May Not Know Whether Or Not This Person Is Illegal Or Not. But, You Know, The Notion That We're Going To Criminalize Priests, For Example, Or Doctors Who Are Providing Services To Individuals, And Throw Them In Jail For Doing What Their Calling Asks Them To Do, Which Is To Provide Help And Service To People In Need, I Think That Is A Mistake. I Think That's Out Of America's Character.

We Want Our Children To Live In An America That Isn't Burdened By Debt, That Isn't Weakened By Inequality, That Isn't Threatened By The Destructive Power Of A Warming Planet.

I've Said Very Clearly, Including In A State Of The Union Address, That I'm Against 'don't Ask, Don't Tell' And That We're Going To End This Policy.

The Wort Terrorist Attack In American History Also Brought Out The Best In Our Country...we Are United As Americans.

American History

So Many Of My Staff Is Young Enough That They're Going To Do Amazing Things. And I'm Going To Be Helping Them Try To Do Them.

I Have Been To This Point Unwilling To Sign On To Same-sex Marriage Primarily Because Of My Understandings Of The Traditional Definitions Of Marriage. But I Also Think You're Right That Attitudes Evolve, Including Mine.

As A Practical Matter, It Is Hard To Think Of Any Society In Human History In Which A Majority Population Has Said That As A Consequence Of Historic Wrongs, We Are Now Going To Take A Big Chunk Of The Nation's Resources Over A Long Period Of Time To Make That Right.

Last Time I Checked, Congress Was Created To Uphold The Values Of The Constitution, Not The Bible And Its Biased Teachings. 'all Men (including Women) Are Created Equal' And Are Afforded Unalienable Rights. Way To Go, Mr. President! Stand Up For What You Believe And For The People Of This Country.

The Key Is Whether Or Not We Have Got Priorities That Are Working For You, As Opposed To Those Who Have Been Dictating The Policy In Washington Lately. And That's Mostly Lobbyists And Special Interests. We Have Got To Put An End To That.

I Know Starting Careers In Troubled Times Is A Challenge, But It Is Also A Privilege. Because It's Moments Like These That Force Us To Try Harder, Dig Deeper And To Discover Gifts We Never Knew We Had. To Find The Greatness That Lies Within Each Of Us. So Don't Ever Shy Away From That Endeavor. Don't Stop Adding To Your Body Of Work. I Can Promise That You Will Be The Better For That Continued Effort As Will Be This Nation That We All Love.

Never Give Up On Your Dreams.

We've Got A Lot Of Work To Do Economically In This Country To Bring About A More Just And Fair Economy.

My Goal Is Not To Resolve Conflicts And Tensions In The Region Through More War. My Goal Is To Make Sure That, You Know, We Are Able To Negotiate A Deal That We Can Verify.

I'm Not The Strapping Young Muslim Socialist That I Used To Be.

To The Extent That We've Got A Fiscal Crisis Right Now, Part Of It Is Prompted By A Bullheaded Insistence On The Part Of The President, For Example, That We Should Extend All Of His Tax Cuts, Make All Of Them Permanent.

We Don't Have This Huge Footprint, We Are Less Likely To Be Targeted As, You Know, Occupiers [in Afghanistan And Iraq].

We Shouldn't Assume That Government Is Always Trying To Do The Wrong Thing.

Mothers Are The Rocks Of Our Families And A Foundation In Our Communities. In Gratitude For Their Generous Love, Patient Counsel, And Lifelong Support, Let Us Pay Respect To The Women Who Carry Out The Hard Work Of Motherhood With Skill And Grace, And Let Us Remember Those Mothers Who, Though No Longer With Us, Inspire Us Still.

Obviously [my Daughters] - And Michelle - Have Made A Lot Of Sacrifices On Behalf Of My Cockamamie Ideas, The Running For Office And Things.

My Task Over The Last Two Years Hasn't Just Been To Stop The Bleeding. My Task Has Also Been To Try To Figure Out How Do We Address Some Of The Structural Problems In The Economy That Have Prevented More Googles From Being Created.

I Will Cut Investments In Unproven Missile Defense Systems.

Islamic Culture Has Given Us Majestic Arches And Soaring Spires; Timeless Poetry And Cherished Music; Elegant Calligraphy And Places Of Peaceful Contemplation.

My Goal Is To Maintain The International Norm On Banning Chemical Weapons. I Want That Enforcement To Be Real. I Want It To Be Serious. I Want People To Understand That Gassing Innocent People, Delivering Chemical Weapons Against Children Is Not Something We Do. It's Prohibited In Active Wars Between Countries. We Certainly Don't Do It Against Kids. And We've Got To Stand Up For That Principle.

Now, I Swore An Oath To Uphold The Laws On The Books... Now, I Know Some People Want Me To Bypass Congress And Change The Laws On My Own... Believe Me, The Idea Of Doing Things On My Own Is Very Tempting. I Promise You. Not Just On Immigration Reform. But That's Not How - That's Not How Our System Works. That's Not How Our Democracy Functions. Thats Not How Our Constitution Is Written.

The Forces That Divide Us Are Not As Strong As Those That Unite Us.

Hunger, Disease And Poverty Can Lead To Global Instability And Leave A Vacuum For Extremism To Fill. So Instead Of Just Managing Poverty, We Must Offer Nations And People A Pathway Out Of Poverty. And As President I've Made Development A Pillar Of Our Foreign Policy, Alongside Diplomacy And Defense.

I Will Continue To Believe That Israel's Security Is Paramount.

The More We Can Encourage Entrepreneurship, Particularly For Young People, The More They Have Hope. That Requires Some Reforms In These [african] Governments: Rooting Out Corruption, Increased Transparency And How Government Operates, Making Sure That Regulations Are Not Designed Just To Advantage Elites, But Are Allowing People Who Have A Good Idea To Get Out There And Get Things Done.

One Of The Things I Think We Have To Do Is Make Sure That College Is Affordable For Every Young Person In America. And I Also Think That We're Going To Have To Rebuild Our Infrastructure, Which Is Falling Behind, Our Roads, Our Bridges, But Also Broadband Lines That Reach Into Rural Communities. So There Are Some Things That We've Got To Do Structurally To Make Sure That We Can Compete In This Global Economy. We Can't Shortchange Those Things. We've Got To Eliminate Programs That Don't Work, And We've Got To Make Sure That The Programs That We Do Have Are More Efficient And Cost Less.

It Is My Judgment That Had I Spent The First Two Years Trying To Get A Single-payer System, All Those Folks Who Now Have Health Insurance That Didn't Have It Would Still Be Uninsured. And Those Are Millions Of People Whose Lives Are Impacted Right Now.

I Have Got To Figure Out A System Because I Have Bad Filing, Sorting, And Organizing Habits.

We Have To Create That Bridge For The Future. And That Means Making Sure We're Paying Attention To The Wages Of Workers In Countries, Making Sure That We're Investing In Their Education And Their Skills.

When You Take On The Position Of President, You Are Committing Yourself To, First And Foremost, Protecting The American People. You Are Accepting An Institutional Role That Requires You To Make Hard Decisions And Hard Choices, And As A Consequence You Have To Take Your Moral Sense And Not Put It Aside.

The World Thanks You For Sharing Nelson Mandela With Us.

There Is A Little Bit Of That Schoolyard Attitude Of, It's One Thing For A Guy Your Own Size To Mouth Off To You, But If There's A Little Guy, You Should Just Smack Him Around. And It's Probably Bad Advice In The Schoolyard. It's Certainly Not A Good Way To Run A Foreign Policy Because Even When You Are Dealing With A Non-peer, Militarily, War Is Complicated.

And Then You've Got President Clinton Who Made The Case As Only He Can. After He Spoke, Somebody Sent Out A Tweet- They Said, You Should Appoint Him Secretary Of Explaining Stuff. I Like That- Secretary Of Explaining Stuff. Although, I Have To Admit, It Didn't Really Say Stuff. I Cleaned That Up A Little Bit.

Political Gerrymandering Makes The Incentive For Most Members Of Congress To Play To The Extremes Of Their Base Rather Than To The Center.

We Have A Choice. We Can Shape Our Future, Or Let Events Shape It For Us. And If We Want To Succeed, We Can't Fall Back On The Stale Debates And Old Divides That Won't Move Us Forward.

I Was Able To See Faith As More Than Just A Comfort To The Weary Or A Hedge Against Death; Rather, It Was An Active, Palpable Agent In The World.

No Deal Means A Greater Chance Of More War In The Middle East.

Americans... Still Believe In An America Where Anything's Possible - They Just Don't Think Their Leaders Do.

And Lest We Get On Our High Horse And Think This Is Unique To Some Other Place, Remember That During The Crusades And The Inquisition, People Committed Terrible Deeds In The Name Of Christ. In Our Home Country, Slavery And Jim Crow All Too Often Was Justified In The Name Of Christ.

We Cannot Have A Society In Which Some Dictator Some Place Can Start Imposing Censorship Here In The United States. If Somebody Is Able To Intimidate Folks Out Of Releasing A Satirical Movie, Imagine What's Going To Happen When They See A Documentary They Don't Like Or News Reports They Don't Like."

All People Should Be Treated Equally, Regardless Of Who They Are Or Who They Love.

Here`s A Guy Who Says He`s A Great Businessman. But It Seems Like A Lot Of Trump's Business Is Built Around Stiffing Small Businesses And Workers Out Of What He Owes Them, Work They`ve Done. He Thinks That`s Cute Or Smart Or Funny To Basically Not Pay Somebody Who`s Done Work For Him And Say Go Ahead And Sue Me Because I`ve Got More Money Than You And You Can`t Do Anything About It.

One Of The Best Parts Of The Holiday Season Is Spending Time With The Special People In Your Life.

People In Your Life

I Just Want To Repeat That There's Nothing That We've Proposed That Would Make It Harder For You To Purchase A Firearm.

We All Remember Abraham Lincoln As The Leader Who Saved Our Union. Founder Of The Republican Party.

No Country On Earth Would Tolerate Missiles Raining Down On Its Citizens From Outside Its Borders.

We Are Convinced, As Some Of You May Be Convinced, That Changing The Way We Produce And Use Energy Is Essential To America's Economic Future, That It Will Create Millions Of New Jobs, Power New Industries, Keep Us Competitive, And Spark New Innovation.

Historically - When You Look At How America Has Evolved, Typically We Make Progress On Race Relations In Fits And Starts. We Make Some Progress, And Then There's Maybe Some Slippage.

For Too Many Of Us, It's Become Safer To Retreat Into Our Own Bubbles, Whether In Our Neighborhoods Or On College Campuses, Or Places Of Worship Or Especially Our Social Media Feeds, Surrounded By People Who Look Like Us And Share The Same Political Outlook And Never Challenge Our Assumptions. And Increasingly, We Become So Secure In Our Bubbles That We Start Accepting Only Information, Whether It's True Or Not, That Fits Our Opinions, Instead Of Basing Our Opinions On The Evidence That Is Out There.

I Don't Think [pot] Is More Dangerous Than Alcohol.

I'm Not Talking About Blind Optimism, The Kind Of Hope That Just Ignores The Enormity Of The Tasks Ahead Or The Road Blocks That Stand In Our Path. I'm Not Talking About The Wishful Idealism That Allows Us To Just Sit On The Sidelines Or Shirk From A Fight. I Have Always Believed That Hope Is That Stubborn Thing Inside Us That Insists, Despite All The Evidence To The Contrary, That Something Better Awaits Us So Long As We Have The Courage To Keep Reaching, To Keep Working, To Keep Fighting.

If We Think That We Can Secure Our Country By Just Talking Tough Without Acting Tough And Smart, Then We Will Misunderstand This Moment And Miss Its Opportunities. If We Think That We Can Use The Same Partisan Playbook Where We Just Challenge Our Opponent's Patriotism To Win An Election, Then The American People Will Lose. The Times Are Too Serious For This Kind Of Politics.

If Democrats Are Not Showing Up In Those [rural] Places Even If You're Not Gonna Win Right Away But If You're Not In There At Least Making An Argument That, "hey, You Know What? It's The Democrats Who Are Trying To Raise Your Minimum Wage."

I Came In With A Healthy Skepticism About These Programs. My Team Evaluated Them. We Scrubbed Them Thoroughly. We Actually Expanded Some Of The Oversight, Increased Some Of The Safeguards. But My Assessment, And My Team's Assessment Was That They Help Us Prevent Terrorist Attacks. In The Abstract, You Can Complain About 'big Brother' And How This Is A Potential Program Run Amok. But When You Actually Look At The Details, Then, I Think We've Struck The Right Balance.

American Politics Is Always Somewhat Fluid. In This Age Of Social Media, It Means That Voters Can Swing Back And Forth.

I Hope You Guys Are Up For A Fight. I Hope You Guys Are Game Because I Haven't Been Putting Up With 19 Months Of Airplanes And Hotel Food And Missing My Babies And My Wife - I Didn't Put Up For That Stuff Just To Come In Second.

When George Bush Came Into Office, We Had Surpluses. And Now We Have Half-a-trillion-dollar Deficit Annually. When George Bush Came Into Office, Our National Debt Was Around $5 Trillion. It's Now Over $10 Trillion. We've Almost Doubled It.

I Have Great Respect For Both President Obama And The Office That He Holds

We Don't Turn Back. We Leave No One Behind. We Pull Each Other Up.

What I Would Advise, What I Advised Before The Election, And What I Will Continue To Advise After The Election, Is That Elections Matter; Voting Matters; Organizing Matters; Being Informed On The Issues Matter.

I Am Asking My Attorney General To Create A Special Unit Of Federal Prosecutors And Leading State Attorneys General To Expand Our Investigations Into The Abusive Lending And Packaging Of Risky Mortgages That Led To The Housing Crisis. This New Unit Will Hold Accountable Those Who Broke The Law, Speed Assistance To Homeowners, And Help Turn The Page On An Era Of Recklessness That Hurt So Many Americans.

Republicans In Congress Have Two Choices Here: They Can Act Responsibly, And Pay America’s Bills; Or They Can Act Irresponsibly, And Put America Through Another Economic Crisis. But They Will Not Collect A Ransom In Exchange For Not Crashing The American Economy.

Over The Last 15 Months, We've Traveled To Every Corner Of The United States. I've Now Been In 57 States? I Think One Left To Go.

When Times Change, So Must We.

We Can Still See God In Other People And Do Our Best To Help Them Find Their Own Grace. So That’s What I Strive To Do And Pray To Do Every Day.

My Administration Is Committed To Creating An Unprecedented Level Of Openness In Government. We Will Work Together To Ensure The Public Trust And Establish A System Of Transparency, Public Participation, And Collaboration. Openness Will Strengthen Our Democracy And Promote Efficiency And Effectiveness In Government.

Campaigning Is Different From Governing.

That Is The Nature Of Democracy. It Is Hard. It Is Not Always Inspiring.

We Have To Uphold A Free Press And Freedom Of Speech - Because, In The End, Lies And Misinformation Are No Match For The Truth.

Freedom Of Speech

We Need Scientists To Design New Fuels. We Need Farmers To Help Grow Them. We Need Engineers To Invent New Technologies. We Need Entrepreneurs To Sell Those Technologies. We Need Workers To Operate Assembly Lines That Hum With High-tech, Zero-carbon Components. We Need Builders To Hammer Into Place The Foundations For A Clean Energy Age. We Need Diplomats And Businessmen And Women, And Peace Corps Volunteers To Help Developing Nations Skip Past The Dirty Phase Of Development And Transition To Sustainable Sources Of Energy. In Other Words, We Need You.

It Still Puts Burden On Some Troops Of Ours Who Are There [in Afghanistan And Iraq] As Advisors And Facilitators.

All Of Us Share This World For But A Brief Moment In Time. The Question Is Whether We Spend That Time Focused On What Pushes Us Apart, Or Whether We Commit Ourselves To An Effort -- A Sustained Effort -- To Find Common Ground, To Focus On The Future We Seek For Our Children, And To Respect The Dignity Of All Human Beings.

The Surest Path To Success Is To Surround Yourself With Brilliant Women

Surround Yourself

First And Foremost, It's Important To Remember That, From My Perspective At Least, My Most Important Legacy Was Making Sure That The World Didn't Go Into A Great Depression.

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