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Edited on Tue Jun-12-07 10:16 PM by JohnLocke
John Edwards' Austin speech transcription
6/12/2007 6:26 PM
By: News 8 Austin StaffThis is a rough transcription of the presidential candidate John Edwards' speech while visiting Austin in June 2007. Thank you. Thank you, Jim. I knew I loved coming to Austin. Thank you all so much all of you for being here. I spoke to my wife, Elizabeth, just a little bit ago. She sends her love to all of you and thanks you for your support. You know it is so important that you are here because this is the place and places like this all across America that we can start the kind of movement that can bring the change that all of us so desperately want to see in America and the rest of the world. America needs to be leading again, but we need you – every single one of you involved in this cause and this movement to change American, and man knows, we’ve got some work to do, don’t we?
The starting place is to end this war in Iraq. And I’ll tell you my view about this. My view about it is the American people made it very clear in November, this past November, that they wanted a different course in Iraq, that they wanted change in Iraq. They sent a mandate to America, a mandate to the Congress; they put the Democrats in charge of the Congress and now the Congress has a responsibility to stand up to this President, to force his hand, to stand their ground, because we know that George Bush is never going to change. And he doesn’t think he is capable of doing anything wrong that Congress needs to force him to end this war.
But if you think about all the extraordinary opportunities out there available to America to lead in a positive way. Wouldn’t you like to see America be a force for good in the world again?
To have the rest of the world say “America, America is the light, that’s the country that we want to follow.” But we have work to do. We need to change because we can’t be the country of Abu Gray, Guantanamo, torture, illegal spying on Americans and, by the way, on the first day that I am sworn into office as your President, I will close Guantanamo.
But my view is that we are past the time for small, cautious political calculation. It is time for us to lead again. It is time for us to be bold and strong and visionary. Here’s an idea. Suppose instead of America spending $500 billion in Iraq, America led an international effort to make primary school education available to 100 million children in the world who have no education whatsoever.
Suppose - Suppose that America led an international effort to stop the spread of disease by leading on sanitation, clean drinking water; suppose America led the way on economic development, micro finance, micro lending, to give hope and opportunity to hundreds of millions of people in the world who have no chance, no hope, whatsoever. And, suppose, America led the way in ending the genocide in Darfur and Western Sudan.
And, suppose America led the way, led the way in dealing with the crisis of climate change and global warming. We are 4% of the world’s population; we emit 25% of the world’s greenhouse gases. We are not a force for good, we’re not an example of good, we’re an example of bad. We’re the worst polluter on the planet. China is catching up, but they haven’t passed us yet. America needs to lead by example. We need to show that we understand how serious this problem is.
And I want to say something new – last week President Bush went to the G-8 Summit and a proposal was made by the Europeans and the Japanese that the G-8 commit to a global effort to reduce greenhouse gases by 50% by the year 2050, but did George Bush agree? America has got to lead again on this issue. We can’t follow, we have to lead. We need to help – the Europeans, the Japanese, the Russians and those not in the G-8, the Chinese, the Indians, we need to help bring them into this effort to solve what is clearly a universal global problem. But how do we do it?
Well, first, suppose we cap greenhouse emissions in the United States of America – a national cap. Suppose we ratchet that cap down every year. In America, we ought to reduce greenhouse gases by 80% by the year 2050, not 50%.
And suppose – suppose we auction off the right to emit any greenhouse gases below the cap and use that money – $30-$40 billion – to invest in clean, renewable sources of energy – wind, solar, cellulose based bio fuels. This is the way America has to go and then, by the way, we should put at least a $1 billion into carbon capture, carbon sequestration technology and there should not be another coal-fired power plant built in America until we have it.
But just think of the good that America can do. And, by the way, I think it’s also about time for the President of the United States to ask Americans to be patriotic about something other than war. To ask Americans to be willing to conserve in our homes and our work places, we need to raise fuel efficiency standards on vehicles at least 40 miles to the gallon by the year 2016. But just think about the way everything in the world today is connected. Think about the impact. If America actually gets off its addiction to oil.
We use 22 million barrels of oil a day. We drive, help drive, the price of oil up. And think of the impact of that. All these countries and bad governments, bad leaders, including in the Middle East, they don’t – they don’t reform, they don’t educate their kids, they’re not interested in economic development. Why? They’re on a drug and that drug is oil and they are mainlining that drug. They have absolutely no incentive to change. And they will never change unless they are forced to change. America can lead this effort to change.
You look at the countries the UAE Dubai, who don’t have oil. What they do is they economically develop. They educate their kids. They participate in a serious way in the international community. If we want to see real reform in the Middle East, we’ve got to get them off their drug. The way we can get them off their drug is America to get off its addiction to oil. And think about what happens. What the consequences are. If we do it here, first of all we create at least a million new green collar jobs in America to replace some of the blue collar jobs that we have lost.
On top of that – On top of that, America’s got the land mass to support the crops for bio fuels, but the Europeans and the Japanese do not. So, the don’t have the land mass, they don’t have the crops, they need cheap land, cheap labor, where are they going? They’re going to Africa, that’s where they’re going. And millions and millions of Africans will be lifted out of poverty in the process. Think about the good that America can do – job creation, strengthening our economy, getting off our addiction to oil, addressing the crisis of climate change, addressing the issue of global poverty directly, just by leading again – just by leading and being a force for good again.
And while we’re talking about that subject, what about 37 million of our own people who wake up every single day living in poverty. This is not okay. The United States of America, the richest nation on the planet, cannot tolerate 37 million of our own people who are literally worried about survival every day. We are better than that. And it says something about our character, how we treat millions of our own people who are worried about survival. And for those people –
I have been running a poverty center at the University of North Carolina and I’m proud of what we’ve done, had a book on ending poverty – looking around to see if I see it – It come out a few days ago that I edited along with a lot of other good people who participated in it. But don’t tell me there is nothing we can do about poverty. I saw, I was a teenager at the time, I watched Bobby Kennedy go through Appalachia and show this country the other America that so many Americans didn’t know about, didn’t want to think about. Those pictures that came out of the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans when the hurricane hit. Do we think we’re the only ones who saw those pictures. The whole world saw them.
I saw a headline overseas that had pictures of victims from the Ninth Ward, big bold print, “The Shaming of America” – we’re better than this. The United States of America is better than this. And we have to show that we are better than this. And for all those people – all those people who say there is nothing you can do, poverty is always going to be with us, oh yeah, there is a lot we can do. How about if people who are working for a living actually earn a living wage so that they can support their families?
How about if we make it easier to organize workers into unions in the workplace so that they have a voice, so that they can earn a decent wage, health care. How about if we make it easier for young people to go to college? Here’s an idea, something that I started in eastern North Carolina, in the poor area of Eastern North Carolina. It’s called “College for Everyone”. If you graduate from high school and qualify to go to college, commit to work at least ten hours a week while you’re there, we pay for your tuition and books. Very simple, very straightforward. The idea is you don’t give it to people. Young people have to work, they have to earn it, but they don’t graduate from college with the crushing burden of debt that so many of our young people are faced with every single day.
There is so much we can do about the issue of poverty in America, but income and equality, asset and equality. Last year the top 300,000 income earners in America earned more than the bottom 150 million. You think about that – I hear the helicopters – we have a dysfunctional healthcare system in America. It does not work by any measure. We’ve got 46 – 47 million people without coverage, health insurance premiums are up 90% to 100% over the last six years. I’m proud of the fact that you are looking at the only candidate –Democrat or Republican – who has a truly specific, truly universal healthcare plan, which is what America needs.
And there are such obvious things to do – We should – We have to require by law that every man, woman, and child in America be covered. We have to give people a choice, private choice, government choice. They can choose whichever they want. We have to fill the cracks in our healthcare system, which means we outlaw pre-existing conditions. No more in America. We treat mental health exactly the same way we treat physical health for coverage. Dental care, vision care, chronic care, long-term care, all covered. People should be able to take their healthcare with them wherever they go in America or from job to job to job. I’ll just tell you the cost of my healthcare plan is $90 to $120 billion a year paid for by getting rid of Bush’s tax cuts for people who make over $200,000 a year.
So it’s not that we don’t know what needs to be done in America. We know what needs to be done. Ending the war in Iraq, America becoming a force for good again in the world, looked up to and respected, closing Guantanamo, building a universal healthcare system, lifting millions of people out of poverty, addressing the crisis of climate change. We now what needs to be done. We need you to do it though. And I am deadly serious about this.
Listen, if you believe that you can just vote for me and when I’m elected President of the United States I can solve all your problems, you’re living in a fantasy world. We need you! The great movements in American history didn’t start in the oval office. They started all across America in cities just like Austin, on college campuses, just like the University of Texas. I watched the civil rights movement. I grew up in it, with it. I know where it started and it started in communities, it started on college campuses with young people who had backbone and courage and went out and spoke out about something they knew was wrong. They changed this country.
The same thing happened in bringing the war in Vietnam to an end. The same thing happened in bringing down a brutal apartheid regime in South Africa. The same thing is happening today in ending this war in Iraq. I’m telling you, to paraphrase Gandhi, ‘you have to be the change that you believe in’. And the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King gave a speech about 40 years ago at the Riverside Church in Harlem in New York City, where he spoke about the war in Viet Nam and he said, “silence is a betrayal, a betrayal to himself, a betrayal to the country.” We cannot stand silently by and let what has happened over the last six or seven years continue. This is not America. This is not who we are. This is not what the world needs from us. We are so much better than this. But the world needs to see who we are. They need to see our better angels.
And last, but not least, your country needs you. It needs you badly. It needs your voice, it needs you involved, it needs you engaged, it needs you active, because that’s the way we change the country. The power in America is here. It’s not in the oval office. It’s not in Washington, D.C. It’s right here. And by the way anybody that’s got you cell phone with you, if you hold it up, pull your cell phone out. If you’ve got it with you, pull it out right now. I want you to text the word “today” T-O-D-A-Y “today” to 30644. “Today” to 30644 and that way we’ll know how to get you involved in the activism ending the war in Iraq. I got you, didn’t I?
Listen, I am proud to be with you. I’m proud to be back in Austin. Join us in this cause. Join us in this grassroots movement. Let’s create an America that all of us will be proud of. God bless you all. Thank you for coming out in this heat and thank you for waiting. It is my great pleasure and privilege to be with all of you today. Thank you.
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