06.03.08 St. Paul Minnesota Speech Full Transcript
It seems like eons ago we made the decision to support the Presidential Candidacy of Barack Obama, it was the moment when we allowed ourselves the luxury to dream again, to set aside our well founded cynicism and consider that perhaps... that maybe it is possible to elect a President in the USA notwithstanding race or the myriad of other superficial and artificial classifications assigned to human beings, along has come a person with the words we yearned to hear for so long and that, paradoxically, we have heard for so long, repeated over and over by other candidates.
But this time is different, it is not about the candidate, it is about us and yet... it is about the candidate too, it is about all of us, it is up to us, we are the ones we have been waiting for and we will not keep us waiting for the road yet to travel in this historic human journey we were asked to join in, and for which we signed up for the duration.
At the start it seemed such an 'impossible dream' and while the undertaking is not completely materialized, we are more convinced that it is possible, because it can be done and we are doing it.
It has been frustrating at times, heartbreaking at others, arduous at every step of the way, but above all, it has been not only uplifting, but exhilarating to work with so many wonderful people in bringing about a shared dream, a vision of what can be.
Yes, it is a dream, but as I wrote back in February:
Maybe it is dreaming awake, who can really know what's ahead, but Barack Obama is talking to me, to us, he is saying that change is possible, but that it will only come about IF WE MAKE IT HAPPEN, it goes parallel to my belief that IT IS UP TO US, which goes right along with what a group of activists (Sisters/Brothers), of which I'm part, are saying: "WE ARE THE ONES WE'VE BEEN WAITING FOR"
It has been a grueling and bruising Democratic Primary Campaing, but the worst is yet to come, because the powers that be will not release their hold to power and their claim to privilege, they will fight us every inch of the way and at times it will get ugly and our candidate has already gone on record tonight, that our campaign or this party will not engage in divisive or demeaning politics, I will follow his lead in spite of the righteous indignation sure to surface at the dirty political tactics that the Republicans are accustomed to and are famous for, if I forget my pledge and fall in the 'politics as usual' again, I ask you of my sisters and brothers to remind me by calling me on it.
It is a time to unite, to work in unision for a goal common to all our communities, we have a society to heal, a country to rebuild and a world to save, we need to put aside our differences and find our similarities.
It is change that I can believe in because it can be done, Yes we can! Si se puede!
Aurora Grajeda
SFCA 06.03.08
"You must be the change you wish to see in the world."
Mohandas Karamachand Gandhi
"We are the ones we have been been waiting for"
A Poem for South African Women
June Jordan
In Commemoration of the 40,000 women and children who, August 9, 1956, presented themselves in bodily protest against the "dompass" in the capital of apartheid. Presented at The United Nations, August 9, 1978
"Viva Obama / Aurora Song / Aurora Video"
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