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Monday
Jan212013

Words from the Inaugural Speech

We thought we'd share some of our favorite bits of President Obama's speech today.

"We do not believe that in this country, freedom is reserved for the lucky, or happiness for the few."  

(And, here's the writer in me...the word "that" seems awkwardly placed.  Perhaps saying, "In this country, we do not believe that freedom is reserved for the lucky, or happiness for the few" might capture the thought more clearly-- at least the thought I was thinking.) 

This is a beauty: "...we must be a source of hope to the poor, the sick, the marginalized, the victims of prejudice--not out of mere charity, but because peace in our time requires the constant advance of those principles that our common creed describes: tolerance and opportunity; human dignity and justice."

But this is the line that brought tears to my eyes: "We, the people, declare today that the most evident of truths -- that all of us are created equal -- is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall; just as it guided all those great men and women, sung and unsung, who left footprints along this great Mall, to hear a preacher say that we cannot walk alone; to hear a King proclaim that our individual freedom is inextricably bound to the freedom of every soul on Earth."

 

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