[ NOTE: Any TRUE democratic leader who has been serving for a while can fill this bill. I supported Bernie Sanders in 2016 and will in 2020. I wrote this when Joe Biden was considering entering the 2016 race which would have split the establishment Democrats. Joe Biden is a true democratic leader as is Bernie Sanders. Bernie is the choice of those who represent the future of the Democratic Party and America! Joe, whether as a candidate or as a former Vice-President, will be right there with us helping us stand up and fight back for America and humanity! We, the people, are all in this together!]
What is missing from the 2016 Presidential Race?
Unifying, inspiring, uplifting leadership and vision!
What is missing is a candidate who is a true witness to history...
...who has ascended to the highest elected offices...
...yet, who has remained deeply rooted in his working class background...
...who is a proven leader with international experience...
...yet, who has never lost his common touch...
...who has grappled with complex legislation and policy issues...
...yet, who has never lost faith in the American promise and the American people...
What is missing is a candidate who does not shrink from the gravity of this moment in history...
...who has the intellectual gravitas to grapple with the complexities of people, politics, and planet...
...yet, who understands that lasting solutions must be built from the ground up by hand by common people with common sense and common decency...
...who has spent decades challenging the system from the inside and working within it to make it better...
...yet, who knows that when systems exceed their limits, the opportunity exists for great democratic progress for humanity...
What is missing is a candidate who will lead a real honest national conversation...
...who will stand up and say...
America, we need to talk!
America IS great!
America always has been great!
America always will be great!
America is greater when we are unified!
America is greater when we listen to each other!
America is greater when we work together!
America is less great when we are divided against ourselves!
America is less great when we yell at each other!
America is less great when we fight for personal and partisan gain at the expense of the common good!
America, we need to talk!
We need to talk because we cannot act when we are so violently divided!
There should always be healthy differences and healthy debates!
America, our differences and our debates are not healthy!
We need to talk so we can find out what we agree on!
As we build common ground, we can stand on solid ground!
When we stand together and pull together, we can do anything!
Archimedes said, "Give me a lever and a place to stand and I will move the world."
We have to reach back for the American spirit of the American revolution and call on the best of the old!
We have to gather at kitchen tables, schools, town halls, churches, pubs, taverns, and living rooms and find what we agree on!
Less and less, though, do we have time for gathering together with neighbors, AND, we need a place to collect our work as citizens and watch as our common progress grows!
For this, we must make full use of technology to build a civic infrastructure and call on the best of the new!
Democracy 2.0 is an idea whose time has come and we need our young people to help us make it a reality for our common future!
Justice Louis Brandeis said, "In a democracy, citizen is the highest office."
We need a civic infrastructure where every person can register their own views and their own priorities and work together with their fellow citizens to build common ground!
As that common ground builds, we can take common action and move America forward and make America greater than ever!
America's greatest challenges lie before us.
Americans will not be divided by small mean greedy parasites!
Americans will face our challenges, and, together, we, the people, will enjoy America's greatest days ever!
The American spirit
is the high and noble
human spirit
famously expressed in the poem by Emma Lazarus
engraved on the pedestal of
the Statue of Liberty,
The New Colossus
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
[ SOURCE: http://www.libertystatepark.com/emma.htm ]
