Two days after his triumphant victory over former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, President Obama thanked his campaign staff for their help in getting him reelected. In a spartan room decorated only with campaign posters, cork boards with post-it notes, and computers, he delivered perhaps his most heartfelt speech yet.
As he looked out at a room filled with young, energetic supporters, he told them they reminded him of himself as a young man. When he first moved to Chicago, he said, Reagan had just been reelected to his second term. He knew he wanted to help the community, and help the kids get the kind of education and opportunities he'd benefited from.
The president described how, during his years as a community organizer on the South Side of Chicago, he grew up, became a man. The community, he said, had done more for him than he could ever repay. It was through learning how people had common dreams, common hopes, and as he looked out over his own community organizers, he said, "...you are going to do just amazing things in your lives, and you'll be what Bobby Kennedy called the ripples of hope that come out when you throw a stone in a lake."
As President Obama spoke, quiet tears rolled down his face, and his voice, normally stoic and strong, broke with emotion as he told them, "I'm really proud of all of you." He wiped them away several times, pausing briefly to gather his thoughts. It was obvious that his campaign workers felt the same way. The entire room was filled with a sense of joyous, but cautious hope. Unlike four years ago, when supporters believed he could help change Washington, this time, it was a sense of relief mixed with resolve that progress must march on, and America can't afford to return to 1950s values. It was a sense that his entire campaign, and the last four years, were validated, and the future can, and will be, much brighter than today.
You can view the video here below. A transcript will be provided in the first comment section for those who are deaf and hard of hearing.
Photo credit: Barack O./Twitter
©2012 Reno Berkeley for Gather News. Berkeley can be found on Tumblr, Google+, Twitter.
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Comments: 9
I try to picture myself when I was your age and I first moved to Chicago at the age of 25.
And I had this big inkling about making a difference. I didn't really know how to do it. I didn't have a structure, and there wasn't a presidential campaign at the time that I could attach myself to.
Ronald Reagan had just been re-elected and was incredibly popular.So I came to Chicago
knowing that somehow I wanted to make sure that my life attached itself to helping kids get a great education or helping people living in poverty to get decent job and be able to work
and have dignity...
To make sure that people didn't have to go to the emergency to get health care, and I ended up being a community organizer on the south side of Chicago.
A group of churches were willing to hire me, and I didn't know at all what I was doing.
And the work I did in those communities changed me more than I changed the communities
because it taught me the hopes and aspirations and the grit and the resilience of ordinary people.
And it taught me the fact of 'under the surface differences', we all have common hopes and we all common dreams, and it taught me something about how I handled this appointment, and what it meant to work hard under a common endeavor.
And I grew up and I became a man during that process and so I come here and I look at all of you, what comes to mind is that it's not that you guys actualy remind me of myself. It's the fact that you are so much better than I was in so many ways.
You're smarter, you're better organized, and you're more effective, and so I'm absolutely confident that all of you are going to do just amazing things in your lives. And you'll be what Bobby Kennedy called the ripples of hope that come out when you throw a stone in a lake. That's gonna be you.
I'm just looking around the room and I'm thinking, wherever you guys end up in whatever states
what ever capacities whether you are in the private sector or not for profit, or some of you decide to go into public service, you're just gonna do great things, and that's why even before last night's results, I felt that the work I have done in running for office had come full circle, because what you guys had done means that the work that I have been doing has been approved.
I'm really proud of that I'm really proud of all of you,
(applause)
What you guys accomplished will go on in the annuls of history and people will read about it and they'll marvel about it. The most thing that you need to know is that your journey is just beginning
you're just starting. And whatever good we do in the next four years will pale in comparison
to whatever you guys end up accomplishing for years and years to come.
And that's been my source of hope.
That's why over the last four years when people ask me about how you put up with this or that or the frustrations of Washington, I just think about you I think about what you guys are gonna do
and thats the source of my hope thats the source of my strength and my inspiration. And I know that you guys aren't gonna disappoint me because I've already seen who you guys are
And you all are good remarkable people, and you've lifted me up every step of the way.
If only people would take the time to understand who he really is. Not as a president, just as person.
The last word should be "important."