Obama, O Yes!

Here's the transcript of Barack Obama's keynote address last night in Boston, and here's a short excerpt:

"Now even as we speak, there are those who are preparing to divide us, the spin masters and negative ad peddlers who embrace the politics of anything goes. Well, I say to them tonight, there's not a liberal America and a conservative America -- there is the United States of America. There's not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America -- there is the United States of America. The pundits, the pundits like to slice and dice our country into red states and blue states; red states for Republicans, blue states for Democrats. But I've got news for them, too. We worship an awesome God in the blue states, and we don't like federal agents poking around our libraries in the red states. We coach Little League in the blue states and have gay friends in the red states. There are patriots who opposed the war in Iraq and patriots who supported it. We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America. In the end, that's what this election is about. Do we participate in a politics of cynicism or do we participate in a politics of hope?"

Seeing and hearing him deliver these words was downright ... inspirational. And now we know what all the fuss was about! Obama, barring the Second Coming, will be a United States Senator from Illinois come November. The Illinois Republican Party still hasn't found anyone to run against him (and we were so hoping for Mike Ditka!).