Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.
Barack Obama
The future rewards those who press on. I don’t have time to feel sorry for myself. I don’t have time to complain. I’m going to press on.
Barack Obama
My fellow Americans, we are and always will be a nation of immigrants. We were strangers once, too.
Barack Obama
We, the People, recognize that we have responsibilities as well as rights; that our destinies are bound together; that a freedom which only asks what’s in it for me, a freedom without a commitment to others, a freedom without love or charity or duty or patriotism, is unworthy of our founding ideals, and those who died in their defense.
Barack Obama
We need to reject any politics that targets people because of race or religion. This isn’t a matter of political correctness. It’s a matter of understanding what makes us strong. The world respects us not just for our arsenal; it respects us for our diversity and our openness and the way we respect every faith.
Barack Obama
If you’re walking down the right path and you’re willing to keep walking, eventually you’ll make progress.
Barack Obama
Now, as a nation, we don’t promise equal outcomes, but we were founded on the idea everybody should have an equal opportunity to succeed. No matter who you are, what you look like, where you come from, you can make it. That’s an essential promise of America. Where you start should not determine where you end up.
Barack Obama
We proved that we are still a people capable of doing big things and tackling our biggest challenges.
Barack Obama
We need to steer clear of this poverty of ambition, where people want to drive fancy cars and wear nice clothes and live in nice apartments but don’t want to work hard to accomplish these things. Everyone should try to realize their full potential.
Barack Obama
Issues are never simple. One thing I’m proud of is that very rarely will you hear me simplify the issues.
Barack Obama
Issues are never simple. One thing I’m proud of is that very rarely will you hear me simplify the issues.
Barack Obama
We have real enemies in the world. These enemies must be found. They must be pursued and they must be defeated.
Barack Obama
Focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a certain poverty of ambition. It asks too little of yourself. Because it’s only when you hitch your wagon to something larger than yourself that you realize your true potential.
Barack Obama
If the people cannot trust their government to do the job for which it exists – to protect them and to promote their common welfare – all else is lost.
Barack Obama
I believe marriage is between a man and a woman. I am not in favor of gay marriage. But when you start playing around with constitutions, just to prohibit somebody who cares about another person, it just seems to me that’s not what America’s about. Usually, our constitutions expand liberties, they don’t contract them.
Barack Obama
We need to internalize this idea of excellence. Not many folks spend a lot of time trying to be excellent.
Barack Obama
In the end, that’s what this election is about. Do we participate in a politics of cynicism or a politics of hope?
Barack Obama
I think when you spread the wealth around it’s good for everybody.
Barack Obama
I miss Saturday morning, rolling out of bed, not shaving, getting into my car with my girls, driving to the supermarket, squeezing the fruit, getting my car washed, taking walks.
Barack Obama
We need somebody who’s got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it’s like to be a young teenage mom, the empathy to understand what it’s like to be poor or African-American or gay or disabled or old – and that’s the criterion by which I’ll be selecting my judges.
Barack Obama
Where the stakes are the highest, in the war on terror, we cannot possibly succeed without extraordinary international cooperation. Effective international police actions require the highest degree of intelligence sharing, planning and collaborative enforcement.
Barack Obama
You know, my faith is one that admits some doubt.
Barack Obama
There’s not a liberal America and a conservative America – there’s the United States of America.
Barack Obama
Operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and the war on terrorism have reduced the pace of military transformation and have revealed our lack of preparation for defensive and stability operations. This Administration has overextended our military.
Barack Obama
I don’t care whether you’re driving a hybrid or an SUV. If you’re headed for a cliff, you have to change direction. That’s what the American people called for in November, and that’s what we intend to deliver.
Barack Obama
It was the labor movement that helped secure so much of what we take for granted today. The 40-hour work week, the minimum wage, family leave, health insurance, Social Security, Medicare, retirement plans. The cornerstones of the middle-class security all bear the union label.
Barack Obama
Money is not the only answer, but it makes a difference.
Barack Obama
Tonight, we gather to affirm the greatness of our nation – not because of the height of our skyscrapers, or the power of our military, or the size of our economy. Our pride is based on a very simple premise, summed up in a declaration made over two hundred years ago.
Barack Obama
And we have done more in the two and a half years that I’ve been in here than the previous 43 Presidents to uphold that principle, whether it’s ending ‘don’t ask, don’t tell,’ making sure that gay and lesbian partners can visit each other in hospitals, making sure that federal benefits can be provided to same-sex couples.
Barack Obama
It’s not enough to train today’s workforce. We also have to prepare tomorrow’s workforce by guaranteeing every child access to a world-class education.
Barack Obama
In a world of complex threats, our security and leadership depends on all elements of our power – including strong and principled diplomacy.
Barack Obama
America is the student who defies the odds to become the first in a family to go to college – the citizen who defies the cynics and goes out there and votes – the young person who comes out of the shadows to demand the right to dream. That’s what America is about.
Barack Obama
Food Stamp recipients didn’t cause the financial crisis; recklessness on Wall Street did.
Barack Obama
I opposed the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996. It should be repealed and I will vote for its repeal on the Senate floor. I will also oppose any proposal to amend the U.S. Constitution to ban gays and lesbians from marrying.
Barack Obama
Our brand of democracy is hard. But I can promise that a year from now, when I no longer hold this office, I’ll be right there with you as a citizen – inspired by those voices of fairness and vision, of grit and good humor and kindness that have helped America travel so far.
Barack Obama
So while I will never minimize the costs involved in military action, I am convinced that a failure to act in Libya would have carried a far greater price for America.
Barack Obama
I just miss – I miss being anonymous.
Barack Obama
We didn’t become the most prosperous country in the world just by rewarding greed and recklessness. We didn’t come this far by letting the special interests run wild. We didn’t do it just by gambling and chasing paper profits on Wall Street. We built this country by making things, by producing goods we could sell.
Barack Obama
It was not a religion that attacked us that September day. It was al-Qaeda. We will not sacrifice the liberties we cherish or hunker down behind walls of suspicion and mistrust.
Barack Obama
A good compromise, a good piece of legislation, is like a good sentence; or a good piece of music. Everybody can recognize it. They say, ‘Huh. It works. It makes sense.
Barack Obama
No party has a monopoly on wisdom. No democracy works without compromise. But when Governor Romney and his allies in Congress tell us we can somehow lower our deficit by spending trillions more on new tax breaks for the wealthy – well, you do the math. I refuse to go along with that. And as long as I’m President, I never will.
Barack Obama
So long as I’m Commander-in-Chief, we will sustain the strongest military the world has ever known. When you take off the uniform, we will serve you as well as you’ve served us – because no one who fights for this country should have to fight for a job, or a roof over their head, or the care that they need when they come home.
Barack Obama
Take off your bedroom slippers. Put on your marching shoes,’ he said, his voice rising as applause and cheers mounted. ‘Shake it off. Stop complainin’. Stop grumblin’. Stop cryin’. We are going to press on. We have work to do.
Barack Obama
You can choose a future where more Americans have the chance to gain the skills they need to compete, no matter how old they are or how much money they have. Education was the gateway to opportunity for me. It was the gateway for Michelle. And now more than ever, it is the gateway to a middle-class life.
Barack Obama
I will continue to believe that Israel’s security is paramount.
Barack Obama
What Washington needs is adult supervision.
Barack Obama
As a nuclear power – as the only nuclear power to have used a nuclear weapon – the United States has a moral responsibility to act.
Barack Obama
I’m going to try to unite all Americans.
Barack Obama
Now you have a choice: we can give more tax breaks to corporations that ship jobs overseas, or we can start rewarding companies that open new plants and train new workers and create new jobs here, in the United States of America.
Barack Obama
We welcome the scrutiny of the world – because what you see in America is a country that has steadily worked to address our problems and make our union more perfect.
Barack Obama
As president, I’m committed to making Washington work better and rebuilding the trust of the people who sent us here.
Barack Obama
What do you think a stimulus is? It’s spending – that’s the whole point! Seriously.
Barack Obama
We have now just enshrined, as soon as I sign this bill, the core principle that everybody should have some basic security when it comes to their healthcare.
Barack Obama
The United States is not, and never will be, at war with Islam.
Barack Obama
I’ve got two daughters. 9 years old and 6 years old. I am going to teach them first of all about values and morals. But if they make a mistake, I don’t want them punished with a baby.
Barack Obama
After 2014, we will support a unified Afghanistan as it takes responsibility for its own future.
Barack Obama
I am the commander in chief of the United States armed forces, and Iraq is gonna have to ultimately provide for its own security.
Barack Obama
Americans… still believe in an America where anything’s possible – they just don’t think their leaders do.
Barack Obama
People of Berlin – people of the world – this is our moment. This is our time.
Barack Obama
I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.
Barack Obama
I have Muslim members of my family. I have lived in Muslim countries.
Barack Obama
I mean, I do think at a certain point you’ve made enough money.
Barack Obama