Bobby
Thu Nov 23, 2006 at 07:48:37 AM PDT
Today is for giving thanks. It is also the release of Bobby.
Many of us salivate over every crumb of courage elected Democrats drop on our plates. Let us remember another dire time in our history -- when many Democrats had gone astray and we were fighting in another hopeless, death-filled quagmire.
Bobby should remind us what bravery means -- to see war, poverty and injustice and reject political expediency and selfish, fear-laden excuses to try and stop it.
Bobby is flying way under the radar.
Lets make sure it doesn't, at least in our own small circles.
Bobby's passion, selflessness and energy need be celebrated. His death ushered in a dark era and moral drought in our history that we still have not recovered from. So much potential and so many dreams were cut down that day in 1968.
But Robert Kennedy planted the seeds of inspiration in so many of our current generation of heroes. His passion, allure and the simple truth in his heartfelt words has beckoned many to serve. And as Robert Kennedy's story is retold and celebrated, I'm hopeful it can help generate yet another crop -- because we still have so very far to go.
“Let no one be discouraged by the belief there is nothing one man or one woman can do against the enormous array of the world’s ills - against misery and ignorance, injustice and violence... Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation...
It is from the numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, these ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.” - Robert Kennedy
“I do not run for the presidency merely to oppose any man but to propose new policies. I run because I am convinced that this country is on a perilous course and because I have such strong feelings about what must be done, and I feel that I'm obliged to do all that I can. I run to seek new policies - policies to end the bloodshed in Vietnam and in our cities, policies to close the gaps that now exist between black and white, between rich and poor, between young and old, in this country and around the rest of the world. I run for the presidency because I want the Democratic Party and the United States of America to stand for hope instead of despair, for reconciliation of men instead of the growing risk of world war. I run because it is now unmistakably clear that we can change these disastrous, divisive policies only by changing the men who are now making them. For the reality of recent events in Vietnam has been glossed over with illusions. [...]
I do not lightly dismiss the dangers and the difficulties of challenging an incumbent President. But these are not ordinary times and this is not an ordinary election. At stake is not simply the leadership of our party and even our country. It is our right to moral leadership of this planet.” - Robert Kennedy
“What is objectionable, what is dangerous, about extremists is not that they are extreme, but that they are intolerant. The evil is not what they say about their cause, but what they say about their opponents.” - Robert Kennedy
"'If we believe men have any personal rights at all,' Aristotle said, 'then they must have an absolute moral right to such a measure of good health as society alone can provide.' [...]
The issue before us then, is simple: Shall we continue to watch as medical costs soar beyond the reach of most Americans, condemning the poor to illness and the average American to the whim of fate -- or are we going to act to make decent medical care something more than a luxury of the affluent?
I think what we want is clear. And I think this nation is willing to make the effort necessary for an effective system of care. We have the resources to do it -- we have the will to do it -- and we are going to do it if I am the next President of the United States. [...]
No program to improve the nation’s health will be effective unless we understand the conditions of injustice which underlie disease. It is illusory to think we can cure a sickly child -- and ignore his need for enough food to eat. It is foolish to pour in money to cure the effect of filth-ridden slums -- without acting to eradicate the slums that breed so much disease. It is pointless to establish community health projects to cure the ills of mind and body -- if we do not understand that a community of the jobless, the hopeless, the purposeless spawns disease in the minds and bodies of its victims. We will not really cure the pathology of individuals unless we begin to come to grips with the pathology of these communities.
Education, jobs, community participation, an end to hunger, these are the elements of a healthy citizenry. And they must be achieved. For it is neither economical nor compassionate to care for the consequences of poverty, and ignores its roots." - Robert Kennedy
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