No One Who Has Lived Through The

My Father Left Me With The Feeling That I Had To Live For Two People, And That If I Did It Well Enough, Somehow I Could Make Up For The Life He Should Have Had. And His Memory Infused Me, At A Younger Age Than Most, With A Sense Of My Own Mortality. The Knowledge That I, Too, Could Die Young Drove Me Both To Try To Drain The Most Out Of Every Moment Of Life And To Get On With The Next Big Challenge. Even When I Wasn't Sure Where I Was Going, I Was Always In A Hurry.

All America Loses When Any Person Is Denied Or Forced Out Of A Job Because Of Sexual Orientation. Being Gay, The Last Time I Thought About It, Seemed To Have Nothing To Do With The Ability To Read A Balance Book, Fix A Broken Bone, Or Change A Spark Plug.

With Almost No Time To Decide, They [your Loved Ones] Gave The Entire Country An Incalculable Gift. They Saved The Capitol From Attack. They Saved God Knows How Many Lives. They Saved The Terrorists From Claiming The Symbolic Victory Of Smashing The Center Of American Government. And They Did It As Citizens. They Allowed Us To Survive As A Country That Could Fight Terror And Still Maintain Liberty And Still Welcome People From All Over The World From Every Religion And Race And Culture As Long As They Shared Our Values, Because ­ordinary People Given No Time At All To Decide Did The Right Thing.

I'm Pretty Good At Seeing Like A Lot Of Different Things Happening At Once And Putting Them In A Pattern And Figuring Out How You Can Rearrange It So It Might Have A Better Outcome.

I Pledge That I Have No Intention Of Raising Taxes In My Second Term.