Monday, June 28, 2010
Transcript: The Country We Beieve in: improvign America - George Washington University
Posted by Linda H on 8:50:00 PM
Transcript Miami Dade commencement 2011
Posted by Linda H on 8:48:00 PM
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you, Miami Dade! (Applause.) Thank you. (Applause.) Please, everyone, be seated.
Hafeeza, thank you for that wonderful introduction. (Applause.) To Dr. Padrón, Dr. Vicente, to the board of trustees, the faculty, parents, family, friends, and, most important, the class of 2011, congratulations -- (applause) -- congratulations on reaching this day.
And thank you for allowing me the profound honor of being a part of it. And thank you for my first honorary associate degree. (Laughter.) One of the perks of this job is that degrees come free these days. (Laughter.) Not that it impresses anybody at home. Now Michelle just says, “Hey, Doctor, go take that dog for a walk.” (Laughter.)
It is such a thrill to be at one of the largest, most diverse institutions of higher learning in America -- one that just this week was named one of the top community colleges in the nation. (Applause.) More than 170,000 students study across your eight campuses. You come from 181 countries, represented by the flags that just marched across this stage. You speak 94 languages. About 90 percent of you are minorities. And because more than 90 percent of you find a job in your field of study, it’s fitting that your motto is “Opportunity changes everything.”
As someone who’s only here because of the chances my education gave me, I couldn’t agree more. Opportunity changes everything. America will only be as strong in this new century as the opportunities that we provide you -- the opportunities that we provide to all our young people -- Latino, black, white, Asian, Native American, everybody. America will only be as strong as our pursuit of scientific research and our leadership in technology and innovation. And I believe that community colleges like this one are critical pathways to the middle class that equip students with the skills and the education necessary to compete and win in this 21st-century economy. And that’s why I’ve made community colleges a centerpiece of my education agenda, along with helping more students afford college. I couldn’t be prouder of the work we’ve done in community colleges. And your accomplishment today is vital to America reclaiming the highest proportion of college graduates in the world by 2020. So I am proud of you. (Applause.) I am proud of you.
I know that for many of you reaching this day wasn’t easy.
AUDIENCE: No.
THE PRESIDENT: See? I got some amens there. (Applause.)
Perhaps you’re the first in your family to go to college. (Applause.) Some of you have had to overcome big obstacles, defeat your own doubts, prove yourself to everyone who ever believed that you couldn’t make it because of what you look like or where you came from. (Applause.) And, of course -- of course, for so many of you, this day represents the fulfillment of your family’s dreams when you were born. This is their achievement as well, so give it up for your parents and your grandparents, your cousins and your uncles and your aunties. (Applause.) This is their day, too. This is their day, too.
See, the diploma you’re about to receive stands for something more than the investment you made in yourselves. It’s the result of an investment made by generations before you; an investment in that radical yet simple idea that America is a place -- the place -- where you can make it if you try. (Applause.) That’s the ideal that has made this country -- that’s the idea that’s represented by that one flag that all of you cheered for; that’s what has made us a shining light to the world.
And preserving this idea -- keeping the American Dream alive from one generation to the next -- that’s never been an easy task. It’s an even greater test in times of rapid change. And all of you are graduating at a moment when change is coming faster than ever before. We’re emerging from an economic downturn like we haven’t seen since the 1930s. Massive shifts in technology have shifted profoundly what our economy looks like. Massive shifts abroad geopolitically have swift and dramatic impacts not only overseas but also here at home, from markets on Wall Street to wallets on Main Street. Just as advances in technology have the power to make our lives better, they also force us to compete with other nations like never before. Tackling big challenges like terrorism and climate change require sustained national effort, and yet too often, our politics seems as broken, as divided as ever.
So I know that for many of you it’s an intimidating time to be marching out into the world. Everything seems so unsettled. The future may seem unclear. But as you make your way in this ever changing world, you should take comfort in knowing that as a country, we’ve navigated tougher times before. We’ve sailed stormier seas. Earlier today, I spent some time in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. And some of you have seen what happened there as a consequence of the tornadoes that struck. The mayor and I visited a community where the devastation from this storm was simply heartbreaking -- entire homes and blocks just gone, wiped away. Some families lost everything. Some families lost family.
But what was striking is the way that damaged community has come together, how they’ve rallied around one another. The mayor there, young man doing wonderful work, Mayor Maddox, he put it best. He told me that when disasters like this strike, all our grievances seem to go away. All our differences don’t seem to matter. All our political disagreements seem so petty. We help each other, we support one another, as one country, as one people.
That’s the American spirit. No matter how hard we are tested, we look to our faith and our faith in one another. No matter what the challenge, we’ve always carried the American Dream forward. That’s been true throughout our history.
When bombs fell on Pearl Harbor, when an Iron Curtain fell over Europe, when the threat of nuclear war loomed just 90 miles from this city, when a brilliant September morning was darkened by terror -- in none of those instances did we falter. We endured. We carried the dream forward.
We’ve gone through periods of great economic turmoil, from an economy where most people worked on farms to one where most people worked in factories to now one fueled by information and technology. Through it all, we’ve persevered. We’ve adapted. We’ve prospered. Workers found their voice, and the right to organize for fair wages and safe working conditions. We carried forward.
When waves of Irish and Italian immigrants were derided as criminals and outcasts; when Catholics were discriminated against, or Jews had to succumb to quotas, or Muslims were blamed for society’s ills; when blacks were treated as second-class citizens and marriages like my own parents’ were illegal in much of the country -- we didn’t stop. We didn’t accept inequality. We fought. We overcame. We carried the dream forward.
We have carried this dream forward through times when our politics seemed broken. This is not the first time where it looked like politicians were going crazy. (Laughter.) In heated debates over our founding, some warned independence would doom America to “a scene of bloody discord and desolation for ages.” That was the warning about independence. One of our greatest Presidents, Thomas Jefferson, was labeled an “infidel” and a “howling atheist” with “fangs.” Think about that. Even I haven’t gotten that one yet. (Laughter.) Lincoln -- Lincoln, FDR, they were both vilified in their own times as tyrants, power hungry, bent on destroying democracy. And of course, this state has seen its fair share of tightly contested elections. (Laughter.)
And we’ve made it through those moments. None of it was easy. A lot of it was messy. Sometimes there was violence. Sometimes it took years, even decades, for us to find our way through. But here’s the thing. We made it through. We made it through because in each of those moments, we made a choice.
Rather than turn inward and wall off America from the rest of the world, we’ve chosen to stand up forcefully for the ideals and the rights we believe are universal for all men and women.
Rather than settle for an America where everybody is left to fend for themselves, where we think only about our own short-term needs instead of the country that we’re leaving to our children, we have chosen to build a nation where everybody has a shot at opportunity, where everyone can succeed. We’ve chosen to invest in our people and in their future -- building public schools, sending a generation to college on the GI Bill, laying highways and railroads, building ports all across the country.
Rather than turn on each other in times of cultural upheaval, we’ve chosen to march, to organize, to sit-in, to turn out, to petition our government for women’s rights and voting rights and civil rights -- even in the face of fierce resistance -- because we are Americans; and no matter who we are or what we look like, we believe that in this country, all are equal, all are free. (Applause.)
Rather than give in to the voices suggesting we set our sights lower, downsize our dreams, or settle for something less, we’ve chosen again and again to make America bigger, bolder, more diverse, more generous, more hopeful.
Because throughout our history, what has distinguished us from all other nations is not just our wealth, it’s not just our power. It’s been our deep commitment to individual freedom and personal responsibility, but also our unshakeable commitment to one another -- a recognition that we share a future; that we rise or fall together; that we are part of a common enterprise that is greater, somehow, than the sum of its parts.
So, yes, class of 2011, change will be a constant in your lives. And that can be scary. That can be hard. And sometimes you’ll be tempted to turn inward; to say “What’s good enough for me is good enough.” Sometimes you’ll be tempted to turn on one another; to say “My problems are the fault of those who don’t look like me or sound like me.” Sometime you’ll be tempted to give into those voices that warn: “too hard,” “don’t try,” “no, you can’t.”
But I have faith you will reject those voices. I have faith you will reject those impulses. Your generation was born into a world with fewer walls; a world educated in an era of information, tempered by war and economic turmoil. And as our globe has grown smaller and more connected, you’ve shed the heavy weights of earlier generations. Your generation has grown up more accepting and tolerant of people for who they are, regardless of race or gender or religious belief; regardless of creed or sexual orientation. That’s how you’ve grown up. You see our diversity as a strength, not a weakness. And I believe those life experiences have fortified you, as earlier generations were fortified, to meet the tests of our time. Everything I have seen of your generation has shown me that you believe, as deeply as any previous generation, that America can always change for the better.
Class of 2011, you and your generation are now responsible for our future. I’m only going to be President a little bit longer. You are going to be leaders for many years to come. You will have to make choices to keep our dream alive for the next generation. Choices about whether we’ll stack the deck against workers and the middle class, or whether we make sure America remains a place where if you work hard you can get ahead. You’re going to have to make a choice about whether we’ll say we can’t afford to educate our young people and send them to college, or whether we continue to be a country that makes investments that are necessary to keep those young people competitive in this new century. It will be up to you to choose whether we’ll remain vulnerable to swings in oil prices or whether we invest in the clean energy that can break our dependence on oil and protect our planet. (Applause.) It will be your choice as to whether we break our promise to seniors and the poor and the disabled and tell them to fend for themselves, or whether we keep strengthening our social safety net and our health care system. (Applause.)
And it will be up to you whether we’ll turn on one another, or whether we stay true to our values of fairness and opportunity, understanding that we are a nation of immigrants -- immigrants that built this country into an economic powerhouse and a beacon of hope around the world. (Applause.)
I know this last issue generates some passion. I know that several young people here have recently identified themselves as undocumented. Some were brought here as young children, and discovered the truth only as adults. And they’ve put their futures on the line in hopes it will spur the rest of us to live up to our most cherished values.
I strongly believe we should fix our broken immigration system. (Applause.) Fix it so that it meets our 21st-century economic and security needs. And I want to work with Democrats and Republicans, yes, to protect our borders, and enforce our laws, and address the status of millions of undocumented workers. (Applause.) And I will keep fighting alongside many of you to make the DREAM Act the law of the land. (Applause.)
Like all of this country’s movements towards justice, it will be difficult and it will take time. I know some here wish that I could just bypass Congress and change the law myself. (Applause.) But that’s not how democracy works. See, democracy is hard. But it’s right.
Changing our laws means doing the hard work of changing minds and changing votes, one by one. And I am convinced we can change the laws, because we should all be able to agree that it makes no sense to expel talented young people from our country. They grew up as Americans. They pledge allegiance to our flag. And if they are trying to serve in our military or earn a degree, they are contributing to our future -- and we welcome those contributions. (Applause.)
We didn’t raise the Statue of Liberty with its back to the world; we raised it with its light to the world. (Applause.) Whether your ancestors came here on the Mayflower or a slave ship; whether they signed in at Ellis Island or they crossed the Rio Grande -- we are one people. We need one another. Our patriotism is not rooted in ethnicity, but in a shared belief of the enduring and permanent promise of this country. (Applause.)
That’s the promise redeemed by your graduation today. That’s the promise that drew so many of you to this college and your parents to this country. And that’s the promise that drew my own father here.
I didn’t know him well, my father -- and he lived a troubled life. But I know that when he was around your age, he dreamed of something more than his lot in life. He dreamed of that magical place; he dreamed of coming to study in America.
And when I was around your age, I traveled back to his home country of Kenya for the first time to learn his story. And I went to a tiny village called Alego, where his stepmother still lives in the house where he grew up, and I visited his grave. And I asked her if there was anything left for me to know him by. And she opened a trunk, and she took out a stack of letters -- and this is an elderly woman who doesn’t read or write -- but she had saved these letters, more than 30 of them, written in his hand and addressed to colleges and universities all across America.
They weren’t that different from the letters that I wrote when I was trying to get into college, or the ones that you wrote when you were hoping to come here. They were written in the simple, sometimes awkward, sometimes grammatically incorrect, unmistakably hopeful voice of somebody who is just desperate for a chance -- just desperate to live his unlikely dream.
And somebody at the University of Hawaii -- halfway around the world -- chose to give him that chance. And because that person gave a young man a chance, he met a young woman from Kansas; they had a son in the land where all things are possible. (Applause.)
And one of my earliest memories from growing up in Hawaii, is of sitting on my grandfather’s shoulders to see the astronauts from one of the Apollo space missions come ashore after a successful splashdown. You remember that no matter how young you are as a child. It’s one of those unforgettable moments when you first realize the miracle that is what this country is capable of. And I remember waving a little American flag on top of my grandfather’s shoulders, thinking about those astronauts, and thinking about space.
And today, on this day, more than 40 years later, I took my daughters to the Kennedy Space Center. And even though we didn’t get to see the Space Shuttle Endeavour launch, we met some of the astronauts, and we toured the Space Shuttle Atlantis. And looking at my daughters, I thought of how things come full circle. I thought of all that we’ve achieved as a nation since I was their age, a little brown boy sitting on my grandfather’s shoulders -- and I thought about all I want us to achieve by the time they have children of their own.
That’s my proof that the idea of America endures. That’s my evidence that our brave endeavor on this Earth continues. And every single day I walk into the Oval Office, and for all the days of my life, I will always remember that in no other nation on Earth could my story be possible, could your stories be possible. That is something I celebrate. That is something that drives every decision I make. (Applause.)
So what I ask of you, graduates, as you walk out of here today is this: Pursue success. Do not falter. When you make it, pull somebody else up. (Applause.) Preserve our dream. Remember your life is richer when people around you have a shot at opportunity as well. Strive to widen that circle of possibility; strive to forge that big, generous, optimistic vision of America that we inherited; strive to carry that dream forward to future generations.
Hafeeza, thank you for that wonderful introduction. (Applause.) To Dr. Padrón, Dr. Vicente, to the board of trustees, the faculty, parents, family, friends, and, most important, the class of 2011, congratulations -- (applause) -- congratulations on reaching this day.
And thank you for allowing me the profound honor of being a part of it. And thank you for my first honorary associate degree. (Laughter.) One of the perks of this job is that degrees come free these days. (Laughter.) Not that it impresses anybody at home. Now Michelle just says, “Hey, Doctor, go take that dog for a walk.” (Laughter.)
It is such a thrill to be at one of the largest, most diverse institutions of higher learning in America -- one that just this week was named one of the top community colleges in the nation. (Applause.) More than 170,000 students study across your eight campuses. You come from 181 countries, represented by the flags that just marched across this stage. You speak 94 languages. About 90 percent of you are minorities. And because more than 90 percent of you find a job in your field of study, it’s fitting that your motto is “Opportunity changes everything.”
As someone who’s only here because of the chances my education gave me, I couldn’t agree more. Opportunity changes everything. America will only be as strong in this new century as the opportunities that we provide you -- the opportunities that we provide to all our young people -- Latino, black, white, Asian, Native American, everybody. America will only be as strong as our pursuit of scientific research and our leadership in technology and innovation. And I believe that community colleges like this one are critical pathways to the middle class that equip students with the skills and the education necessary to compete and win in this 21st-century economy. And that’s why I’ve made community colleges a centerpiece of my education agenda, along with helping more students afford college. I couldn’t be prouder of the work we’ve done in community colleges. And your accomplishment today is vital to America reclaiming the highest proportion of college graduates in the world by 2020. So I am proud of you. (Applause.) I am proud of you.
I know that for many of you reaching this day wasn’t easy.
AUDIENCE: No.
THE PRESIDENT: See? I got some amens there. (Applause.)
Perhaps you’re the first in your family to go to college. (Applause.) Some of you have had to overcome big obstacles, defeat your own doubts, prove yourself to everyone who ever believed that you couldn’t make it because of what you look like or where you came from. (Applause.) And, of course -- of course, for so many of you, this day represents the fulfillment of your family’s dreams when you were born. This is their achievement as well, so give it up for your parents and your grandparents, your cousins and your uncles and your aunties. (Applause.) This is their day, too. This is their day, too.
See, the diploma you’re about to receive stands for something more than the investment you made in yourselves. It’s the result of an investment made by generations before you; an investment in that radical yet simple idea that America is a place -- the place -- where you can make it if you try. (Applause.) That’s the ideal that has made this country -- that’s the idea that’s represented by that one flag that all of you cheered for; that’s what has made us a shining light to the world.
And preserving this idea -- keeping the American Dream alive from one generation to the next -- that’s never been an easy task. It’s an even greater test in times of rapid change. And all of you are graduating at a moment when change is coming faster than ever before. We’re emerging from an economic downturn like we haven’t seen since the 1930s. Massive shifts in technology have shifted profoundly what our economy looks like. Massive shifts abroad geopolitically have swift and dramatic impacts not only overseas but also here at home, from markets on Wall Street to wallets on Main Street. Just as advances in technology have the power to make our lives better, they also force us to compete with other nations like never before. Tackling big challenges like terrorism and climate change require sustained national effort, and yet too often, our politics seems as broken, as divided as ever.
So I know that for many of you it’s an intimidating time to be marching out into the world. Everything seems so unsettled. The future may seem unclear. But as you make your way in this ever changing world, you should take comfort in knowing that as a country, we’ve navigated tougher times before. We’ve sailed stormier seas. Earlier today, I spent some time in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. And some of you have seen what happened there as a consequence of the tornadoes that struck. The mayor and I visited a community where the devastation from this storm was simply heartbreaking -- entire homes and blocks just gone, wiped away. Some families lost everything. Some families lost family.
But what was striking is the way that damaged community has come together, how they’ve rallied around one another. The mayor there, young man doing wonderful work, Mayor Maddox, he put it best. He told me that when disasters like this strike, all our grievances seem to go away. All our differences don’t seem to matter. All our political disagreements seem so petty. We help each other, we support one another, as one country, as one people.
That’s the American spirit. No matter how hard we are tested, we look to our faith and our faith in one another. No matter what the challenge, we’ve always carried the American Dream forward. That’s been true throughout our history.
When bombs fell on Pearl Harbor, when an Iron Curtain fell over Europe, when the threat of nuclear war loomed just 90 miles from this city, when a brilliant September morning was darkened by terror -- in none of those instances did we falter. We endured. We carried the dream forward.
We’ve gone through periods of great economic turmoil, from an economy where most people worked on farms to one where most people worked in factories to now one fueled by information and technology. Through it all, we’ve persevered. We’ve adapted. We’ve prospered. Workers found their voice, and the right to organize for fair wages and safe working conditions. We carried forward.
When waves of Irish and Italian immigrants were derided as criminals and outcasts; when Catholics were discriminated against, or Jews had to succumb to quotas, or Muslims were blamed for society’s ills; when blacks were treated as second-class citizens and marriages like my own parents’ were illegal in much of the country -- we didn’t stop. We didn’t accept inequality. We fought. We overcame. We carried the dream forward.
We have carried this dream forward through times when our politics seemed broken. This is not the first time where it looked like politicians were going crazy. (Laughter.) In heated debates over our founding, some warned independence would doom America to “a scene of bloody discord and desolation for ages.” That was the warning about independence. One of our greatest Presidents, Thomas Jefferson, was labeled an “infidel” and a “howling atheist” with “fangs.” Think about that. Even I haven’t gotten that one yet. (Laughter.) Lincoln -- Lincoln, FDR, they were both vilified in their own times as tyrants, power hungry, bent on destroying democracy. And of course, this state has seen its fair share of tightly contested elections. (Laughter.)
And we’ve made it through those moments. None of it was easy. A lot of it was messy. Sometimes there was violence. Sometimes it took years, even decades, for us to find our way through. But here’s the thing. We made it through. We made it through because in each of those moments, we made a choice.
Rather than turn inward and wall off America from the rest of the world, we’ve chosen to stand up forcefully for the ideals and the rights we believe are universal for all men and women.
Rather than settle for an America where everybody is left to fend for themselves, where we think only about our own short-term needs instead of the country that we’re leaving to our children, we have chosen to build a nation where everybody has a shot at opportunity, where everyone can succeed. We’ve chosen to invest in our people and in their future -- building public schools, sending a generation to college on the GI Bill, laying highways and railroads, building ports all across the country.
Rather than turn on each other in times of cultural upheaval, we’ve chosen to march, to organize, to sit-in, to turn out, to petition our government for women’s rights and voting rights and civil rights -- even in the face of fierce resistance -- because we are Americans; and no matter who we are or what we look like, we believe that in this country, all are equal, all are free. (Applause.)
Rather than give in to the voices suggesting we set our sights lower, downsize our dreams, or settle for something less, we’ve chosen again and again to make America bigger, bolder, more diverse, more generous, more hopeful.
Because throughout our history, what has distinguished us from all other nations is not just our wealth, it’s not just our power. It’s been our deep commitment to individual freedom and personal responsibility, but also our unshakeable commitment to one another -- a recognition that we share a future; that we rise or fall together; that we are part of a common enterprise that is greater, somehow, than the sum of its parts.
So, yes, class of 2011, change will be a constant in your lives. And that can be scary. That can be hard. And sometimes you’ll be tempted to turn inward; to say “What’s good enough for me is good enough.” Sometimes you’ll be tempted to turn on one another; to say “My problems are the fault of those who don’t look like me or sound like me.” Sometime you’ll be tempted to give into those voices that warn: “too hard,” “don’t try,” “no, you can’t.”
But I have faith you will reject those voices. I have faith you will reject those impulses. Your generation was born into a world with fewer walls; a world educated in an era of information, tempered by war and economic turmoil. And as our globe has grown smaller and more connected, you’ve shed the heavy weights of earlier generations. Your generation has grown up more accepting and tolerant of people for who they are, regardless of race or gender or religious belief; regardless of creed or sexual orientation. That’s how you’ve grown up. You see our diversity as a strength, not a weakness. And I believe those life experiences have fortified you, as earlier generations were fortified, to meet the tests of our time. Everything I have seen of your generation has shown me that you believe, as deeply as any previous generation, that America can always change for the better.
Class of 2011, you and your generation are now responsible for our future. I’m only going to be President a little bit longer. You are going to be leaders for many years to come. You will have to make choices to keep our dream alive for the next generation. Choices about whether we’ll stack the deck against workers and the middle class, or whether we make sure America remains a place where if you work hard you can get ahead. You’re going to have to make a choice about whether we’ll say we can’t afford to educate our young people and send them to college, or whether we continue to be a country that makes investments that are necessary to keep those young people competitive in this new century. It will be up to you to choose whether we’ll remain vulnerable to swings in oil prices or whether we invest in the clean energy that can break our dependence on oil and protect our planet. (Applause.) It will be your choice as to whether we break our promise to seniors and the poor and the disabled and tell them to fend for themselves, or whether we keep strengthening our social safety net and our health care system. (Applause.)
And it will be up to you whether we’ll turn on one another, or whether we stay true to our values of fairness and opportunity, understanding that we are a nation of immigrants -- immigrants that built this country into an economic powerhouse and a beacon of hope around the world. (Applause.)
I know this last issue generates some passion. I know that several young people here have recently identified themselves as undocumented. Some were brought here as young children, and discovered the truth only as adults. And they’ve put their futures on the line in hopes it will spur the rest of us to live up to our most cherished values.
I strongly believe we should fix our broken immigration system. (Applause.) Fix it so that it meets our 21st-century economic and security needs. And I want to work with Democrats and Republicans, yes, to protect our borders, and enforce our laws, and address the status of millions of undocumented workers. (Applause.) And I will keep fighting alongside many of you to make the DREAM Act the law of the land. (Applause.)
Like all of this country’s movements towards justice, it will be difficult and it will take time. I know some here wish that I could just bypass Congress and change the law myself. (Applause.) But that’s not how democracy works. See, democracy is hard. But it’s right.
Changing our laws means doing the hard work of changing minds and changing votes, one by one. And I am convinced we can change the laws, because we should all be able to agree that it makes no sense to expel talented young people from our country. They grew up as Americans. They pledge allegiance to our flag. And if they are trying to serve in our military or earn a degree, they are contributing to our future -- and we welcome those contributions. (Applause.)
We didn’t raise the Statue of Liberty with its back to the world; we raised it with its light to the world. (Applause.) Whether your ancestors came here on the Mayflower or a slave ship; whether they signed in at Ellis Island or they crossed the Rio Grande -- we are one people. We need one another. Our patriotism is not rooted in ethnicity, but in a shared belief of the enduring and permanent promise of this country. (Applause.)
That’s the promise redeemed by your graduation today. That’s the promise that drew so many of you to this college and your parents to this country. And that’s the promise that drew my own father here.
I didn’t know him well, my father -- and he lived a troubled life. But I know that when he was around your age, he dreamed of something more than his lot in life. He dreamed of that magical place; he dreamed of coming to study in America.
And when I was around your age, I traveled back to his home country of Kenya for the first time to learn his story. And I went to a tiny village called Alego, where his stepmother still lives in the house where he grew up, and I visited his grave. And I asked her if there was anything left for me to know him by. And she opened a trunk, and she took out a stack of letters -- and this is an elderly woman who doesn’t read or write -- but she had saved these letters, more than 30 of them, written in his hand and addressed to colleges and universities all across America.
They weren’t that different from the letters that I wrote when I was trying to get into college, or the ones that you wrote when you were hoping to come here. They were written in the simple, sometimes awkward, sometimes grammatically incorrect, unmistakably hopeful voice of somebody who is just desperate for a chance -- just desperate to live his unlikely dream.
And somebody at the University of Hawaii -- halfway around the world -- chose to give him that chance. And because that person gave a young man a chance, he met a young woman from Kansas; they had a son in the land where all things are possible. (Applause.)
And one of my earliest memories from growing up in Hawaii, is of sitting on my grandfather’s shoulders to see the astronauts from one of the Apollo space missions come ashore after a successful splashdown. You remember that no matter how young you are as a child. It’s one of those unforgettable moments when you first realize the miracle that is what this country is capable of. And I remember waving a little American flag on top of my grandfather’s shoulders, thinking about those astronauts, and thinking about space.
And today, on this day, more than 40 years later, I took my daughters to the Kennedy Space Center. And even though we didn’t get to see the Space Shuttle Endeavour launch, we met some of the astronauts, and we toured the Space Shuttle Atlantis. And looking at my daughters, I thought of how things come full circle. I thought of all that we’ve achieved as a nation since I was their age, a little brown boy sitting on my grandfather’s shoulders -- and I thought about all I want us to achieve by the time they have children of their own.
That’s my proof that the idea of America endures. That’s my evidence that our brave endeavor on this Earth continues. And every single day I walk into the Oval Office, and for all the days of my life, I will always remember that in no other nation on Earth could my story be possible, could your stories be possible. That is something I celebrate. That is something that drives every decision I make. (Applause.)
So what I ask of you, graduates, as you walk out of here today is this: Pursue success. Do not falter. When you make it, pull somebody else up. (Applause.) Preserve our dream. Remember your life is richer when people around you have a shot at opportunity as well. Strive to widen that circle of possibility; strive to forge that big, generous, optimistic vision of America that we inherited; strive to carry that dream forward to future generations.
Transcript: A Renaissance in American Manufacturing
Posted by Linda H on 8:33:00 PM
Transcript President Obamas remarks at CMU 62411
A transcript of remarks by President Obama during his June 24, 2011, appearance at Carnegie Mellon University's National Robotics Engineering Center, in Lawrenceville.
THE PRESIDENT: Hello, hello, hello! (Applause.) Thank you very much. Everybody, please have a seat. Thank you. Hello, Pittsburgh! (Applause.) It is good to be back. Thank you, Senator Casey, and Mayor Ravenstahl, County Executive Dan Onorato, State Auditor Jack Wagner, and all of you for having me back here at Carnegie Mellon. It is good to be here.
And it seems like every time I'm here I learn something. So, for those of you who are thinking about Carnegie Mellon, it's a terrific place, and you guys are doing just great work.
I just met with folks from some cutting-edge companies and saw some of their inventions here in your National Robotics Engineering Center. But that's not the only reason I'm here. You might not know this, but one of my responsibilities as Commander-in-Chief is to keep an eye on robots. (Laughter.) And I'm pleased to report that the robots you manufacture here seem peaceful -- (laughter) -- at least for now.
This is a city that knows something about manufacturing. For generations of Americans, it was the ticket to a middle-class life. Here and across America's industrial heartland, millions clocked in each day at foundries and on assembly lines to make things. And the stuff we made -- steel, cars, planes -- was the stuff that made America what it is. The jobs were good. They paid enough to own a home, to raise kids, send them to college, to retire. They were jobs that told us something more important than just how much money we made, what was in our paycheck. These jobs also told us that we were meeting our responsibilities to our family and to our neighborhoods, and building our communities, and building our country.
But for better and worse, our generation has been pounded by wave after wave of profound economic change. Revolutions in technology have transformed the way we live and the way we work. Businesses and industries can relocate anywhere in the world, anywhere that there are skilled workers, anywhere that there is an Internet connection. And companies have learned to become more efficient with fewer employees. In Pittsburgh, you know this as well as anybody -- steel mills that once needed a thousand workers now do the same work with a hundred.
And while these changes have resulted in great wealth for some Americans and have drastically increased productivity, they've also caused major disruptions for many others. Today, a high school diploma no longer guarantees you a job. Over the past 13 years, about a third of our manufacturing jobs have vanished. And meanwhile, the typical worker's wages have barely kept up with the rising costs of everything else. And all this was even before a financial crisis and recession that pounded the middle class even more.
Now, we've made some tough decisions that have turned our economy in a positive direction over the past two years. We've created more than 2 million new jobs in the private sector over the past 15 months alone, including almost 250,000 in manufacturing. But we still have to confront those underlying problems. They weren't caused overnight, and we won't solve them overnight. But we will solve them. And we're starting to solve them right here in Pittsburgh, and right here at Carnegie Mellon. (Applause.)
And by the way, that's why I ran for President. Not just to get us back to where we were -- I ran for President to get us to where we need to be. I have a larger vision for America -- one where working families feel secure, feel like they are moving forward and that they know that their dreams are within reach; an America where our businesses lead the world in new technologies like clean energy; where we work together, Democrats and Republicans, to live within our means, to cut our deficit and debt, but also to invest in what our economy needs to grow -- world-class education, cutting-edge research, and building the best transportation and communication infrastructure anywhere in the world. That's what it's going to take for us to win the future. And winning the future begins with getting our economy moving right now.
And that's why we're here. Carnegie Mellon is a great example of what it means to move forward. At its founding, no one would have imagined that a trade school for the sons and daughters of steelworkers would one day become the region's largest -- one of the region's largest employers and a global research university. And yet, innovations led by your professors and your students have created more than 300 companies and 9,000 jobs over the past 15 years -- companies like Carnegie Robotics.
But more important than the ideas that you've incubated are what those ideas have become: They've become products made right here in America and, in many cases, sold all over the world. And that's in our blood. That's who we are. We are inventors, and we are makers, and we are doers.
If we want a robust, growing economy, we need a robust, growing manufacturing sector. That's why we told the auto industry two years ago that if they were willing to adapt, we'd stand by them. Today, they're profitable, they're creating jobs, and they're repaying taxpayers ahead of schedule. (Applause.)
That's why we've launched a partnership to retrain workers with new skills. That's why we've invested in clean energy manufacturing and new jobs building wind turbines and solar panels and advanced batteries. We have not run out of stuff to make. We've just got to reinvigorate our manufacturing sector so that it leads the world the way it always has -- from paper and steel and cars to new products that we haven't even dreamed up yet. That's how we're going to strengthen existing industries; that's how we're going to spark new ones. That's how we're going to create jobs, grow the middle class, and secure our economic leadership.
And this is why I asked my Council of Advisors on Science and Technology -- what we call PCAST -- a while back to look at the state of American manufacturing and the promise of advanced manufacturing. The concept of advanced manufacturing is not complicated. It means how do we do things better, faster, cheaper to design and manufacture superior products that allow us to compete all over the world.
And so these very smart folks, many of whom are represented here, wrote up a report which is now up on the White House website. But we didn't want to just issue a report, we wanted to actually get something done. So we've launched an all-hands-on-deck effort between our brightest academic minds, some of our boldest business leaders, and our most dedicated public servants from science and technology agencies, all with one big goal, and that is a renaissance of American manufacturing.
We're calling it AMP, A-M-P -- the Advanced Manufacturing Partnership. It's made up of some of the most advanced engineering universities, like Carnegie Mellon, Georgia Tech, Stanford, Berkeley, Michigan; some of our most innovative manufacturers, from Johnson & Johnson to Honeywell, Stryker to Allegheny Technologies. I've asked Susan Hockfield, the President of MIT, who is here -- there's Susan -- (applause) -- and Andrew Liveris, the CEO of Dow Chemical -- (applause) -- to lead this partnership, and to work with my own advisors on science, technology and manufacturing.
Throughout our history, our greatest breakthroughs have often come from partnerships just like this one. American innovation has always been sparked by individual scientists and entrepreneurs, often at universities like Carnegie Mellon or Georgia Tech or Berkeley or Stanford. But a lot of companies don't invest in early ideas because it won't pay off right away. And that's where government can step in. That's how we ended up with some of the world-changing innovations that fueled our growth and prosperity and created countless jobs -- the mobile phone, the Internet, GPS, more than 150 drugs and vaccines over the last 40 years was all because we were able to, in strategic ways, bring people together and make some critical investments.
I'll take one example. The National Science Foundation helped fund Stanford's Digital Library Project in the 1990s. The idea was to develop a universal digital library that anybody could access. So two enterprising Ph.D. students got excited about the research that was being done at Stanford -- this is funded by NSF. So these two Ph.D. students, they moved from campus to a friend's garage, and they launched this company called Google. And when the private sector runs with the ball, it then leads to jobs, building and selling, that is successful all over the world.
This new partnership that we've created will make sure tomorrow's breakthroughs are American breakthroughs. (Applause.) We're teaming up to foster the kind of collaborative R&D that resulted in those same early discoveries, and to create the kind of innovation infrastructure necessary to get ideas from the drawing board to the manufacturing floor to the market more rapidly -- all of which will make our businesses more competitive and create new, high-quality manufacturing jobs.
Now, to help businesses operate at less cost, the Energy Department will develop new manufacturing processes and materials that use half as much energy. That will free up more money for companies to hire new workers or buy new equipment.
To help businesses discover, develop, and deploy new materials twice as fast, we're launching what we call the Materials Genome Initiative. The invention of silicon circuits and lithium-ion batteries made computers and iPods and iPads possible -- but it took years to get those technologies from the drawing board to the marketplace. We can do it faster.
To help everyone from factory workers to astronauts carry out more complicated tasks, NASA and other agencies will support research into next-generation robotics. And I just met with folks from a local company, RedZone Robotics, who make robots that explore water and sewer pipes. And I have to say, it is fascinating stuff, when you watch -- the robot is about this big. It can go through any sewer system. It's operated remotely by the municipal worker. It's got a camera attached so it can film everything that it's seeing. It then transmits the data. It goes into a citywide database, and can enhance the productivity of these workers by three or fourfold, and help the city make even better decisions. Potentially this can save cities millions in infrastructure costs. Companies also are training new workers to operate the robots, and analysts to pore through the data that's being collected.
To help smaller manufacturers compete, federal agencies are working with private companies to make powerful, often unaffordable modeling and simulation software easier to access. And I just saw an example. A few years ago, Procter & Gamble teamed up with the researchers at Los Alamos National Labs to adapt software developed for war to figure out what's happening with nuclear particles, and they are using these simulators to dramatically boost the performance of diapers. (Laughter.) Yes, diapers. Folks chuckle, but those who've been parents -- (laughter) -- are always on the lookout for indestructible, military-grade diapers. (Laughter and applause.)
But here's what's remarkable: Using this simulation software that was developed at Los Alamos, Procter & Gamble has saved $500 million -- half a billion dollars -- as a consequence of this simulator. Now, through the new partnership that we're setting up, Procter & Gamble is offering its powerful fluid dynamics simulator to smaller manufacturers, and it's doing it for free.
Now, this is not just because Procter & Gamble wants to do good. It's also they've got thousands of suppliers, and they're thinking to themselves, if we can apply this simulation technology to our smaller suppliers they're going to be able to make their products cheaper and better, then that, in turn, is going to save us even more money. And it has a ripple effect throughout the economy.
Starting this summer, federal agencies will partner with industries to boost manufacturing in areas critical to our national security. I just saw an example backstage. The Defense Department scientists -- we call it DARPA -- the folks who brought us stealth technology and, by the way, who brought us the Internet -- wanted to see if it was possible to design defense systems cheaper and faster. So they found a small company in Arizona called Local Motors, and they gave them a test: You have one month to design a new combat support vehicle, and you've got three months to build it.
Their CEO, Jay Rogers, is here today, and as an ex-Marine who lost a couple of buddies in combat, understood the importance of increasing the speed and adaptability and flexibility of our manufacturing process for vehicles that are used in theater.
So Local Motors solicited design ideas on their website, chose the best out of 162 that it received, built and brought this new vehicle here ahead of schedule. We just took a look at it. Not only could this change the way the government uses your tax dollars -- because think about it, instead of having a 10-year lead time to develop a piece of equipment with all kinds of changing specs and a moving target, if we were able to collapse the pace at which that manufacturing takes place, that could save taxpayers billions of dollars. But it also could get products out to theater faster, which could save lives more quickly, and could then be used to transfer into the private sector more rapidly, which means we could get better products and services that we can sell and export around the world. So it's good for American companies. It's good for American jobs. It's good for taxpayers. And it may save some lives in places like Afghanistan for our soldiers.
So that's what this is all about. As futuristic and, let's face it, as cool as some of this stuff is, as much as we are planning for America's future, this partnership is about new, cutting-edge ideas to create new jobs, spark new breakthroughs, reinvigorate American manufacturing today. Right now. Not somewhere off in the future -- right now.
It's about making sure our workers and businesses have the skills and the tools they need to compete better, faster, and smarter than anybody else. That's what we're about. We are America, and we don't just keep up with changing times, we set the pace for changing times. (Applause.) We adapt; we innovate; we lead the way forward. (Applause.)
It's worth remembering, there was a time when steel was about as advanced as manufacturing got. But when the namesake of this university, Andrew Carnegie -- an immigrant, by the way -- discovered new ways to mass-produce steel cheaply, everything changed. Just 20 years after founding his company, not only was it the largest, most profitable in the world, America had become the number one steelmaker in the world.
Now, imagine if America was first to develop and mass-produce a new treatment that kills cancer cells but leaves healthy ones untouched; or solar cells you can brush onto a house for the same cost as paint; or flexible display soldiers -- flexible displays that soldiers can wear on their arms; or a car that drives itself. Imagine how many workers and businesses and consumers would prosper from those breakthroughs.
Those things aren't science fiction -- they're real. They're being developed and deployed in labs and factories and on test tracks right now. They sprang from the imagination of students and scientists and entrepreneurs like all of you. And the purpose of this partnership is to prove that the United States of America has your back, is going to be supporting you -- because that's the kind of adventurous, pioneering spirit that we need right now. (Applause.)
That's the spirit that's given us the tools and toughness to overcome every obstacle and adapt to every circumstance. And if we remember that spirit, if we combine our creativity, our innovation, and our optimism, if we come together in common cause, as we've done so many times before, then we will thrive again. We will get to where we need to be. And we will make this century the American century just like the last one was.
A transcript of remarks by President Obama during his June 24, 2011, appearance at Carnegie Mellon University's National Robotics Engineering Center, in Lawrenceville.
THE PRESIDENT: Hello, hello, hello! (Applause.) Thank you very much. Everybody, please have a seat. Thank you. Hello, Pittsburgh! (Applause.) It is good to be back. Thank you, Senator Casey, and Mayor Ravenstahl, County Executive Dan Onorato, State Auditor Jack Wagner, and all of you for having me back here at Carnegie Mellon. It is good to be here.
And it seems like every time I'm here I learn something. So, for those of you who are thinking about Carnegie Mellon, it's a terrific place, and you guys are doing just great work.
I just met with folks from some cutting-edge companies and saw some of their inventions here in your National Robotics Engineering Center. But that's not the only reason I'm here. You might not know this, but one of my responsibilities as Commander-in-Chief is to keep an eye on robots. (Laughter.) And I'm pleased to report that the robots you manufacture here seem peaceful -- (laughter) -- at least for now.
This is a city that knows something about manufacturing. For generations of Americans, it was the ticket to a middle-class life. Here and across America's industrial heartland, millions clocked in each day at foundries and on assembly lines to make things. And the stuff we made -- steel, cars, planes -- was the stuff that made America what it is. The jobs were good. They paid enough to own a home, to raise kids, send them to college, to retire. They were jobs that told us something more important than just how much money we made, what was in our paycheck. These jobs also told us that we were meeting our responsibilities to our family and to our neighborhoods, and building our communities, and building our country.
But for better and worse, our generation has been pounded by wave after wave of profound economic change. Revolutions in technology have transformed the way we live and the way we work. Businesses and industries can relocate anywhere in the world, anywhere that there are skilled workers, anywhere that there is an Internet connection. And companies have learned to become more efficient with fewer employees. In Pittsburgh, you know this as well as anybody -- steel mills that once needed a thousand workers now do the same work with a hundred.
And while these changes have resulted in great wealth for some Americans and have drastically increased productivity, they've also caused major disruptions for many others. Today, a high school diploma no longer guarantees you a job. Over the past 13 years, about a third of our manufacturing jobs have vanished. And meanwhile, the typical worker's wages have barely kept up with the rising costs of everything else. And all this was even before a financial crisis and recession that pounded the middle class even more.
Now, we've made some tough decisions that have turned our economy in a positive direction over the past two years. We've created more than 2 million new jobs in the private sector over the past 15 months alone, including almost 250,000 in manufacturing. But we still have to confront those underlying problems. They weren't caused overnight, and we won't solve them overnight. But we will solve them. And we're starting to solve them right here in Pittsburgh, and right here at Carnegie Mellon. (Applause.)
And by the way, that's why I ran for President. Not just to get us back to where we were -- I ran for President to get us to where we need to be. I have a larger vision for America -- one where working families feel secure, feel like they are moving forward and that they know that their dreams are within reach; an America where our businesses lead the world in new technologies like clean energy; where we work together, Democrats and Republicans, to live within our means, to cut our deficit and debt, but also to invest in what our economy needs to grow -- world-class education, cutting-edge research, and building the best transportation and communication infrastructure anywhere in the world. That's what it's going to take for us to win the future. And winning the future begins with getting our economy moving right now.
And that's why we're here. Carnegie Mellon is a great example of what it means to move forward. At its founding, no one would have imagined that a trade school for the sons and daughters of steelworkers would one day become the region's largest -- one of the region's largest employers and a global research university. And yet, innovations led by your professors and your students have created more than 300 companies and 9,000 jobs over the past 15 years -- companies like Carnegie Robotics.
But more important than the ideas that you've incubated are what those ideas have become: They've become products made right here in America and, in many cases, sold all over the world. And that's in our blood. That's who we are. We are inventors, and we are makers, and we are doers.
If we want a robust, growing economy, we need a robust, growing manufacturing sector. That's why we told the auto industry two years ago that if they were willing to adapt, we'd stand by them. Today, they're profitable, they're creating jobs, and they're repaying taxpayers ahead of schedule. (Applause.)
That's why we've launched a partnership to retrain workers with new skills. That's why we've invested in clean energy manufacturing and new jobs building wind turbines and solar panels and advanced batteries. We have not run out of stuff to make. We've just got to reinvigorate our manufacturing sector so that it leads the world the way it always has -- from paper and steel and cars to new products that we haven't even dreamed up yet. That's how we're going to strengthen existing industries; that's how we're going to spark new ones. That's how we're going to create jobs, grow the middle class, and secure our economic leadership.
And this is why I asked my Council of Advisors on Science and Technology -- what we call PCAST -- a while back to look at the state of American manufacturing and the promise of advanced manufacturing. The concept of advanced manufacturing is not complicated. It means how do we do things better, faster, cheaper to design and manufacture superior products that allow us to compete all over the world.
And so these very smart folks, many of whom are represented here, wrote up a report which is now up on the White House website. But we didn't want to just issue a report, we wanted to actually get something done. So we've launched an all-hands-on-deck effort between our brightest academic minds, some of our boldest business leaders, and our most dedicated public servants from science and technology agencies, all with one big goal, and that is a renaissance of American manufacturing.
We're calling it AMP, A-M-P -- the Advanced Manufacturing Partnership. It's made up of some of the most advanced engineering universities, like Carnegie Mellon, Georgia Tech, Stanford, Berkeley, Michigan; some of our most innovative manufacturers, from Johnson & Johnson to Honeywell, Stryker to Allegheny Technologies. I've asked Susan Hockfield, the President of MIT, who is here -- there's Susan -- (applause) -- and Andrew Liveris, the CEO of Dow Chemical -- (applause) -- to lead this partnership, and to work with my own advisors on science, technology and manufacturing.
Throughout our history, our greatest breakthroughs have often come from partnerships just like this one. American innovation has always been sparked by individual scientists and entrepreneurs, often at universities like Carnegie Mellon or Georgia Tech or Berkeley or Stanford. But a lot of companies don't invest in early ideas because it won't pay off right away. And that's where government can step in. That's how we ended up with some of the world-changing innovations that fueled our growth and prosperity and created countless jobs -- the mobile phone, the Internet, GPS, more than 150 drugs and vaccines over the last 40 years was all because we were able to, in strategic ways, bring people together and make some critical investments.
I'll take one example. The National Science Foundation helped fund Stanford's Digital Library Project in the 1990s. The idea was to develop a universal digital library that anybody could access. So two enterprising Ph.D. students got excited about the research that was being done at Stanford -- this is funded by NSF. So these two Ph.D. students, they moved from campus to a friend's garage, and they launched this company called Google. And when the private sector runs with the ball, it then leads to jobs, building and selling, that is successful all over the world.
This new partnership that we've created will make sure tomorrow's breakthroughs are American breakthroughs. (Applause.) We're teaming up to foster the kind of collaborative R&D that resulted in those same early discoveries, and to create the kind of innovation infrastructure necessary to get ideas from the drawing board to the manufacturing floor to the market more rapidly -- all of which will make our businesses more competitive and create new, high-quality manufacturing jobs.
Now, to help businesses operate at less cost, the Energy Department will develop new manufacturing processes and materials that use half as much energy. That will free up more money for companies to hire new workers or buy new equipment.
To help businesses discover, develop, and deploy new materials twice as fast, we're launching what we call the Materials Genome Initiative. The invention of silicon circuits and lithium-ion batteries made computers and iPods and iPads possible -- but it took years to get those technologies from the drawing board to the marketplace. We can do it faster.
To help everyone from factory workers to astronauts carry out more complicated tasks, NASA and other agencies will support research into next-generation robotics. And I just met with folks from a local company, RedZone Robotics, who make robots that explore water and sewer pipes. And I have to say, it is fascinating stuff, when you watch -- the robot is about this big. It can go through any sewer system. It's operated remotely by the municipal worker. It's got a camera attached so it can film everything that it's seeing. It then transmits the data. It goes into a citywide database, and can enhance the productivity of these workers by three or fourfold, and help the city make even better decisions. Potentially this can save cities millions in infrastructure costs. Companies also are training new workers to operate the robots, and analysts to pore through the data that's being collected.
To help smaller manufacturers compete, federal agencies are working with private companies to make powerful, often unaffordable modeling and simulation software easier to access. And I just saw an example. A few years ago, Procter & Gamble teamed up with the researchers at Los Alamos National Labs to adapt software developed for war to figure out what's happening with nuclear particles, and they are using these simulators to dramatically boost the performance of diapers. (Laughter.) Yes, diapers. Folks chuckle, but those who've been parents -- (laughter) -- are always on the lookout for indestructible, military-grade diapers. (Laughter and applause.)
But here's what's remarkable: Using this simulation software that was developed at Los Alamos, Procter & Gamble has saved $500 million -- half a billion dollars -- as a consequence of this simulator. Now, through the new partnership that we're setting up, Procter & Gamble is offering its powerful fluid dynamics simulator to smaller manufacturers, and it's doing it for free.
Now, this is not just because Procter & Gamble wants to do good. It's also they've got thousands of suppliers, and they're thinking to themselves, if we can apply this simulation technology to our smaller suppliers they're going to be able to make their products cheaper and better, then that, in turn, is going to save us even more money. And it has a ripple effect throughout the economy.
Starting this summer, federal agencies will partner with industries to boost manufacturing in areas critical to our national security. I just saw an example backstage. The Defense Department scientists -- we call it DARPA -- the folks who brought us stealth technology and, by the way, who brought us the Internet -- wanted to see if it was possible to design defense systems cheaper and faster. So they found a small company in Arizona called Local Motors, and they gave them a test: You have one month to design a new combat support vehicle, and you've got three months to build it.
Their CEO, Jay Rogers, is here today, and as an ex-Marine who lost a couple of buddies in combat, understood the importance of increasing the speed and adaptability and flexibility of our manufacturing process for vehicles that are used in theater.
So Local Motors solicited design ideas on their website, chose the best out of 162 that it received, built and brought this new vehicle here ahead of schedule. We just took a look at it. Not only could this change the way the government uses your tax dollars -- because think about it, instead of having a 10-year lead time to develop a piece of equipment with all kinds of changing specs and a moving target, if we were able to collapse the pace at which that manufacturing takes place, that could save taxpayers billions of dollars. But it also could get products out to theater faster, which could save lives more quickly, and could then be used to transfer into the private sector more rapidly, which means we could get better products and services that we can sell and export around the world. So it's good for American companies. It's good for American jobs. It's good for taxpayers. And it may save some lives in places like Afghanistan for our soldiers.
So that's what this is all about. As futuristic and, let's face it, as cool as some of this stuff is, as much as we are planning for America's future, this partnership is about new, cutting-edge ideas to create new jobs, spark new breakthroughs, reinvigorate American manufacturing today. Right now. Not somewhere off in the future -- right now.
It's about making sure our workers and businesses have the skills and the tools they need to compete better, faster, and smarter than anybody else. That's what we're about. We are America, and we don't just keep up with changing times, we set the pace for changing times. (Applause.) We adapt; we innovate; we lead the way forward. (Applause.)
It's worth remembering, there was a time when steel was about as advanced as manufacturing got. But when the namesake of this university, Andrew Carnegie -- an immigrant, by the way -- discovered new ways to mass-produce steel cheaply, everything changed. Just 20 years after founding his company, not only was it the largest, most profitable in the world, America had become the number one steelmaker in the world.
Now, imagine if America was first to develop and mass-produce a new treatment that kills cancer cells but leaves healthy ones untouched; or solar cells you can brush onto a house for the same cost as paint; or flexible display soldiers -- flexible displays that soldiers can wear on their arms; or a car that drives itself. Imagine how many workers and businesses and consumers would prosper from those breakthroughs.
Those things aren't science fiction -- they're real. They're being developed and deployed in labs and factories and on test tracks right now. They sprang from the imagination of students and scientists and entrepreneurs like all of you. And the purpose of this partnership is to prove that the United States of America has your back, is going to be supporting you -- because that's the kind of adventurous, pioneering spirit that we need right now. (Applause.)
That's the spirit that's given us the tools and toughness to overcome every obstacle and adapt to every circumstance. And if we remember that spirit, if we combine our creativity, our innovation, and our optimism, if we come together in common cause, as we've done so many times before, then we will thrive again. We will get to where we need to be. And we will make this century the American century just like the last one was.
Wilmington receives $2 million for Cross City Trail
Posted by Linda H on 7:53:00 PM
The city of Wilmington has received an additional $2 million in stimulus money for the Cross-City Trail, bringing the full amount of federal money slated for the project to $4 million, according to a statement released Monday.When complete, the Cross-City Trail will be a 20-mile, multi-use asphalt path running through Wilmington beside major roads like 17th Street, Independence Boulevard, Randall Parkway and Eastwood Road. In addition to federal stimulus money, the trail has been funded in part by the 2006 parks bond, as well as by a $75,000 grant from the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources.
Apple Needs to Make it in America
