Transcript of Palin’s Speech

Transcript of Palin’s Speech


and comfortable committee chairmen in Congress have fought the prospect of a McCain presidency – from the primary election of 2000 to this very day.


Our nominee doesn’t run with the Washington herd. He’s a man who’s there to serve his country, and not just his party.


A leader who’s not looking for a fight, but is not afraid of one either. Harry Reid, the Majority Leader of the current do-nothing Senate, not long ago summed up his feelings about our nominee.


He said, quote, “I can’t stand John McCain.” Ladies and gentlemen, perhaps no accolade we hear this week is better proof that we’ve chosen the right man. Clearly what the Majority Leader was driving at is that he can’t stand up to John McCain. That is only one more reason to take the maverick of the Senate and put him in the White House. My fellow citizens, the American presidency is not supposed to be a journey of “personal discovery.” This world of threats and dangers is not just a community, and it doesn’t just need an organizer.


And though both Senator Obama and Senator Biden have been going on lately about how they are always, quote, “fighting for you,” let us face the matter squarely.


There is only one man in this election who has ever really fought for you … in places where winning means survival and defeat means death … and that man is John McCain. In our day, politicians have readily shared much lesser tales of adversity than the nightmare world in which this man, and others equally brave, served and suffered for their country.


It’s a long way from the fear and pain and squalor of a six-by-four cell in Hanoi to the Oval Office.


But if Senator McCain is elected president, that is the journey he will have made.


It’s the journey of an upright and honorable man – the kind of fellow whose name you will find on war memorials in small towns across this country, only he was among those who came home.


To the most powerful office on earth, he would bring the compassion that comes from having once been powerless … the wisdom that comes even to the captives, by the grace of God … the special confidence of those who have seen evil, and seen how evil is overcome. A fellow prisoner of war, a man named Tom Moe of Lancaster, Ohio, recalls looking through a pin-hole in his cell door as Lieutenant Commander John McCain was led down the hallway, by the guards, day after day.


As the story is told, “When McCain shuffled back from torturous interrogations, he would turn toward Moe’s door and flash a grin and thumbs up” – as if to say, “We’re going to pull through this.” My fellow Americans, that is the kind of man America needs to see us through these next four years.


For a season, a gifted speaker can inspire with his


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