For me and Michelle, this visit has therefore held special meaning. Throughout my life, including my work as a young man on behalf of the urban poor, I have always found inspiration in the life of Gandhiji and in his simple and profound lesson to be the change we seek in the world. And just as he summoned Indians to seek their destiny, he influenced champions of equality in my own country, including a young Martin Luther King

Hope is the bedrock of this nation. The belief that our destiny will not be written for us, but by us, by all those men and women who are not content to settle for the world as it is, who have the courage to remake the world as it should be.

On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.

For the sake of our economy, our security, and the future of our planet, I will set a clear goal as President: in ten years, we will finally end our dependence on oil from the Middle East.

The Russians don't make determinations about what our defense posture is.

Some people in D.C. talk about me like a dog.

I don't think there's a lot of dispute for this. You can argue that we didn't get everything done that we wanted to get done, but I can make a really strong argument, and I think prove, that by almost every measure the country's better off now than when I started.