For those of us who are fortunate to share an Irish ancestry, we take great pride in the contributions that Irish-Americans.

I just want to assure you that both President Bush and I have very firm alibis.

It’s time we framed every question - every issue -- not in terms of what’s in it for ‘me,’ but what’s in it for all of us?

George Bush's vision does not live up to the America I enlisted in the Navy to defend, the America I have fought for in the Senate, and the America that I hope to lead as president.

And now that the Greatest Generation is getting older, I think it is the responsibility of all Americans to make sure we do our part for America's seniors. You have earned the best of America -- and we need to make sure you get the protection and health care you deserve.

We need a leader who has a sense of balance, an understanding of the ebb and flow of history and a sense of our country's unique place in it. This is a foreign policy debate, and you cannot conduct foreign policy without a sense of what we are fighting for. And any President who can reduce the conduct of this country's affairs to a morning's attack by a bunch of demented fascists does not, in my view, understand what this great nation is all about.

There the Bush Administration has offered only a merry-go-round policy. They got up on their high horse, whooped and hollered, rode around in circles and ended right back where they'd started.