Inauguration

APGOV 2009 F Block
Team Written Inaugural Address for Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States

43 presidents have stood upon these steps before me. Some have inspired and others have led us astray. Franklin Roosevelt stood in this very place 76 years ago in the midst of the worst economic climate this nation had ever known and told this nation that the only thing to fear was fear itself. The country was in a challenging time. Just four years before him, Herbert Hoover stood on these same steps and swore to preserve, protect, and defend the constitution of the United States, and then turned away from the American people.
Just as Franklin Roosevelt followed flawed leadership with progressive policies and hope, I promise to help turn this nation around and give America the help it needs. Together, as Democrats and Republicans, blacks and whites, blue collar and white collar, we will turn this nation around. We will get our tires rolling again, out of this mud that has held us. Future generations will see the tracks that we will leave behind, and remember this day as the day that America was born again. Do not misunderstand me, we are nowhere near where we were in the 1930’s, but we must make sure that we never go that way again.
As President, getting our economy moving again will be my top priority. We must start with getting direct, immediate relief to the people who need it, not the wealthy oil companies or CEOs. This administration will work immediately to pass a tax cut for 95 percent of working families. We will also raise the minimum wage. Today, workers are paid less when their wages are adjusted for inflation than their counterparts were in the 1970’s. We must move forward into the twenty first century, instead of falling back to the low standards of the twentieth.
We must also act to make sure those without jobs are not left behind as we forge ahead. We will extend unemployment insurance for an additional thirteen weeks in order to get workers back on their feet. We must also work to create jobs. Jobs that use and develop today’s technologies. This administration will help to create 5 million new green jobs over the next ten years by investing 150 billion dollars in the development of new biofuels, fuel infrastructure, the commercial sale of renewable energy, the construction of new, clean-burning coal plants, and the transition into a new, digital electricity grid. We will also create these new jobs by mandating that 25 percent of American electricity come from renewable sources by 2025.
We must not stop at green jobs, however. We must create and save all kinds of jobs. For this reason, we are going to invest 25 billion dollars into a jobs and growth fund, designed to carry out needed infrastructure improvements. This will save one million jobs, while getting our economy back on the right path.
We must also ensure that the American dream of property ownership doesn’t disappear. From our early days, ownership of land was one of the hallmarks of a prosperous citizen. Today, our prosperity is crumbling with the housing market. We will act immediately to provide assistance to homeowners, not irresponsible lenders. We will work with the Treasury department and the department of Housing and Urban Development to restructure the mortgage giants, and we will work with Congress to remove impediments to the restructuring. We will enact a 90-day foreclosure moratorium for homeowners making a good-faith effort to pay for their homes. This will give us time to create far-reaching solutions without putting families on the street.
We must make the American dream real again by encouraging the development of small businesses as well. The first step to this will be to unfreeze the credit market and get money moving again. We will create an emergency lending facility for small businesses run by the SBA disaster loan program, and instruct the treasury to purchase mortgage-backed securities. We will not stop here, however. We will eliminate the capital gains taxes on small and start up industries, allowing them to hire and keep the employees they need. It is a reciprocal relationship. Businesses need employees and employees need work. For this reason, this administration will stop encouraging oversees movement of jobs. Instead we will keep them here in America, by giving further incentives through taxes.
The economy is dynamic and changing and therefore, it requires dynamic and changing policies. This administration will not sit and wait for waves of trouble to come. This administration will be proactive in tracking the progress of the economy, and making adjustments as needed. The key to solving this crisis is going to be government investments in businesses, industries, and, the American worker. Though the times are tough and we lie in precarious straights, we will emerge from this as once again the greatest nation in the world.
In order to ensure our global preeminence economically, I intend to fight for a trade policy that opens up foreign markets in order to support good American jobs. Through trade agreements, my administration will set good labor and environmental standards and stand firmly against agreements like the Central American Free Trade Agreement that fail to meet those important benchmarks. My administration will also pressure the World Trade Organization to enforce trade agreements and stop countries from continuing to give government subsidies to foreign exporters and non-tariff barriers on US exports unfairly.
Now concerning unfairness towards Americans, I believe that NAFTA and its potential were oversold to the American people. I intend to work with our friends to our north and south in Canada and Mexico in order to improve NAFTA so it can work for American workers and help them adapt to changing global conditions. I intend to do this by updating the existing system of Trade Adjustment Assistance by extending it to service industries, creating flexible education accounts to help workers retrain, and providing retraining assistance for workers in sectors of the economy that are vulnerable to dislocation before they lose their jobs.
Working with other countries to improve economic and trade conditions is the first step of America reforming its image and returning to its place as a respected leader in the world. I intend to restore American influence and our own values, by seeking our international partnerships in military, intelligence, law enforcement, financial transactions, border controls, and transportation security. All of this can only be accomplished by diplomacy, and instead of ignoring our enemies and only consulting our friends, I intend to be more open with consulates and create new consulates in the far corners of the world. I plan to expand our foreign service, and develop the capacity of our civilian aid workers to work alongside our fighting men and women in the military.
We will make many friends in the future, but as the situation stands, America still faces many grave threats, mainly from terrorists, specifically Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda. The times are changing, and I want to bring our military into the future. The military must advance with the times, and in order to ensure that mission is accomplished, I plan to make sure the military becomes more agile and technologically advanced when it comes to combating terrorists. Bolstering our military’s ability to speak different languages, navigate different cultures, and coordinatie complex missions with our civilian agencies will help achieve this goal. Furthermore, I want to return to a foreign policy consistent with traditional values by working with moderates within the Islamic world to counter Al-Qaeda.
These objectives will all take time to achieve, and at the moment, al-Qaeda is still at large. As president, I will make America’s security a top priority and I intend to end the terrorist threat to our great nation. I have opposed the war in Iraq from the beginning, and in 2007, I introduced legislation to responsibly end the war, with phased withdrawals of troops engaged in operations. Now that I am taking office, I will give Defense Secretary Gates and General Petraeus a new mission in Iraq: ending the conflict. We will coordinate efforts to responsibly remove the troops in a phased process, directed by our own commanders and with consultation with Iraqi government. Military experts say we can safely redeploy combat brigades from Iraq at a rate of 1 to 2 brigades a month that could have all our forces out in 16 months – about the summer of 2010.
I promised to end the war responsibly, and I fully intend to do that. We will maintain a residual force in Iraq and the surrounding regions in order to conduct targeted counter-terrorism missions against Al-Qaeda and to protect American diplomatic personnel and civilians. We will not build permanent bases in Iraq, but will continue our efforts to train and support the Iraqi security forces as long as Iraqi leaders move towards political reconciliation.
I have discussed bringing back America’s traditional values. One of the most significant ways I plan to do that is by closing down Guantanamo Bay. America must reclaim its position as a beacon of hope and light for the rest of the world by closing down Guantanamo, and the inexcusable actions that took place there. While many detainees at Guantanamo are suspected terrorists, it is important that we recognize that not every one of them is. I plan to put nearly eighty inmates on trial, and close down the camp for good, ending one of the remaining marks of America’s tarnished name. We will bring America out of the long night, and spark a bright light back into the world.

As we create history today, we also produce and protect the future. And the future is our children. The healthcare crisis in America includes the over 45 million Americans and over 8 million children without health insurance. And the uninsured children, who can’t afford to go to doctors or pay for their medication, are forced to stay at home and miss school. This snowball effect is a fundamental issue in America and results in critical repercussions on all levels.
We have a true crisis in America and it does not represent who we are as a nation. I believe that every American has the right to affordable, accessible healthcare – a right that should never be controlled by Washington politics or insurance and drug companies – and that is what I intend to provide to the American people.
If you like your health insurance, you keep that insurance. If you like your doctor, you keep that doctor. The only change for you is that your health care costs will go down by as much as $2500 per year.
But if you don’t have health insurance, or you don’t like yours, you will be able to choose from quality plans, just like every federal employee in America does. All of these plans cover essential medical services and no one – no one - will be turned away because of pre-existing conditions. Your children will be covered under this plan as well. This health insurance will move with you if you change jobs. And if you have trouble paying for this plan, you will receive a tax credit to help pay for it.
Under my healthcare plan, I will also provide assistance to small businesses. There will be no more small businesses sinking under the high health care costs for their employees. I will provide employers with a health tax credit of up to 50 percent of the costs. The employers must do their part as well to assist in providing effective healthy lifestyle interventions to help in the prevention of critical diseases in America. The high levels of preventative diseases, such as obesity and diabetes, must be halted so as there are less complications with health insurance companies.
Together as Americans we must fix this; I will do my part in Washington to redirect American healthcare, but you also have the responsibility do your part. We must also solve this healthcare crisis with prevention, which begins with education. We all have the responsibility to protect and promote health and wellness throughout families, schools, work, and government. We must all do our part to work together and encourage each other to embrace healthy lifestyles. There are five specific environments where I plan to do this: employers, school systems, workforce, families, and federal, state, and local governments.
Worksite interventions created by employers will be very effective in influencing employees to live healthier lives. Similarly, I will work with schools to create healthier environments for children; this will include increasing financial support for physical education and educational programs.
As we strive to ensure that affordable, accessible healthcare be provided for all Americans by building off of the existing healthcare, it is crucial that we strengthen and reform the healthcare system towards a focus on preventative care and prescription drug reform. It is time that Americans feel empowered to take responsibility for their health and I will ensure that federally supported health plans will cover preventative services. In times that question the unity and perseverance of America, we will come together to build a strong healthy nation in which we, as Americans, take responsibility for living healthy lives.
But when we fall ill, we must also be able to access the resources to make us better. Therefore, as part of the reformation of the healthcare system, prescription drug costs will be lowered by allowing the importation of safe medicines from other developed countries, freeing Americans from the hold of large companies that charge them high prices for generic drugs in an attempt to maintain their monopolies of the markets. These companies will be prohibited from manipulating the market at the expense of the American people. Additionally, my administration will work with Congress to increase the use of generic drugs in programs such Medicare and Medicaid. No longer will pharmaceutical companies block safe, low-cost generic drugs from entering the market. Healthcare plans that participate in the new healthcare plan, such as Medicare and the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program will also be required to utilize proven disease management programs. These reforms will benefit the American people greatly and will encourage an open market and free trade. By strengthening our country domestically and moving into a “21st century public health system and a healthy America”, we plan to open doors that improve our national image and increase our competitiveness in foreign markets, upholding our role as a global leader.

Our nation first emerged on the world stage under the leadership of one of our nation’s greatest presidents and humanitarians, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. FDR was the leader of our country in a similar economic crisis to the one we now face. He led our nation to health through his New Deal. The New Deal of today will promote not only the economic and physical health of our citizenry, but the health of our environment as well. For too long we have ignored our earth and our dependence on its bounty. We now know better, we have grown.
The security of our planet and the security of our economy are much the same; they both have caused us to see our imminent and long term futures. We must reform our use of the environment and smooth our relationship with it. Our hope is to create a better America in every aspect and for everyone. This will raise us back to the position of global leadership from which we can make this a better, cleaner world. Real change happens from the bottom up, and that is how we will solve today’s environmental and energy problems.
Short-term relief will be provided to families as needed until this “Green New Deal” is truly under way and successful. We will end excessive energy speculation and swap oil from the strategic petroleum reserve to cut prices. We will begin the slow process to heal the environment. Under the green plan, demand for current imports from the Middle East and Venezuela will be eliminated. We will end the costly energy imports which have designated America a dependent country, and in doing so, America will return to self-sufficiency and self-reliance. To promote our independence, one of the great American values, we will rely upon our own responsible domestic production of oil and natural gas.
They say that necessity is the mother of invention; and today we have hit a moment of dire necessity. But, my fellow Americans, we have so much invention at our disposal; we have the technology to capture the sun, the wind, and the water, but more importantly we have our minds, and our American spirit. The green revolution will start right here in America. As Americans, we hold a certain responsibility, to set a standard, an example in global affairs. We have an obligation to fulfill that which has been too long postponed. We must commit to long-term goals, which will ease the burden we place upon the environment, and in turn will help it heal us all.
We will invest in an economy-wide-cap-and-trade program to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions 15% by 2020 and 80% by 2050, while our economy continues to grow. By 2020, we will generate 20% of our electrical requirements from renewable and sustainable sources including wind and photovoltaic panels. By 2015, we will develop a new generation of electrical storage batteries and hydrogen fuel cells to enable our domestic fleet of cars to run on electricity rather than fossil fuels. This will help our economy by taking us away from the crippled backbone of foreign oil, which has hurt our economy and is continuing to hurt the earth we live on. We will continue to modernize and safeguard our water resources including conservation of our domestic water supply and sanitation disposal. We will continue to conserve our country’s vast natural resources including our national forests, and our fish and wildlife stocks. We will further reduce all forms of air pollution including CO2, SO2 and particulate emissions from our factories and power plants. We will make the United States a leader in addressing climate change and reducing its impact throughout the world.
We have the resources and we have the minds, now all we need is to bring these two assets together. We must focus our best and the brightest into the kinds of fields that can make breakthroughs in the technology that will bring about solutions by offering them green scholarships. All of our academic institutions will receive funding to help open green departments so they can prepare the next generation of solutions that are vital today. We will use our research to train our men and women to implement these solutions for our collective future, and this will create many of the new jobs that are on their way. Yes, we can get out of our economic mess, and we can do it while leaving behind a world that we can be proud to give for our children and our children’s children. But we will need their help in doing it as well, and that is why we must give them the tools to do so. We will invest completely and with no strings attached in something that has never failed to live up to its name: we will invest in the American People with education.

Not only does a quality education allow children to reach their full potential and skilled workers the ability to build a life for their families with their college degrees, but education will allow America to push forward and become a 21st century global leader. Education begins at the earliest step—without a good preschool education, children may be behind in elementary school. Without a quality high school education and diploma, children will be unable to attend college or earn enough money. Without a college degree, our youth will be unable to compete in the global economy. The state of our education in this nation today is lagging behind other industrialized nations. There are fewer children today in the United States that are competent in math and science then in other countries. These children are our future; we need to improve their education so that we can empower our economy, our nation, and our position as a global leader. We need to give our children a quality education, beginning in pre-school, supporting schools during kindergarten through twelfth grade, and by insuring that everyone has a chance to attend college. Each child will receive a world-class education from the day of their birth until the day that they graduate from college. The American Opportunity Tax Credit will make college affordable for all Americans, while the Zero to Five Plan will ensure that those children just starting out in their education will be supported in their education.
America, our country has faced many challenges over the years, but we have faced them together. Together, then, we need to stand with our teachers and show them how much we honor their dedication and support to the education and enrichment of our children’s lives. Our teachers deserve to feel needed, prepared, and rewarded, so that they will continue to develop the knowledge of our children. The average salary of a teacher is $42,000; it is time to raise the salaries of teachers. We need to put into place mentoring programs that will pair experienced teachers with new teachers, so that those new to the profession can feel confident and prepared in educating the children of America. We need to commit to those who are willing to commit their lives to teaching our youngest citizens by paying for their college education. We need the best teachers placed into the most underserved areas—inner cities or rural regions—where education is much needed.
Students in inner city schools will be provided with equal quality of education as other schools, and programs will be created to help students in these struggling places. There are a plethora of struggles faced by inner city students. The drop out crisis will be addressed by providing funding for states that create intervention strategies in middle schools. Working families will have access to affordable, quality childcare as well, and students will be encouraged to continue their education in college. I support college outreach programs that help convince students from low-income families to consider college, and I want to ”Make College a Reality,” by giving grants to students who wish to attend community college, if their school does not offer AP, or college level courses. Many people do not realize the population of immigrant children who come to this country, and whose education is hindered because of the language barrier. Immigrant students at all economic levels should have access to a transitional bilingual education, and I will make schools accountable for these student’s progress. Inner city and rural schools will benefit by my plan to create a reward system for those teachers who work in undesirable districts.
There is no doubt in my mind that No Child Left Behind needs reform. Poor planning, and lack of funding has caused this law to become more of a detriment to the public school system than a benefit. Struggling schools are unable to obtain quality teachers, and pay them adequately because of insufficient funds, and poor schools are constantly faced with the threat of a “blow up”. This is why my first act in reforming No Child Left Behind will be to increase federal funds for this law, and better the accountability system as well. Instead of punishing struggling schools and taking state funds, those schools facing hardships will be supported and improved.
The standardized testing system that is required by this law has been under much scrutiny as well. With the current track tests teachers are limited to teaching certain material, which takes the quality from education. I also do not believe that the student’s education be consumed by a single test, in which they fill in bubbles. A tracking system is needed to assess the readiness of children for the workplace and college, but I believe a more efficient test can be creating to do such. My goal to not only personalized learning for the student, but also timelier learning for the betterment of the child’s individual education. The best education should be provided to all children, and those children in inner city schools do not have the same quality of education as more wealthy districts.
America, now is the time where we surpass the illusory image of prosperity and face the task before us with perseverance and awareness of our ability as a nation to overcome these troublesome times. It has been done before and it will be done again. The interrelatedness of all of our problems calls for swift and thoughtful action to improve the failing institutions that once characterized our shining beacon on a hill. One cannot imagine fighting crime and ending poverty without extensive education reform from a child’s earliest years until she is on her way to college. John F. Kennedy once said, “A child miseducated is a child lost.” The quality of life in this “preeminent” country is now trailing those of many other countries around the world. We can we fix and we will. Comprehensive health care plans that leave no one without the benefit of help when it comes to one’s health are possible – and we will achieve them. Perhaps the ultimate issue at hand, one that has no boundaries, sees neither black nor white, the result of our chronic insistence to exploit and misuse our precious and finite environment; global warming is perhaps an appropriate example of what results from the prolonged ignorance and misuse of our resources. But we have seen the light and we will do right.
I see this moment as a profound opportunity to regain our foothold of prominence among nations, a chance to start fresh with a new set of policies geared toward revitalizing our American way of life and re-instilling the spirit of the American Dream. Such is the very belief that this nation was founded on, and the belief rooted so deeply in what we Americans hold dear: the opportunity to live joyful and productive lives without having to fear one another or fear our own government.
I have so much pride, faith, and gratitude with the American people for electing me the 44th president of the United States. I believe it is trying times like these in which people show their true colors, and the American people have expressed a desire for change. I shall not let you down. If we look back at our past as a nation, we see that some of our greatest moments have been in the midst of our greatest tribulations. Abraham Lincoln became president with daunting task of liberating an entire group of people while attempting to unify the nation. Without his bravery and determination/dedication to this country, the course of history could have been severely different. In the 1930’s, the Great Depression struck and, though it is hard to imagine, our economy was more perilous than it is now. With the election of Franklin Roosevelt, and his New Deal reform, America was able to fight its way back as an international superpower. America’s past contains the greatest leaders in history as is fitting since America has been faced with many of the most critical and demanding of political matters in the history of government. As I look ahead towards all of the changes that must be taken care of domestically and internationally, I find great comfort in leading a nation that has history of overcoming seemingly impossible tasks. Here today, I embrace the challenge to bring America back.