EMBRACING CHANGE … OBAMA AND CLINTON
PRESIDENT CALLS FOR U.S. TO REJECT FEAR AND CYNICISM
Hug of history: President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton share an emotional embrace after he urged US voters to reject fear and cynicism and make her America’s first woman president
BARACK OBAMA today said he was “ready to pass the baton” to Hillary Clinton in her White House bid to follow him into the history books.
The President paid tribute to his one-time nomination rival, promising US voters they were in “good hands” with the former First Lady.
Mrs Clinton even threatened to upstage him with a surprise appearance at the end of his speech at a pumped up Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.
Mr Obama was America’s first black president and Mrs Clinton will become its first woman leader if she defeats Republican Donald Trump in November’s election.
She and Mr Obama shared a long, emotional embrace as his 2008 campaign song, Stevie Wonder’s Signed, Sealed, Delivered, blared over the loudspeakers to an exuberant crowd. The deep divisions over the party leadership’s treatment of beaten candidate Bernie Sanders were laid aside, at least for one night.
“America, you have vindicated that hope these past eight years. And now I’m ready to pass the baton and do my part as a private citizen,” said Mr Obama, after receiving a rock star welcome.
“This year, in this election, I’m asking you to join me — to reject cynicism, reject fear, to summon what’s best in us; to elect Hillary Clinton as the next President of the United States, and show the world we still believe in the promise of this great nation,” he implored. In what is likely to be one of the last prime time speeches of his eight-year presidency, Mr Obama took aim at Mr Trump. “He’s betting that if he scares enough people, he might score just enough votes to win this election,” he said of the outspoken property billionaire.
“That is another bet that Donald Trump will lose. Because he’s selling the American people short. We are not a fragile or frightful people. Our power doesn’t come from some selfdeclared saviour promising that he alone can restore order. We don’t look to be ruled,” he added.
“This is not your typical election. It’s not just a choice between parties or policies; the usual debates between Left and Right. This is a more fundamental choice — about who we are as a people, and whether we stay true to this great American experiment in self-government.
“Does anyone really believe that a guy who’s spent his 70 years on this earth showing no regard for working people is suddenly going to be your champion? Your voice? If so, you should vote for him,” Mr Obama continued. “Anyone who threatens our values, whether fascists or communists or jihadists or home-grown demagogues, will always fail in the end. That’s America. Those bonds of affection; that common creed. We don’t fear the future; we shape it, embrace it, as one people, stronger together than we are on our own. That’s what Hillary Clinton understands.” He went on to attack Mr Trump’s proposals to build a wall to keep out Mexican migrants.
“Hillary knows we can insist on a lawful and orderly immigration system while still seeing striving students and their toiling parents as loving families, not criminals or rapists; families that came here for the same reasons our forebears came — to work, and study, and make a better life, in a place where we can talk and worship and love as we please.
“She knows their dream is quintessentially American, and the American Dream is something no wall will ever contain.” He said Mrs Clinton “won’t relent” in the battle against Islamic State.
Mr Trump blasted Mr Obama’s speech, along with those of vice presidential nominee Tim Kaine and vice president Joe Biden claiming they ignored the problems facing voters.