For these speeches, it may be especially important for you to bring in another instrument as well, one that's about FEELING what's at stake in this struggle. Talk to the American people about the health care thing as if you were feeling intensely the pain and outrage of the status quo. Show what your heart feels about the thousands who die every year because they're uninsured, about the million families who fall into bankruptcy, about the struggles of tens of millions of families under the weight of skyrocketing costs.
If you can project real feeling about the unacceptability of the status quo, then your audience will feel it, too, and the position of the obstructionists arrayed against you will get washed out to sea like sandcastles on the beach with an incoming tide.
When you've inspired the people in the arena, and millions of others watching on TV, when you've brought them to their feet, when the arena is rocking with shouts of "Yes We Can!" and "Reform Now!," issue a call to action. Just as during the campaign, call on your supporters to put the "move" into movement: knock on doors, call their Congresspeople, lean on their Blue Dogs, march on Washington.
Call forth that great Force that bore you to this office, and not only can you turn the tide on health care reform but also begin again to fulfill, more generally, the great potential of your leadership.
America elected you to be a torch-bearer in this era where such dark forces dragged us down. Hold up the light for us again, and lead us upward with high moral purpose and spiritual passion. Rekindle that hope --not just for new laws, but for a new America-- that you were audacious and eloquent enough to kindle.
If you can project real feeling about the unacceptability of the status quo, then your audience will feel it, too, and the position of the obstructionists arrayed against you will get washed out to sea like sandcastles on the beach with an incoming tide.
When you've inspired the people in the arena, and millions of others watching on TV, when you've brought them to their feet, when the arena is rocking with shouts of "Yes We Can!" and "Reform Now!," issue a call to action. Just as during the campaign, call on your supporters to put the "move" into movement: knock on doors, call their Congresspeople, lean on their Blue Dogs, march on Washington.
Call forth that great Force that bore you to this office, and not only can you turn the tide on health care reform but also begin again to fulfill, more generally, the great potential of your leadership.
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