Hey Barack! Want my support? Give THIS speech.

[jgraz]

For too long we seem to have surrendered personal excellence and community value in the mere accumulation of material things.

Our gross national product now is over 800 billion dollars a year, but that gross national product, if we judge the United States of America by that, that gross national product counts air pollution, and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwoods and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic squall. It counts Napalm, and it counts nuclear warheads, and armored cars for the police to fight the riots in our city. It counts Whitman's rifles and Speck's Knifes and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children.

Yet, the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play; it does not include the beauty of our poetry of the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate for the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country it measures everything in short except that which makes life worth while.

And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.

Say THAT, or something even close to it. Then you can lay claim to the Kennedy legacy.

[Bread and Circus]

1. I know this won't measure up in your eyes but it might be a tiny window of light.

Remarks of Senator Barack Obama: Taking Our Government Back
Manchester, NH | June 22, 2007


Obama's Plan for Ethics Reform

Senator Barack Obama speaks to supporters in Manchester, NH about how he plans to make government more accountable to the American Citizen.; Accountability; Barack Obama; Five Days; Government Reform; Legislation on Internet; New Hampshire; Senator Barack Obama speaks to supporters in Manchester, NH about how he plans to make government more accountable to the American Citizen. http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid988313356http://www.brightcove.com/channel.jsp?channel=353512430
Plan Overview
Over one hundred years ago, around the turn of the last century, the Industrial Revolution was beginning to take hold of America, creating unimaginable wealth in sprawling metropolises all across the country.

As factories multiplied and profits grew, the winnings of the new economy became more and more concentrated in the hands of a few robber barons, railroad tycoons and oil magnates.

It was known as the Gilded Age, and it was made possible by a government that played along. From the politicians in Washington to the big city machines, a vast system of payoffs and patronage, scandal and corruption kept power in the hands of the few while the workers who streamed into the new factories found it harder and harder to earn a decent wage or work in a safe environment or get a day off once in awhile.

Eventually, leaders committed to reform began to speak out all across America, demanding a new kind of politics that would give government back to the people.

One was the young governor of the state of New York.

In just his first year, he had already begun to antagonize the state's political machine by attacking its system of favors and corporate giveaways. He also signed a workers' compensation bill, and fired a high-level official for taking money from the very industry he was supposed to be regulating.

None of this reform sat too well with New York's powerful party boss, who finally plotted to get rid of the governor by making sure he was nominated for the Vice Presidency that year. What no one could have expected is that soon after the election, when President William McKinley was assassinated, the greatest fears of all the entrenched interests came true when that former governor became President of the United States.

His name, of course, was Teddy Roosevelt. And during his presidency, he went on to bust trusts, break up monopolies, and do his best to give the American people a shot at the dream once more.

Over a century later, America needs this kind of leadership more than ever. We need a President who sees government not as a tool to enrich well-connected friends and high-priced lobbyists, but as the defender of fairness and opportunity for every American. That's what this country has always been about, and that's the kind of President I intend to be.

We cannot settle for a second Gilded Age in America. And yet we find ourselves once more in the midst of a new economy where more wealth is in danger of falling into fewer hands; where the average CEO now earns more in one day than an average worker earns in an entire year; where Americans are struggling like never before to pay their medical bills, or their kids' tuition, or high gas prices, all while the profits of the drug and insurance and oil industries have never been higher.

And once again, we are faced with a politics that makes all of this possible. In the last six years, our leaders have thrown open the doors of Congress and the White House to an army of Washington lobbyists who have turned our government into a game only they can afford to play - a game played on a field that's no longer level, but rigged to always favor their own narrow agendas.

From Jack Abramoff to Tom Delay, from briberies to indictments, the scandals that have plagued Washington over the last few years have been too numerous to recall.

But their most troubling aspect goes far beyond the headlines that focus on the culprits and their crimes. It's an entire culture in Washington - some of it legal, some of it not - that allows this to happen. Because what's most outrageous is not the morally offensive conduct on behalf of these lobbyists and legislators, but the morally offensive laws and decisions that get made as a result.

The drug and insurance industries spent $1 billion in lobbying over the last decade. They got what they paid for when their friends in Congress broke the rules and twisted arms to push through a prescription drug bill that actually made it illegal for our own government to negotiate with the pharmaceutical companies for cheaper drug prices. Once it passed, those companies rewarded fifteen government officials and Congressmen who worked on the bill with cushy lobbying jobs that pay millions.

And yet, right now, there are parents and grandparents in this country who will walk into a drugstore and wonder how their Social Security check isgoing to cover a prescription that's more expensive than it was a month ago; who will be forced to choose between their medicine and their groceries because they can no longer afford both.

This isn't the government they deserve.

The oil companies were allowed to craft energy policy with Dick Cheney in secret while every other voice was silenced - including the NASA scientists who tried to warn us about the dangers of climate change. The industry got everything it wanted, and it even got one of its top lobbyists a job at the White House as an environmental watchdog - a job he used to fix reports that showed a link between carbon emissions and global warming.

Today, our planet is six years closer to a tipping point on climate change. Our country grows more dependent by the day on oil supplied by some of the world's most dangerous and defiant regimes. And in a year where Exxon reported the biggest annual profit of any U.S. corporation in history, our families are heading into a summer where they could pay up to four dollars a gallon for gasoline in some places.

This isn't the government we deserve.

At least eight top officials in our own Education Department have taken or had jobs in the student loan industry, including one who was fired for still owning $100,000 worth of stock in that industry. These are the same private lenders and banks who have been caught actually bribing colleges to steer business their way - the same ones who charge taxpayers $8 billion a year to provide student loans at inflated rates, instead of offering the loans directly and using the savings to help more kids. And we wonder why 200,000 students didn't go to college in one recent year for the simple reason that they couldn't afford it.

Billions of no-bid, no-strings-attached contracts have been handed out in New Orleans and Iraq and at Walter Reed Medical Center on the sole basis of who you know and the favors you've done, and yet we're somehow surprised when the families in the 9th Ward are still living in trailers, or our soldiers don't have the body armor they need, or our veterans are forced to come home to squalor and neglect.

This isn't the government they deserve. This isn't the America we believe in. And this is the kind of politics that will end when I am President.

Americans of every background and belief are hungry for a new kind of politics -- a people's politics that reconnects them with their government; one that offers not just a vote at the ballot box, but a voice in Washington and an assurance that the leaders we send there will hear it.

The people I've met across this country don't just want reform for reform's sake, they want reform that will help pay their doctor's bills, or ensure that their tax dollars are spent wisely, or put us on the path to energy independence. They want real reform and they're tired of the lobbyists standing in the way.

Look, we can't begrudge businesses for trying to make a profit. That's how the free market works. And every American -- rich or poor -- has the right to lobby their government. That's perfectly fine. But it's time we had a President who tells the drug companies and the oil companies and the insurance industry that while they get a seat at the table in Washington, they don't get to buy every chair. Not anymore.

I know that in every campaign, politicians make promises about cleaning up Washington. And most times, you end up disappointed when it doesn't happen. So it's easy to become cynical - to believe that change isn't possible; that the odds are too great; that this year is bound to be no different from the last.

But I also know what I've seen and what I've done. I know that for me, reform isn't just the rhetoric of a campaign; it's been a cause of my career.

When I arrived in Springfield a decade ago as a state Senator, people said it was too hard to take on the issue of money in politics. Illinois actually had a law that allowed politicians to pocket the money in their campaign accounts for personal use; that allowed any lobbyist or special interest to shower lawmakers with unlimited gifts.

It was obvious that as long as this went on, the people's business would never come first. I knew it was going to be tough, and that I wasn't going to make myself the most popular guy in town -- or even in my own party.

But we had the people of Illinois on our side, and that there were folks on both sides of the aisle who were willing to listen, and so we were finally able to pass the first major ethics reform in twenty-five years.

When I arrived in Washington eight years later, the need for change was equally clear. Big money and lobbyists were clearly drowning out the aspirations of the American people. So when my party made me the point person on ethics, I was determined to pass the strongest reform possible. The first time around, Congress came up with a watered-down version. And I was proud to vote against it.

So we came back the second time, and in our bill, we banned gifts and meals and put an end to subsidized travel on corporate jets. We made sure that the American people could see all the pet projects that lawmakers were trying to pass before they were voted on.

And we did something more. Over the objections of powerful voices in both parties, we shined a bright light on how lobbyists help fill the campaign coffers of members of Congress. And we made sure those lobbyists will have to disclose who they're raising campaign money from, and who in Congress they're funneling it to.

As a candidate for President, I've tried to lead by example, turning down all contributions from federal lobbyists and the political action committees that the special interests use to pass out campaign money.

Now, it's true that all of this represents a step forward when it comes to reconnecting people with their government. But it's also true that a step forward isn't good enough. Too often in Washington, special interests still exercise an effective veto on our progress, on issues from health care reform and drug costs to energy independence and global warming.

We saw how this happens during the debate over the energy bill this week. In the face of furious lobbying, Congress brushed aside incentives for the production of more renewable fuels in favor of more tax breaks for the oil and gas companies. And while we made some progress on fuel economy standards, we didn't get the bold, long-lasting solution that America needs to break its dependency on foreign oil.

So there's more cleaning up to do in Washington and Congress needs to start doing it so we can finally take action on the big challenges that demand solutions.

But we need to clean up both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue. I believe that the responsibility for a people's politics begins with the person who sits in the Oval Office. That is why on my very first day as President, I will launch the most sweeping ethics reform in history to make the White House the people's house and send the Washington lobbyists back to K Street.

First, we will close the revolving door that has allowed people to use their Administration job as a stepping stone to further their lobbying careers.

This Administration tried to fill the top job at the Consumer Product Safety commission with a lobbyist from the same manufacturing industry it's supposed to regulate. If Michael Baroody had taken that job, and he faced a complaint over an unsafe product, whose interest would he have served -- the mother worried about the lead in her child's toy, or the former boss who gave him a special $150,000 severance package on his way out the door?

When you're on Dick Cheney's energy task force and you know that a multimillion dollar job as an oil lobbyist could be waiting for you, whose interests are you going to serve - the oil companies that are asking for more tax breaks or the scientists and energy experts who say we need to invest in renewable fuels?

When I am President, I will make it absolutely clear that working in an Obama Administration is not about serving your former employer, your future employer, or your bank account - it's about serving your country, and that's what comes first. When you walk into my administration, you will not be able to work on regulations or contracts directly related to your former employer for two years. And when you leave, you will not be able to lobby the Administration throughout the remainder of my term in office.

A lot of people have told me this is pretty tough, but I refuse to accept the Washington logic that you cannot find thousands of talented, patriotic Americans willing to devote a few years to their country without the promise of a lucrative lobbying job after they're done. I know we can find them, and in my administration, we will.

Second, I will end the abuse of no-bid contracts in my administration. In the last six years, the unprecedented use of these contracts has wasted billions of taxpayer dollars and outsourced critical government services to friends and supporters who are more connected than they are qualified. That's why, in the Senate, I worked with Republican Senator Tom Coburn to pass legislation that restricts the use of no-bid contracts when it comes to rebuilding the Gulf Coast.

But we need to do more. When our government gives Halliburton $7 billion in taxpayer dollars to put out Iraqi oil fires that don't exist; when we hand over Katrina contracts to more of George Bush's FEMA friends, it doesn't just violate the American people's trust, it takes away the tax dollars they've earned and the valuable services they need. It's wrong, and when I am President, it will end.

Third, we will institute an absolute gift ban so that no registered lobbyist can curry favor and build relationships with members of my administration based on how much they can spend. When the American people have a concern about the high cost of health care or college tuition, they can't afford to take a White House staffer out to a fancy dinner or an expensive sporting event, and lobbyists shouldn't get to either.

Fourth, when it comes to hiring people in my administration, the litmus test we'll apply will not be based on party or ideology, but qualification and experience. This has been the most politicized White House in history, and the American people have suffered as a result. Presidents obviously want to surround themselves with those who share their views and their beliefs, but the days of firing eight qualified U.S. attorneys because of their politics is over. The days of using the White House as another arm of the Republican National Committee are over. And the days of Michael Brown, Arabian Horse Judge, are over.

Finally, we will return government to the people by bringing government to the people -- by making it open and transparent so that anyone can see that our business is the people's business.

As Justice Louis Brandeis once said, sunlight is the greatest disinfectant. The more people know about how federal laws, rules and regulations are made, and who's making them, the less likely it is that critical decisions will be hijacked by lobbyists and special interests.

I think the current administration knows that, too, which is why it's been the most defiantly secretive government in modern times.

It's time to change that.

When there is a bill that ends up on my desk as President, you will have five days to look online and find out what's in it before I sign it. When there are meetings between lobbyists and a government agency, we won't be going to the Supreme Court to keep it secret like Dick Cheney and his energy task force, we'll be putting them up on the Internet for every American to watch. And instead of allowing lobbyists to slip big corporate tax breaks into bills during the dead of night, we will make sure every single tax break and earmark is available to every American online. This builds on the "Google for Government" law I passed in Congress, which already allows you to see every contract, every grant, every dime of federal spending online.

It's time to renew a people's politics in this country - to ensure that the hopes and concerns of average Americans speak louder in Washington than the hallway whispers of high-priced lobbyists.

In 2004, over $2.1 billion was spent lobbying the federal government. That amounts to over $3.9 million per Member of Congress. $3.9 million so that oil companies can still run our energy policy and pharmaceutical companies can still inflate our drug prices and special interests can still waste our tax dollars.

The American people don't have that kind of money to spend on Washington.

But they shouldn't have to. In our democracy, the price of access and influence should be nothing more than your voice and your vote. That should be enough for health care reform. That should be enough for a real energy policy. That should be enough to ensure that our government is still the defender of fairness and opportunity for every American.

That's the country we're working towards right now. And that's the country I'll fight for every day as your President.

Early in his presidency, Teddy Roosevelt gave a famous speech before farmers and factory workers that laid out his vision of what government at its best should be. He said, "The welfare of each of us is dependent fundamentally upon the welfare of all of us, and therefore in public life, that man is the best representative...whose endeavor it is not to represent any special class or interest, but to represent all...by working for our common country."

It's time to get to work once more for our common country. It's time we had a politics that reflected that commitment. And it's time we had a President who can get it done. I look forward to being that President, and working with all of you to make this America happen. Thank you.

[jgraz]

2. It's a good start

I'd like to hear something besides Change/Hope/Change/Hope.

[Bread and Circus]

3. To the Detroit Economic Club

Remarks of Senator Barack Obama to the Detroit Economic Club
Detroit, MI | May 07, 2007
Watch the Complete Speech.

Senator Obama addresses the Detroit Economic Club and sets forth some of his plans for America's energy policy. (Part 1 of 2); 2007; Automobile Industry; Economic Club; Energy policy; change; detroit; michigan; Senator Obama addresses the Detroit Economic Club and sets forth some of his plans for America's energy policy. (Part 2 of 2); 2007; Automobile Industry; Barack Obama; Energy policy; Fuel increase; Increase mileage; detroit; michigan; Remarks of Senator Barack Obama to the National Education Association Annual Meeting. http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1155316231http://www.brightcove.com/channel.jsp?channel=353512430



America is a country that hasn't come easily. In our brief history, we have been tested by revolution and slavery, war and depression, and great movements for social, civil, and equal rights.

We have emerged from each challenge stronger, more prosperous, and ever closer to the ideals of liberty and opportunity that lay at the heart of the American experiment.

And yet, the price of our progress has always been borne by the struggle and sacrifice of our people - by leaders who have asked ordinary Americans to do extraordinary things; and by generations of men and women who've had the courage to answer that call.

It was the greatest of all generations that took up this charge in the days after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Almost overnight, they were asked to transform a peacetime economy that was still climbing out from the depths of depression into an Arsenal of Democracy that could wage war across three continents. If you weren't heading overseas, you were heading into the factories - factories that had to be immediately retooled and reorganized to produce the world's greatest fighting machine.

Many doubted whether this could be achieved in time, or even at all. President Franklin Roosevelt's own advisors told him that his goals for wartime production were unrealistic and impossible to meet. But the President simply waved them off, saying, believe me, "the production people can do it if they really try."

And so the nation turned here, to Detroit, with the hope that the Motor City could lead the way in using its assembly lines to mass produce arms instead of automobiles. At first, the industry was skeptical about whether this was technologically possible or even profitable in the long run. But after repeated assurances from Roosevelt and some help from the federal government, the arsenal began to churn.

In an astonishingly short period of time, the auto industry and its workers became one of the nation's most important contributors to the war effort, manufacturing more planes, tanks, bombs and weapons than the world had ever seen. The New York Times declared that the automakers had achieved a "production miracle," and it labeled Detroit "the Miraculous City."

It was a miracle that was distinctly American - the idea that in the face of impossible odds, people who love their country can rise to meet its greatest challenges.

It's the kind of American miracle we need today.

At the dawn of the twenty-first century, the country that faced down the tyranny of fascism and communism is now called to challenge the tyranny of oil. For the very resource that has fueled our way of life over the last hundred years now threatens to destroy it if our generation does not act now and act boldly.

We know what the dangers are here. We know that our oil addiction is jeopardizing our national security - that we fuel our energy needs by sending $800 million a day to countries that include some of the most despotic, volatile regimes in the world. We know that oil money funds everything from the madrassas that plant the seeds of terror in young minds to the Sunni insurgents that attack our troops in Iraq. It corrupts budding democracies, and gives dictators from Venezuela to Iran the power to freely defy and threaten the international community. It even presents a target for Osama bin Laden, who has told al Qaeda to, "focus your operations on oil, especially in Iraq and the Gulf area, since this will cause to die off on their own."

We know that our oil dependency is jeopardizing our planet as well - that the fossil fuels we burn are setting off a chain of dangerous weather patterns that could condemn future generations to global catastrophe. We see the effects of global climate change in our communities and around the world in record drought, famine, and forest fires. Hurricanes and typhoons are growing in intensity, and rapidly melting ice sheets in Antarctica and Greenland could raise global sea levels high enough to swallow up large portions of every coastal city and town.

And this city knows better than any what our oil addiction is doing to our economy. We are held hostage to the spot oil market - forced to watch our fortunes rise and fall with the changing price of every barrel. Gas prices have risen to record levels, and could hit $4 a gallon in some cities this summer. Here in Detroit, three giants of American industry are hemorrhaging jobs and profits as foreign competitors answer the rising global demand for fuel-efficient cars.

America simply cannot continue on this path. The need to drastically change our energy policy is no longer a debatable proposition. It is not a question of whether, but how; not a question of if, but when. For the sake of our security, our economy, our jobs and our planet, the age of oil must end in our time.

This is a challenge that has not been solved for a lack of talking. Every single President since Richard Nixon has spoken in soaring rhetoric about the need to reduce America's energy dependence, and many have offered plans and policies to do so.

And yet, every year, that dependence keeps on growing. Good ideas are crushed under the weight of typical Washington politics. Politicians are afraid to ask the oil and auto industries to do their part, and those industries hire armies of lobbyists to make sure it stays that way. Autoworkers, understandably fearful of losing jobs, and wise to the tendency of having to pay the price of management's mistakes, join in the resistance to change. The rest of us whip ourselves into a frenzy whenever gas prices skyrocket or a crisis like Katrina takes oil off the market, but once the headlines recede, so does our motivation to act.

There's a reason for this.

A clean, secure energy future will take another American miracle. It will require a historic effort on the scale of what we saw in those factories during World War II. It will require tough choices by our government, sacrifice from our businesses, innovation from our brightest minds, and the sustained commitment of the American people.

It will also take leadership willing to turn the page on the can't-do, won't-do, won't-even try politics of the past. Leadership willing to face down the doubters and the cynics and simply say, "Believe me, we can do it if we really try."

I will be that kind of President - a President who believes again in America that can. A President who believes that when it comes to energy, the challenge may be great and the road may be long, but the time to act is now; who knows that we have the technology, we have the resources, and we are at a rare moment of growing consensus among Democrats and Republicans, unions and CEOs, evangelical Christians and military experts who understand that this must be our generation's next great task.

A comprehensive energy plan will require bold action on many fronts. To fully combat global climate change, we'll need a stringent cap on all carbon emissions and the creation of a global market that would make the development of low-carbon technologies profitable and create thousands of new jobs. We'll also need to find a way to use coal - America's most abundant fossil fuel - without adding harmful greenhouse gases to the environment.

I have already endorsed a cap-and-trade system that would achieve real near-term reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and return America to a position of leadership so that we can secure an effective and equitable global solution to this crisis. It would invest substantial revenue generated by auctioning off emissions credits into the development of carbon sequestration, advanced biofuels, and energy efficiency.

We'll also need new ideas on energy efficiency and the ability to harness renewable sources of energy, because there is absolutely no reason we shouldn't be able to get at least 20% of our energy from clean and renewable sources by 2020.

I will be laying out more detailed proposals on each of these areas in the months to come. But here in Detroit, I want to focus on a few proposals that would drastically reduce our oil dependence and our carbon emissions by focusing on two of their major causes - the cars we drive and the fuels we use. By 2020, these proposals would save us 2.5 million barrels of oil per day - the equivalent of ending all oil imports from the Middle East and removing 50 million cars' worth of pollution off the road.

It starts with our cars - because if we truly hope to end the tyranny of oil, the nation must once again turn to Detroit for another great transformation.

I know these are difficult times for automakers, and I know that not all of the industry's problems are of its own making.

But we have to be honest about how we arrived at this point.

For years, while foreign competitors were investing in more fuel-efficient technology for their vehicles, American automakers were spending their time investing in bigger, faster cars. And whenever an attempt was made to raise our fuel efficiency standards, the auto companies would lobby furiously against it, spending millions to prevent the very reform that could've saved their industry. Even as they've shed thousands of jobs and billions in profits over the last few years, they've continued to reward failure with lucrative bonuses for CEOs.

The consequences of these choices are now clear. While our fuel standards haven't moved from 27.5 miles per gallon in two decades, both China and Japan have surpassed us, with Japanese cars now getting an average of 45 miles to the gallon. And as the global demand for fuel-efficient and hybrid cars have skyrocketed, it's foreign competitors who are filling the orders. Just the other week, we learned that for the first time since 1931, Toyota has surpassed General Motors as the world's best-selling automaker.

At the dawn of the Internet Age, it was famously said that there are two kinds of businesses - those that use email and those that will. Today, there are two kinds of car companies - those that mass produce fuel-efficient cars and those that will.

The American auto industry can no longer afford to be one of those that will. What's more, America can't afford it. When the auto industry accounts for one in ten American jobs, we all have a stake in saving those jobs. When our economy, our security, and the safety of our planet depend on our ability to make cleaner, more fuel-efficient cars, every American has a responsibility to make sure that happens.

Automakers still refuse to make the transition to fuel-efficient production because they say it's too expensive at a time when they're losing profits and struggling under the weight of massive health care costs.

This time, they're actually right. The auto industry's refusal to act for so long has left it mired in a predicament for which there is no easy way out.

But expensive is no longer an excuse for inaction. The auto industry is on a path that is unacceptable and unsustainable - for their business, for their workers, and for America. And America must take action to make it right.

That's why my first proposal will require automakers to meet higher fuel standards and produce more fuel-efficient cars while providing them the flexibility and assistance to do it.

This is a proposal that's already brought together Republicans and Democrats, those who've long-advocated increases in our fuel standards, and those who have opposed those increases for years. It enjoys the support of corporate leaders like Fred Smith of Federal Express who understand that our economy is at risk if we fail to act and military leaders like General P.X. Kelley who know all to well the human cost of our nation's addiction to oil.

It's a proposal that answers the concerns that many have previously had with raising fuel standards - that it's too expensive, or unsafe, or not achievable. And it's an approach that asks our government, our businesses, and our people to invest in a secure energy future - that recognizes we can make great cars and protect American jobs if we transform the auto industry so that our autoworkers can compete with world once more.

It begins by gradually raising our fuel economy standards by four percent - approximately one mile per gallon - each year. The National Academy of Sciences has already determined that we can begin to achieve this rate of improvement today, using existing technology and without changing a vehicle's weight or performance. And so the only way that automakers can avoid meeting this goal is if the National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration can prove that the increase is not safe, not cost-effective, or not technologically possible.

This proposal provides additional flexibility to manufacturers as well. Currently, domestic automakers are disadvantaged by the requirement that their fleets have to meet the same overall fuel standard as foreign manufacturers even though U.S. companies sell a much broader array of vehicles. My approach would establish different fuel standards for different types of cars. This reform will level the playing field by requiring all car makers to achieve a similar rate of progress regardless of their vehicle mix. It will also allow manufacturers to get credit if they increase the fuel-efficiency in one particular car beyond what the fuel economy standards require.

We also know that, absent some assistance, the significant costs associated with retooling parts and assembly plants could be prohibitive for companies that are already struggling and shedding workers. Our goal is not to destroy the industry, but to help bring it into the 21st century. So if the auto industry is prepared to step up to its responsibilities, we should be prepared to help.

That's why my proposal would provide generous tax incentives to help automakers upgrade their existing plants in order to accommodate the demands of producing more fuel-efficient vehicles.

This approach would also strike a bargain with the auto industry on one of the biggest costs they face. We've heard for years that the spiraling cost of health care for retired autoworkers constrains manufacturers from investing in more fuel-efficient technology. We all know the statistic - health care costs currently account for $1,500 of every GM Car. So here's the deal. We'll help to partially defray those health care costs, but only if the manufacturers are willing to invest the savings right back into the production of more fuel-efficient cars and trucks.

Finally, we should make it easier for the American people to buy more fuel-efficient cars by providing more tax credits to more consumers for the purchase of hybrid and ultra-efficient vehicles. But we should also realize that the more choices we have as consumers, the more responsibility we have to buy these cars - to realize that a few hundred extra dollars for a hybrid is the price we pay as citizens committed to a cause bigger than ourselves.

For too long, we've been either too afraid to ask our automakers to meet higher fuel standards or unwilling to help them do it. But the truth is, if we hope for another miracle out of Detroit, we have to do both. We must demand that they revamp their production, we must assist that transition, and we must make the choice to buy these cars when we have the option. All of us have a responsibility here, and all of us are required to act.

Now it's not enough to only build cars that use less oil - we also have to start moving away from that dirty, dwindling fossil fuel altogether. That's why my second proposal will create a market for clean-burning, home-grown biofuels like ethanol that can replace the oil we use and begin to slow the damage caused by global climate change.

The potential for biofuels in this country is vast. Farmers who grow them know that. Entrepreneurs and fueling station owners who want to sell them know that. Scientists and environmentalists who study the atmosphere know it too.

It's time we produced, sold, and used biofuels all across America - it's time we made them as commonly available as gasoline is now.

I've already done some of this work in the U.S. Senate by helping to provide tax credits to those who want to sell a mix of ethanol and gasoline known as E85 at their fueling stations. And since it only costs $100 per vehicle to install a flexible-fuel tank that can run on biofuels, I've also proposed that we help pay for this transition.

Government should lead the way here. I showed up at this event in a government vehicle that does not have a flexible-fuel tank. When I'm President, I will make sure that every vehicle purchased by the federal government does.

Of course, to truly overcome the lack of a biofuel infrastructure in this country, we need to create a market for the production of more biofuels.

Like the auto industry, the oil industry has generally been resistant to making the transition from petroleum to biofuels - with some even trying to block the installation of E85 pumps at fueling stations.

To overcome this resistance and create this infrastructure, I've introduced a proposal known as a National Low-Carbon Fuel Standard, based on the one introduced by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in California just a few months ago. Like raising our fuel-efficiency standards, this approach simultaneously reduces our dependence on oil and reduces greenhouse gas emissions.

The idea behind the standard is simple.

Beginning in 2010, we will require petroleum makers to reduce the carbon content of their fuel mix one percent per year by selling more clean, alternative fuels in its place. This proposal will spur greater production and availability of renewable fuels like cellulosic ethanol and biodiesel, and it will even create an incentive for the production of more flexible-fuel and plug-in hybrid vehicles that can use these clean fuels or charge up with renewable electricity.

This approach will also allow the market, not the government, to determine which fuels are used by fuel distributors to meet the standard. It's gradual, so it gives these companies time to meet the requirements. And if you're a fuel producer that's having trouble meeting the standard, it allows you to pay for a credit from a company that is.

The low-carbon fuel standard also provides a greater incentive for private sector investment in the cleanest biofuels possible. Corn-based ethanol has led the way here, and now we need to expand the universe of biofuels to include cellulosic ethanol made from switchgrass or forest waste that can reduce our carbon footprint even further.

In the end, the two major proposals I outlined today - higher fuel-efficiency standards and a National Low-Carbon Fuel Standard - will not end our oil dependence entirely.

But the transformation of the cars we drive and the fuels we use would be the most ambitious energy project in decades, with results that would last for generations to come: 2.5 million fewer barrels of oil per day; 50 million cars' worth of pollution off the road by 2020. The direct consumer savings at the pump in that year would be over $50 billion, not to mention the great economic benefits of a rejuvenated and fiercely competitive domestic auto industry.

Some will say that the goals are too large; that the ask is too great; and that the political reality is too difficult for this to work.

To that I'd say that we've heard it all before, and we still believe we can do it if we really try. Because that's who we are as Americans. Because that's who we've always been.

In the days and months after September 11th, Americans were waiting to be called to something larger than themselves. Just like their parents and grandparents of the Greatest Generation, so many of us were willing to serve and defend our country - not only on the fields of war, but on the homefront too.

This is our generation's chance to answer that call. Meeting the challenge posed by our oil dependence won't require us to build the massive war machine that Franklin Roosevelt called for so many years ago, but it will require the same sense of shared sacrifice and responsibility from all of us - not just the auto industry and its workers here in Detroit, but oil companies in Texas, power plants from New Jersey to California, legislators in Washington, and consumers in every American city and town. It's time for all of us to head back into the factories and universities; to the boardrooms and the halls of Congress so we can roll up our sleeves and find a way to get this done. I am ready and willing to lead us there as your next President, and I hope you are willing to join me in the journey toward that next great American miracle. Thank you.