http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/03/us/politics/03edwards-transcript.htmlAnd now we move on. We move on from Iowa to New Hampshire and to the other states to determine who’s best suited to bring about the change that this country so desperately needed. Because what we’ve seen here in Iowa is we’ve seen two candidates who thought their money would make them inevitable. But what the Iowa caucus-goers have shown, is if you’re willing to have a little BACKBONE, to have a little courage, to speak for the middle class, to speak for those who have no voice.
(snip)
But I want all of us to remember tonight while we’re having all these political celebrations, that just a few weeks ago in America, Nataline Sarkisian (ph), a 17- year-old girl who had a -- needed a liver transplant, and whose insurance company decided they wouldn’t pay for her liver transplant operation.
Finally, her nurses spoke up on her behalf. Her doctors spoke up on her behalf. Ultimately, the American people spoke up on her behalf by marching and picketing in front of her health insurance carrier. And, finally, the insurance carrier caved in and agreed to pay for her operation. And when they notified the family just a few hours later, she died. She lost her life. Why? Why?
James Lowe was born 51 years ago in the United States of America with a severe cleft palate, which kept him from being able to speak. And he lived for 50 years in the greatest, most prosperous nation on the planet, not able to speak because he didn’t have health-care coverage and couldn’t pay for a simple operation. Why?
Doug Bishop, who’s actually behind me tonight, Doug and his family worked at the Maytag plant in Newton -- Newton, Iowa. For generations, for generations, they worked. They sacrificed. They did everything you’re supposed to do in America. And then recently, this plant closed. And the jobs went overseas.
Why? The reason is because corporate greed has got a stranglehold on America. And unless and until we have a president in the proud tradition of Teddy Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, who has a little BACKBONE, who has some strength, who has some fight, who’s willing to stand up to these people, nothing will change.
We will never have the America that all of us dream of. The promise of America, which has been available to so many of us, will not be available to our children and our grandchildren. And I take this very personally.
(snip)
And you have created and started a wave of change, a tidal wave of change that will travel from here to New Hampshire to Nevada to South Carolina, all across this country.
Because we know the torch has been passed to us. We stand proudly on the shoulders of our parents and grandparents and all those generations who came before us. And we take our responsibility seriously.
And this tidal wave of change that began tonight in Iowa and that will sweep across America, when that wave is finished, when it is done, every one of us are going to be able to look our children in the eye and say, we did what our parents did for us and what our grandparents did for us.
Which is: We left America better than we found it, and we gave our children a better life than we had.