2008 Ambassador Remarks
Ambassador Crocker Hosts Election Day Celebration - Nov 6, 2008
AMBASSADOR CROCKER: Thank you very much Adam and as-salam aleykum and good morning to all of you. This is truly an historic occasion and I’m delighted that you could join us here for the first event we have had in our new embassy.
We’ve just been through America’s 56th presidential election. Forty-three different men have been elected and today marked the election of the 44th. This represents 44 peaceful transfers of power from one head-of-state to another. Twenty-one times over the last 219 years, since our first election, a new party has taken control of our government through democratic means. Today represents the 22nd time.
But, today is like no other election, because today, for the first time in America’s history, an African-American is the President-elect of the United States.
He is also the son of an immigrant. Yesterday I had the privilege of being part of the ceremony in which 186 service members of the American Armed Forces were naturalized as American citizens. They come from 60 different countries and now as citizens, every potential that America has is open to them, with one exception. They cannot be the President of the United States because under our constitution you have to be born in the United States. But their children can be president, and Barack Obama has just shown the world how that can be done.
This is what Senator John McCain had to say just a few hours ago, “A century ago, President Theodore Roosevelt's invitation of Booker T. Washington to dine at the White House was taken as an outrage in many quarters. America today is a world away from the cruel and frightful bigotry of that time. There is no better evidence of this than the election of an African-American to the presidency of the United States.” That was said by the man who just lost the election.
And here’s what the man said who just won the election, “As Abraham Lincoln said to a nation far more divided than ours, we are not enemies but friends. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. And to those Americans whose support I have yet to gain, I may not have won your vote tonight, but I hear your voices. I need your help. And I will be your president, too.”
So in the great spirit of coming together after a hard fought campaign, the two men who carried the banners of their parties in a hard fought campaign come together in true national purpose.
The President-Elect also said, we are not just a collection of red states and blue states, we are the United States. The President-elect will have to determine his policies, and clearly all the world will be watching.
And this is what he said to the world, “to all those watching tonight from beyond our shores, from parliaments and palaces to those who are huddled around radios in the forgotten corners of our world — our stories are singular, but our destiny is shared, and a new dawn of American leadership is at hand. To those who would tear this world down: We will defeat you. To those who seek peace and security: We support you. And to all those who have wondered if America's beacon still burns as bright: Tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity and unyielding hope. For that is the true genius of America — that America can change, and what we have already achieved gives us hope for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.”
I think nowhere are those words more important than where we are today, here in Iraq. Iraq has come a great distance in a short period of time. Just as history was made last night in the United States, so too are Iraqis writing their own history. It takes time to build a nation. We did not have our first election in America until 13 years after we declared independence. Iraq has come a long way in a much shorter period of time.
Like America, Iraq will achieve great things and it will do these things through its elections. 2009 will be the year of elections in Iraq as it moves to its second elections, first at the provincial level, and at the end of the year, at the national level. So, in America and in Iraq, our elected leaders may change but our loyalty to our nation remains steadfast.
And in America we have just one president at a time. That president today is George Bush, and he will be our president for the next two-and-a-half months. So while this historic election has changed a great many things, we will also have full continuity of policy and purpose as we move through our transition.
So thank you again for joining us on an occasion that has such important meaning for the United States and for the world. God bless America. God bless Iraq.
(Applause)
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