英语演讲Ann Richards - DNC Keynote

听力可以提高你的英语口语能力，这样可以尽快的让你可以表达你想要表达的事情，用心去听，用心去理解。

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, very much.
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Buenas noches, mis amigos.

I'm delighted to be here with you this evening, because after listening to George Bush all 
these years, I figured you needed to know what a real Texas accent sounds like.

Twelve years ago Barbara Jordan, another Texas woman, Barbara made the keynote address 
to this convention, and two women in a hundred and sixty years is about par for the course.

But if you give us a chance, we can perform. After all, Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred 
Astaire did. She just did it backwards and in high heels.

I want to announce to this Nation that in a little more than 100 days, the ReaganMeeseDeaverNofzigerPoindexterNorthWeinbergerWattGorsuchLavelleStockmanHaigBorkNoriegaGeorge 
Bush [era] will be over!

You know, tonight I feel a little like I did when I played basketball 
in the 8th grade. I thought I looked real cute in my uniform. And then I heard a boy yell 
from the bleachers, "Make that basket, Birdlegs." And my greatest fear is that same guy is somewhere out 
there in the audience tonight, and he's going to cut me down 
to size, because where I grew up there really wasn’t much 
tolerance for selfimportance, people who put on airs.

I was born during the Depression in a little community just outside Waco, and I grew 
up listening to Franklin Roosevelt on the radio. Well, it was back then 
that I came to understand the small 
truths and the hardships that bind neighbors together. Those were real people with 
real problems and they had 
real dreams about getting out of the Depression. I can remember 
summer nights when we’d put down what we called the Baptist pallet, and we listened to 
the grownups talk. I can still hear the sound of the dominoes clicking on the marble slab my 
daddy had found for a tabletop. I can still hear the laughter of the men telling jokes you 
weren’t supposed to hear talkin' about how big that old buck deer was, laughin' about 
mama puttin' Clorox in the well when the frog fell in.

They talked about war and Washington and what this country needed. They talked straight 
talk. And it came from people who were living their lives as best they could. 
And that’s what we’re gonna do tonight. We’re gonna tell how the cow ate the cabbage.

I got a letter last week from a young mother in Lorena, Texas, and I wanna read part of it to 
you. She writes,

“Our worries go from pay day to pay day, just like millions of others. And we have two 
fairly decent incomes, but I worry how I’m going to pay the rising car insurance and food. I pray my 
kids don’t have a growth spurt from August to December, so I don’t have to buy new jeans. 
We buy clothes at the budget stores and 
we have them fray and fade and stretch in the first wash. We ponder and try to figure out how 
we're gonna pay for college and braces and tennis shoes. We don’t 
take vacations and we don’t go out to eat. Please don’t think me ungrateful. We have jobs and a nice place to 
live, and we’re healthy. We're the people you see every day in 
the grocery stores, and we obey the laws. We pay our taxes. We fly our flags on 
holidays and we plod along trying to make it better for ourselves and our children and our 
parents. We aren’t vocal any more. I think maybe we’re too tired. 
I believe that people like us are forgotten in America.”

Well of course you believe you’re forgotten, because you 
have been.

This Republican Administration treats us as if we were pieces of a puzzle that can’t fit 
together. They've tried to put us into compartments and separate us from each other. Their 
political theory is “divide and conquer.” 
They’ve suggested time and time again that what is of 
interest to one group of Americans is not of interest to any one else. We’ve been isolated. 
We’ve been lumped into that sad phraseology called “special interests.” 
They’ve told farmers that they were selfish, that 
they would drive up food prices if they asked the government to 
intervene on behalf of the family farm, and we watched farms go on the auction block while 
we bought food from foreign countries. Well, that’s wrong!

They told working mothers it’s all their fault their families are falling apart because they had 
to go to work to keep their kids in jeans and tennis shoes and college. 
And they’re wrong!! They told American labor they were trying to ruin free enterprise by asking for 60 days’ notice 
of plant closings, and that’s wrong. 
And they told the auto industry and the steel industry and 
the timber industry and the oil industry, companies being threatened by foreign products 
flooding this country, that you’re "protectionist" if you think the government should enforce 
our trade laws. And that is wrong. 
When they belittle us for demanding clean air and clean water for trying to 
save the oceans and the ozone layer, that’s wrong.

No wonder we feel isolated and confused. We want answers and their answer is that 
"something is wrong with you." Well nothing's wrong with you. Nothing’s wrong with 
you that you can’t fix in November!

We’ve been told We’ve been told that the interests of the South and the Southwest are not 
the same interests as the North and the Northeast. They pit one group against the 
other. They've divided this country and in our isolation we think government isn’t gonna help 
us, and we're alone in our feelings. We feel forgotten. Well, the fact is that we are not an 
isolated piece of their puzzle. We are one nation. We are the United States of America.

Now we Democrats believe that America is still the county of fair play, that we can come out 
of a small town or a poor neighborhood and have the same chance as anyone else. and it 
doesn’t matter whether we are black or Hispanic or disabled or a women [sic]. We believe that 
America is a country where small business owners must 
succeed, because they are the bedrock, backbone of our economy.

We believe that our kids deserve good daycare and public schools. We believe our kids 
deserve public schools where students can learn and teachers can teach. And we wanna 
believe that our parents will have a good retirement and that we will too. We Democrats 
believe that social security is a pact that can not be broken.

We wanna believe that we can live out our lives without the terrible fear that an illness is 
going to bankrupt us and our children. We Democrats believe that 
America can overcome any problem, including the dreaded disease called AIDS. We believe that America is still a country where there is more to life than just a constant 
struggle for money. And we believe that America must have leaders who show us that our struggles amount 
to something and contribute to something larger leaders who want us to be all that we can be.

We want leaders like Jesse Jackson. Jesse Jackson is a leader and a teacher who can open our 
hearts and open our minds and stir our very souls. And he has taught 
us that we are as good as our capacity for caring, caring about 
the drug problem, caring about crime, caring about education, and caring about each other.

Now, in contrast, the greatest nation of the free world has had a leader for eight straight 
years that has pretended that he can not hear our questions over the noise of the helicopters. 
And we know he doesn’t wanna answer. But we have a lot of questions. And when we get our 
questions asked, or there is a leak, or an investigation the only answer we get is, “I don’t 
know,” or “I forgot.”

But you wouldn’t accept that answer from your children. I wouldn’t. Don’t tell me “you 
don’t know” or “you forgot.” 
We're not going to have the America that we want until we elect 
leaders who are gonna tell the truth. not most days but every day. leaders who don’t forget 
what they don’t want to remember. And for eight straight years George Bush hasn’t displayed 
the slightest interest in anything we care about. And now that he's after a job that he can’t 
get appointed to, he's like Columbus discovering America. He’s found child care. 
He’s found education. Poor George. He can’t help it. He was born with a silver foot 
in his mouth.

Well, no wonder. No wonder we can’t figure it out. Because the leadership of this nation 
is telling us one thing on TV and doing something entirely different. They tell us They 
tell us that they're fighting a war against terrorists. And then we find out 
that the White House is selling arms to the Ayatollah. They They 
tell us that they’re fighting a war on drugs and 
then people come on TV and testify that the CIA and the DEA and the FBI knew 
they were flying drugs into America all along. 
And they’re negotiating with a dictator who is shoveling 
cocaine into this country like crazy. I guess that’s their Central American strategy.

Now they tell us that employment rates are great, and that they’re for equal opportunity. But 
we know it takes two paychecks to make ends meet today, when it used to take one. 
And the opportunity they’re so proud of is lowwage, deadend jobs. 
And there is no major city in America where you cannot 
see homeless men sitting in parking lots holding signs that say, “I will work for food.”

Now my friends, we really are at a crucial point in American 
history. Under this Administration 
we have devoted our resources into making this country a military colossus. But we’ve let our 
economic lines of defense fall into disrepair. The debt of this nation is greater than 
it has ever been in our history. We fought a world war on less debt than 
the Republicans have built up in 
the last eight years. You know, it’s kind of like that brotherinlaw 
who drives a flashy new car, but he’s always borrowing money from you 
to make the payments.

Well, but let’s take what they are most proudest of that is their stand of defense. We 
Democrats are committed to a strong America, and, quite frankly, when our leaders say to 
us, "We need a new weapons system," our inclination is to say, “Well, they must be right.” 
But when we pay billions for planes that won’t fly, billions for tanks that won’t fire, and billions for 
systems that won’t work, "that old dog won’t hunt." And you don’t have to be from Waco 
to know that when the Pentagon makes crooks rich and doesn’t make America strong, that it’s a 
bum deal.

Now I’m going to tell you, I'm really glad that our young people missed the Depression and 
missed the great Big War. But I do regret that they missed the leaders that I 
knew, leaders who told us when things were tough, and that we’d have to sacrifice, and that these 
difficulties might last for a while. They didn’t tell us things were hard for us because we were 
different, or isolated, or special interests. They brought 
us together and they gave us a sense 
of national purpose. They gave us Social Security and they told us they were setting up a 
system where we could pay our own 
money in, and when the time came for our retirement we 
could take the money out. People in the rural areas were told that we deserved to 
have electric lights, and they were gonna harness the energy that was necessary to give us 
electricity so my grandmamma didn’t 
have to carry that old coal oil lamp around. And they 
told us that they were gonna guarant[ee] when 
we put our money in the bank, that the 
money was going to be there, and it was going to be insured. 
They did not lie to us.

And I think one of the saving graces of Democrats is that we are candid. We talk straight 
talk. We tell people what we think. And that tradition and those values live today in Michael 
Dukakis from Massachusetts.

Michael Dukakis knows that this country is on the edge of a great new era, that we’re not 
afraid of change, that we’re for thoughtful, truthful, strong leadership. Behind his calm there’s 
an impatience to unify this country and to get on with 
the future. His instincts are deeply American. They’re tough and they’re generous. 
And personally, I have to tell you that I have never met a man who 
had a more remarkable sense about what is really important in life.

And then there’s my friend and my teacher for many years, Senator Lloyd Bentsen. And I 
couldn’t be prouder, both as a Texan and as a Democrat, because Lloyd Bentsen understands 
America. From the barrio to the boardroom, he knows how to bring us together, by regions, 
by economics, and by example. And he’s already beaten George Bush once.

So, when it comes right down to it, this election is a contest between those who are satisfied 
with what they have and those who know we can do better. That’s what this election is really 
all about. It’s about the American dream those who want to keep it for the few and those 
who know it must be nurtured and passed along.

I’m a grandmother now. And I have one nearly perfect granddaughter named Lily. And when 
I hold that grandbaby, I feel the continuity of life that unites us, that binds generation to generation, that 
ties us with each other. And sometimes I spread that 
Baptist pallet out on the floor, and Lily and I roll a ball back and forth. And I think of all the families like mine, 
like the one in Lorena, Texas, like the ones that nurture children all across America. 
And as I look at Lily, I know that it is within families that we learn both the need to respect 
individual human dignity and to work together for our common good. 
Within our families, within our nation, it is the same.

And as I sit there, I wonder if she’ll ever grasp the changes I’ve seen 
in my life if she’ll ever believe that there was a time when 
blacks could not drink from public water fountains, when 
Hispanic children were punished for speaking Spanish in the public schools, and women couldn’t vote.

I think of all the political fights I’ve fought, and all the compromises I’ve had 
to accept as part payment. And I think of all the small victories that have added up to national triumphs and all 
the things that would never have happened and all the people who would’ve been left behind 
if we had not reasoned and fought and won those battles together. And I will tell Lily that 
those triumphs were Democratic Party triumphs.

I want so much to tell Lily how far we’ve come, you and I. And as the ball rolls back and forth, 
I want to tell her how very lucky she is that for all our difference, we are still the greatest 
nation on this good earth. And our strength lies in the men and women who go 
to work every day, who struggle to balance their family and their jobs, and who should never, ever be 
forgotten.

I just hope that like her grandparents and her greatgrandparents before that Lily goes on to 
raise her kids with the promise that echoes in homes all across America: that we can do 
better, and that’s what this election is all about.

Thank you 
very much.