I never forgot that. It was terrific to see him yesterday. We are happy to be here in iowa. We are going to come back to iowa. Were going to go over the whole state, and were going to come back as many times as we can. Youll be seeing more of us. I would like to take a few minutes tonight to talk to you about three things that i care deeply about. What are the challenges that are facing us as a nation . Where do i see the need for us to really focus in the next several years . The first is restoring fairness, economic fairness. Social justice in our system. I talked about this when i ran for the senate. It was the principal issue i was talking about when i ran for the senate. We have had an economic recovery since the Great Recession that has only helped a partial element in our society. We have to be honest about that. Particularly as democrats we have to be honest about that. If you go to april 2009, and look at the recovery. If you own stocks and capital assets, youre probably doing pretty well. The stock market bottomed out as out at a little over 6000 and has been up to 18,000, almost tripling since april of 2009. Working peoples wages have gone down since 2009. Assets of working people have actually decreased. We have to fix this problem. We have to put our leadership efforts into fixing this challenge. We have to reshape our National Security. I proud that i was able to serve as a marine during a very tough time in our countrys history. I was also able to spend five years in the pentagon. I sat on the Armed Services committee the Foreign Relations , committee when i was in the senate. Im privileged to be a journalist in the time that i am not been in public service. I was in beirut when the marines were in beirut in 1983, covering it for pbs. I was in afghanistan in 2004 as an embedded journalist. I can tell you, from these years of observation and involvement that we need to have a new doctrine that articulates for us the National Security policy of the United States. And from that doctrine, we can reshape the United States military. You cannot reshape the military without a strategy, clearly understood. The third area we really need to focus on is basic governance. We need to be working toward a governing style that will allow the congress and the presidency to work together, and also people of different parties to work together. What should you be looking for in terms of leadership . First of all, when i go around the country and i talk to people, i hear over and over again that we need leaders that we can trust. We need leaders that will tell us what the problems are, with tell us what their beliefs are about the problems, and how they want to fix it. There is a consistency in that. This kind of leadership course the willingness to take a risk to take the hits. To stand up for what you believe, not from a poll that helps you to ship an issue politically, but what you need to do is put out these issues in a way that is not simply smart or safe, but from your heart. And i have to say, the one comment that i have been the proudest of in the leadership positions ive had is when people tell me i do not agree with you all the time, but i know what you say is what you mean. That is not always easy to do. When i look at the issue of the iraq war, it was not easy to say early that this was going to be a strategic error. I wrote the first piece in the in a Major National newspaper, the washington post, that this is going to be a strategic problem. There are ways to address our National Security without being an Occupying Force in that part of the world. You do not take a hornets nest out by sitting on it. [laughter] it was not an easy thing to do to take on criminal justice reform. When i started talking about our broken criminal Justice System i had advisers tell me you are committing suicide. Virginia second only to texas in terms of capital punishment. But it is clear that it is broken from the point of apprehension to help people are arrested, to Prison Administration to the reentry , process. I held two and a half years of hearings on it, and wed brought this issues out of the shadows into the national debate. The great irony is this is in issue that the Democratic Party should own. Criminal justice reform, social justice. Know who is making the most mileage out of it right now . Rand paul. Rand paul. When you look at the american conservative Political Action conference, it was the number three issue to be focusing on. We need to get the issue back. The comprehensive issue of criminal justice reform, not one little piece of it or another. When i introduced the g. I. Bill, my first day in office, i had written it with counsel. And the comment i was making even before i ran for the senate, is give them the same Educational Opportunities of the greatest generation. Pay their tuition, by their books. And i had people saying that youre a freshman, youve only been here two weeks, there are bills from others first. But this was a comprehensive piece of legislation. We developed a partisan consensus. And in 16 months, we were able to pass the most comprehensive piece of veterans legislation since world war ii. One of the great prides of my life is that more than a million post9 11 veterans have been able to take it vantage of our g. I. Bill. [applause] how can we make america a better place . Lets look into the future. I want to Say Something that troubles me a lot and i think there are a lot of people in this room who would agree. Money is ruining our political process. [applause] particularly since the Citizens United case of 2012. I hear jeb bush say he made 100 million in three months. He is meeting with the super pacs, he is not alone. This cannot continue. The only way were going to do anything about it is to make sure that our people, by the numbers, can outnumber the kind of money that is coming in here, and we get the policies we believe in to place. When i ran for the senate we had , 14,000 volunteers that came up and helped us when we ran against an incumbent senator who just gotten highest number of votes for president. We need to remember, the American Dream is a unique thing in this world. When people say you should not talk about american exceptionalism. Excuse me. I think the American Dream is unique and that is why people are trying to come here from all over the world. I was able to get scholarships to go to school, as able to serve my country. Ive had a great experience in my life. But my wife has really lived the American Dream. She was born in vietnam. Her family escaped vietnam when the communists took over. There is something we need to remember. April 30, it is good to be the 40s anniversary of the fall of saigon. Those of you who can remember what that was like, what the chaos was like in that country. Hundreds of thousands of vietnamese were jumping into the sea, rather than face what was happening when the communists took over. Her extended family got on a fishing boat, and they went out to sea. They did not know theyre going to live or die. After three days, the United States navy scooped them out of the sea. Brought them to a refugee camp in guam, from there she went to a refugee camp in arkansas, and her family eventually settled in new orleans. Her parents never spoke english. She started working when she was 11. She got a scholarship to the university of michigan. She ended up going to cornell law school. That is the American Dream. [applause] we are going to preserve this, it is only going to come from the Democratic Party. We have to remember that. We are never going to find an answer in the Republican Party on issues like economic fairness and giving people who have no voice in the corridors of power, the voice of the Democratic Party. And we should say, we should agree, that we are not going to be marginalized by special interests. Were not be silenced in the face of overwhelming pressures that this kind of money can buy. We will not acquiesce to a future that marginalizes this whole beauty of the American Dream. We will not allow them to ignore us after the election is over. Everyone in this room, i think shares these type of feelings, or you would not be committing yourself to the type of service that you are giving right now. If enough of you believe that we can restore and preserve the American Dream for everyone, then we will not become what some people are calling the moderate wing of the Republican Party. We will return to the party of roosevelt and of truman, the party that truly looks after everyone who lacks a voice. [applause] Harley Cooper will be proud of me, because were not going to come in second. We are the guarantor of stability in the world, and that is going to continue. Thank you very much. [applause] [applause] a host let me tell you a little bit about governor martin omalley. His father was the National Leader of the Democratic Party. He came here in 1983 to work on gary harts campaign as one of his staff organizers and had a chance to work on that Great Campaign in which he finished second. After graduating from law school he settled in baltimore. He ran for the city council and got elected. The mayor spot became open, and there was a crowded field running for that, and he was successful getting elected mayor. By the time he took over, it was suffering through some really tough times regarding high crime rates and a struggling economy. As a role as a result of the innovative policies he enacted baltimore was able to turn , around, and became a city that was recognized nationally for some fine achievements. It was elected governor in 2006. He took on a republican incumbent and beat him in 2006 for governor. He was rewarded with a bad economy in 2007 and 2008 that he had to deal with. He enacted some innovative policies. He was reelected in 2010, and a bad year for democrats by a landslide. After he left office, he looked to these as these most successful accomplishments. First of all, he raised the minimum wage to 10. 10 an hour. [applause] he signed into law the Marriage Equality act. [applause] he signed into law legislation abolishing the death penalty. [applause] and he also was instrumental in passing the dream act to provide instate tuition for undocumented immigrants. [applause] when he left office, they had recovered 100 of the jobs they lost during the recession. [applause] under his leadership, maryland Public Schools were ranked number one in the nation or five years in a row. [applause] and finally, the u. S. Chamber of commerce, which is not always kind to democrats, recognized him because maryland was number one for entrepreneurship and innovation three years in a row. [applause] please give my strong applause for governor omalley. [applause] omalley thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Lets give it up for senator webb. Thank you for your message tonight. [applause] senator webb, thank you for your message of economic fairness for your message of National Security, for your message of basic governance. I want you to turn to one another and say it is to be a democrat in polk county. Now turn to your other neighbor and say it. Now that weve established that, let us establish one very important thing that i was taught by maryland senior senator pulsar veins paul s arbenes. We are great believers in the truth of program should end on the same day they start. [laughter] im way to get right into it. [laughter] tom henderson, i want to thank , camaro, i want to thank you as well. I want to thank all of you for being here today. My 17 year old son william. [applause] sharon, i know that families give up a lot in order to support their parents in public service, and i would also like to tell your dad one other thing. And that is, my mom, barbara omalley, who is 87 years old, when she found out i was coming to iowa, she said to say hello to my friend neil smith. She was in the Young Democrats from fort wayne indiana, where she got her pilots license during the second world war. Join the civil air patrol. Protective the indiana coastline against german uboat incursions. At the time, after that, she was in washington dc. She remembers your father very fondly. She would see your father in washington. I promised my mom i would do that. My parents were part of that generation that tom brokaw and others have called the greatest generation. But it was not a title they would readily embrace themselves. As americans they believe that every generation had an obligation to be a great generation. That is my message for you tonight. We still have time, all of us, to be a great generation of americans. And our children, and their future is depending upon it great and yes, the future is watching. Tonight i want to talk to you about the story of us. About the story of des moines and baltimore. About the story maryland and iowa, and the story of america. 200 years ago, in the war of 1812, true story, the british had just burned our Nations Capital to the ground. They had taken washington. The capital and the white house were burning and the people of my home city, the people of baltimore, could actually see the glow from those fires to our south. And now we knew that they were coming for us. Amidst the ashes of our Nations Capital, the commanding british general at the time declared im going to march on baltimore, im going to dine there. Because even then we had great restaurants. [laughter] and then i am going to burn baltimore to the ground. Our nation was not yet 40 years old. The American Dream at that moment was facing extinction. Imagine what we felt at that time. Anger, fear, disbelief confidence shattered, trust totally gone. There are moments in the life of our country, and they are defining moments, when it seems the American Dream itself is hanging by a thread. And yet for america, there is always a yet. That final thread that holds us could just be the strongest. 50 of the defenders at the time were actually immigrants. One out of five of us were black citizens of an imperfect country, and one out of five of the black defenders were free. But somehow, together, we transformed our despair. Instead of digging graves, we dug trenches. And against the shock and off force of its day, the people of baltimore stood firm. All of this in our own day, we now sing the starspangled banner. Let us remember as we sing the anthem today, that the colors of that starspangled banner were themselves stitched together by black and white hands. By mens hands and womens hands. Hands of freedom, hands of bondage, and i would submit to you, the thread that held that flag together then is the same thread that holds us together here tonight. [applause] and what is that thread . The thread of human dignity, the the dignity of home the dignity , of place, the dignity of country, the dignity of neighbor helping neighbor, so that all of us can succeed. In other words, with our countrys future hanging in the balance, we stood as one of the as one and the American Dream lived on. Now fastforward, when i ran for mayor, there was a different sort of battle going on in the streets of baltimore. This time we were losing. Baltimore had become the most violent, addicted, and abandoned city in america. And the biggest enemy that we faced was not the drug dealers or crack cocaine, it was a lack of belief. A culture of failure. Countless excuses for why it was the nothing we would try would ever work, and why none of us, if we had an ounce of sense, should even bother to try. So we set out to make our city work again, to make the dream true again. We started setting goals and deadlines, and instead of simply counting out inputs, we started measuring outputs. We saw trash in our streets and alleys, and we picked it up every day. We saw openair drug markets and we began to relentlessly close them down. And guess what . When the people of baltimore saw that their government was working again, they rallied too. [applause] together, in other words, we put into action that powerful belief, that in our city there is no such as a spare american. Then we are all in this together. And over the next 10 years baltimore went on to achieve the biggest reduction in part one crime of any major city in america. [applause] we americans sometimes have short memories, dont we . None of us will ever forget seven years ago when our country was facing the worst recession since the great depression. A meltdown on wall street led our entire economy hanging by a thread. We refused to give up. We elected a new president to move our country forward, and that is exactly what our exactly what barack obama has done. [applause] at that moment, all of us had a decision to make. Would we be a part of bringing our country back, or would we sit back on our haunches and say , lets see if he actually can . In our state, we started supporting our president , doing the things that worked. We tossed aside the failed trickledown economics, and we embraced and returned to the truth that our parents and grandpas understood. That the more person learns, the more of person earns. A stronger middle class [applause] that a stronger middle class is not the consequence of economic growth, a stronger middle class is the cause of economic growth. [applause] im not even sure our parents and grandparents even had a word for that type of economics. They called it common sense. The more that workers earned the , better businesses have, and the better our economy grows. Together, we actually we passed , the living wage. We raised the minimum wag