Allowing for hope

Men without hope, resigned to despair and oppression, do not make revolutions. It is when expectation replaces submission, when despair is touched with the awareness of possibility, that the forces of human desire and the passion for justice are unloosed — Robert F. Kennedy, Berkeley, 10-22-1966

I think the American people are hungry for something different and can be mobilized around big changes, not incremental changes, not small changes. I think that there are a whole host of Republicans, and certainly independents, who have lost trust in their government, who don't believe anybody is listening to them, who are staggering under rising costs of health care, college education, don't believe what politicians say. And we can draw those independents and some Republicans into a working coalition, a working majority for change. — Barack Obama, 01-05-2008

Republicans in Washington ... are fearful because his appeal just might work.