There are elections in which everyone knows that 'the people have spoken' but they don't always know exactly what the people have said. This November's election was different. Not only did the people speak, they spoke clearly.
People can't imagine an enemy that would cut someone's head off before a video camera and spread it out across the world. But that has happened with the kind of enemy we are now facing.
Our country was hit on 9/11, 2001. Everybody in the world knows that. It hasn't been easy to deal with a different kind of enemy, but that is what we have, a different kind of enemy.
Our country also hungers for leadership to ensure the long-term survival of our Social Security system. With 70 million baby boomers in this country on the verge of retirement, we need to take action to shore up the system.
I am proud of the President's leadership. I am proud to support him in saying: Yes, we are going to do what is necessary now when it is less painful and less expensive.
We can be proud of our record as an international beacon of liberty. From fostering democracies in Eastern Europe to the stabilization of Iraq and Afghanistan, we have been true to that calling and helped spread freedom to oppressed peoples everywhere.
We are battling fanatics who kidnap and behead civilians and shoot fleeing children in the back. There can be no dialogue with such people, and the American people understand this.
The important thing is that we recognize our President's leadership, that he is not saying: I am going to walk away from this. He is saying: I am going to do the right thing.
