My brother's keeper

A-ha! Found the transcript of Alston's speech last night. I nearly lost it when he spoke of "speaking truth to power."

I hope you were watching Barack Obama speak tonight. That's your President in 2016, my friends.

Forgive me if I quote at length here, but Obama encapsulated just why I belong to the Democractic party.

OBAMA: John Kerry believes in America. And he knows that it's not enough for just some of us to prosper. For alongside our famous individualism, there's another ingredient in the American saga, a belief that we are all connected as one people.

If there's a child on the south side of Chicago who can't read, that matters to me, even if it's not my child.

(APPLAUSE)

If there's a senior citizen somewhere who can't pay for their prescription and having to choose between medicine and the rent, that makes my life poorer, even if it's not my grandparent.

(APPLAUSE)

If there's an Arab-American family being rounded up without benefit of an attorney or due process, that threatens my civil liberties.

(APPLAUSE)

It is that fundamental belief -- it is that fundamental belief -- I am my brother's keeper, I am my sisters' keeper -- that makes this country work.

The rest of the transcript is at the Washington Post.

In other news, we have ants in the house and I spent a good chunk of my evening looking for ant death. So I missed Teresa Heinz Kerry speaking, except what I heard over the radio. Damn.

For that, among other things, the ants must die.