Listen to this articleU.S. Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., endorsed Barack Obama for president of the United States Jan. 28.
Accepting the endorsement, Obama mentioned gays too.
“The dream has never died,” he said. “[It] lives on in those Americans – young and old, rich and poor, black and white, Latino and Asian and Native American, gay and straight – who are tired of a politics that divides us and want to recapture the sense of common purpose that we had when John Kennedy was president of the United States of America. That is the dream we hold in our hearts. That is the kind of leadership we long for in this country. And that is the kind of leadership I intend to offer as president of the United States of America.”
“With Barack Obama, we will turn the page on the old politics of misrepresentation and distortion,” Kennedy said. “With Barack Obama, we will close the book on the old politics of race against race, gender against gender, ethnic group against ethnic group, and straight against gay.”
John F. Kennedy's daughter Caroline also has endorsed Obama.
Writing in The New York Times Jan. 27, she said: “Over the years, I've been deeply moved by the people who've told me they wished they could feel inspired and hopeful about America the way people did when my father was president. This sense is even more profound today. That is why I am supporting a presidential candidate in the Democratic primaries, Barack Obama.
“My reasons are patriotic, political and personal, and the three are intertwined,” Caroline Kennedy said. “All my life, people have told me that my father changed their lives, that they got involved in public service or politics because he asked them to. And the generation he inspired has passed that spirit on to its children. I meet young people who were born long after John F. Kennedy was president, yet who ask me how to live out his ideals. Sometimes it takes a while to recognize that someone has a special ability to get us to believe in ourselves, to tie that belief to our highest ideals and imagine that together we can do great things. In those rare moments, when such a person comes along, we need to put aside our plans and reach for what we know is possible.
“We have that kind of opportunity with Senator Obama.”
