A Letter from Michelle Obama....

Michelle Obama's open letter to The Advocate:

In about a month, Americans will head to the polls to cast their votes for the next president of the United States. It will be a momentous day. But this presidential election has already changed our country in profound ways. The candidacies of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have smashed old barriers and broadened opportunities for all Americans. And I’m grateful to them -- both as a citizen and as a parent of two young girls.
But our country’s journey toward equality is not finished. It’s been five years since Lawrence v. Texas. It’s been 39 years since Stonewall. And we still have more work to do before we achieve equality for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender Americans.
Election Day offers an opportunity to take another crucial step toward equality. Millions have joined this movement for change. People are hoping again -- believing again -- that we can come together to create a stronger, fairer nation. And on November 4 we’ll have a chance to put that hope into action.
Translating hope into action is something Barack has done for his entire career.
Barack and I met in Chicago 20 years ago. He thought the best way for me to know him was to get a sense of the work he cared about most. After college he had worked in neighborhoods that were devastated when steel plants shut down and jobs dried up. He’d been invited back to speak to people from those neighborhoods about how to create new opportunities for their families. He asked me to come with him.
I watched as Barack took off his jacket, rolled up his sleeves, and instantly connected with every person in that room. He gave the most eloquent talk about “the world as it is” and “the world as it should be.”
Too often, he said, we accept the distance between the two, and we settle for the world as it is -- even when it doesn’t reflect our values and aspirations. But he reminded us that we know what fairness and justice and opportunity look like. And he urged us to believe in ourselves and find the strength to strive for the world as it should be.
Barack Obama, the 2008 presidential nominee, is the same man I fell in love with on that day 20 years ago. He has never stopped pursuing that better world.