 So the fact is, none of us want to be here. Literally, you know, this is New Orleans, and I'm sharing a stage with Jennifer Lawrence and my hero, Buddy Romer. So don't get me wrong, I'm perfectly happy to be here today. But what I mean is, none of us want to have to be here. None of us want to be living in a democracy where our first fight has got to be about that democracy. Because all of us believe that there are real things, important things, substantive things that this democracy must do, but that it can't do now. Some of us wanted to address climate change, finally. Some of us wanted to fight the inequality that is shot through the society from the hopelessness of the steel workers in Ohio to the mother barely able to provide for her kids while working two jobs every single day. This is America, and that is just not right. Stuck in stall where middle class wages just hover they don't rise, while productivity and corporate profits rise, rise, and rise. For two generations, 50% of Americans have seen no growth in their income. Last year, 1% of Americans captured 82% of the wealth that this economy created. That's not right. Now whatever the issue, whatever the issue, what we know, what we who are here know is that we want to address any of these issues sensibly. Until we fix this democracy first, this we all know. What we don't know is how we do that. I don't mean what changes we need to make. We're pretty good about that. We know those answers. I mean, how do we get America to take up the fight to take back our democracy? That begins by speaking an obvious truth. They don't represent us. When congressmen spend 30 to 70% of their time sucking up to no more than 100,000 rich people, they don't represent us, they represent them. When safe seat gerrymandering makes congressmen care only about the fringes from their own party because only an even more extreme Democrat or even more extreme Republican could ever possibly challenge them, they don't represent us, they represent them. When the president gets elected with a system that concentrates campaigns in a dozen battleground states, states that represent just 35% of America, but in older and whiter America than America as a whole, we know that president can't represent us. We know that he and Jesus, it's the 21st century and it has only ever been a he, he represents them. And that's true whether you're a Republican or a Democrat, whether you're from Montana or North Carolina, whether you're old or not yet old, whatever your race, whatever your sex, whatever, whatever, whatever, they don't represent us. And step two is to use that truth, a truth already believed by practically every American to build a different kind of political movement, a political movement that steps to the side and above partisan politics. All across America, there are thousands who have been inspired by Reverend Barber and Memorial Monday movement. Tens of thousands go from community to community to say, how could we possibly disagree? Black citizens travel to KKK country and sitting at the kitchen tables of men whose fathers burnt crosses. They ask, how could we possibly disagree? And from that question, a question with only one possible answer, the moral majority movement is building a movement that will knit America together, not again, but for the first time ever, just maybe. We need a moral movement here too. We need a movement that doesn't just hang around in D.C., but like Granny D. gets citizens to walk with citizens and to see on this issue we are not divided, we are united. And then step three, we must turn those citizens to our leaders, to the people we elect to represent us and tell them, if you want our vote, you must commit to fixing this democracy first. Because at some point, my friends, we have to draw a line of integrity across the ground that stands before us and ask, on which side do you stand? It's fine to talk about single-payer healthcare, but it's just not serious unless you show us how you will fix this democracy first. It's wonderful to rail against corporate welfare, as the conservatives and libertarians call it, but it is just not serious unless you explain to us how you're going to fix this democracy first. They dupe us with our own dreams, with the promises of the policies we want our government to enact, as if we're stupid, we are not stupid. We know their words mean nothing unless they fix this democracy first. Patient for way too long. We have been way too polite for way too long. We must feel our entitlement. We are citizens and this is a democracy and use that power, a moral power, to make this change happen now. Because we can't afford to be hanging around in conferences like this. We can't afford a democracy that still needs to fix itself. There is too much to be done. There is too much that a moral America, the only great America that I can imagine, a moral America must do. So my friends, let us like Reverend Barber bring America to its feet. Let us like Granny D get America to walk and in those walks as Dr. King asked us, let us dream again. Dream of the greatness a democracy in America could give. If only we could finally sing in unison to everyone who asks us for our votes. I will stand with you if you will say to me, I will fix this democracy first now. Thank you very much.