Quote

The solid, middle-class values of hard work, responsibility, family, community, and faith my father talked about tirelessly from Iowa to New York, he lived at home. The hopes he had for his family and for me, he had for all Americans. I think Americans understood this.

The promise of America has always been that if you worked hard, had the right values, took some risks, that there was an opportunity to build a better life for your family and for your next generation.

My parents were exactly like millions of other Americans who had a fire in their belly to build something of their own, and in so doing they exemplified the dignity of work, the opportunity available in this great nation to those willing to work, and they left the world a bit better than it was when they first showed up.

Our family's fortune is growing faster than ever. We're a part of a small number of American families that own most of the country's wealth. But having so much in the hands of so few can't be good for America.

We were never a family that had a lot. We had enough, but not a lot.

We got more out of this as a family than we were able to give to the people.

Families are the tie that reminds us of yesterday, provide strength and support today, and give us hope for tomorrow. No government, no matter how well-intentioned, or well-managed, can provide what our families provide.

Our parents set the moral tone of the family. They expected more of some of us and less of others, but never less than they thought we were capable of.

When liberals finally grasped the strength of popular feeling about the family, they cried to appropriate the rhetoric and symbolism of family values for their own purposes.

My parents did great and provided well, and gave all their kids personal, moral, ethical values, not a belief that we were entitled to something.