“This was not a rally to ridicule people of faith. Or people of activism or to look down our noses at the heartland, or passionate argument or to suggest that times are not difficult and that we have nothing to fear. They are and we do. But we live now in hard times, not end times. And we can have animus and not be enemies.

"But unfortunately, one of our main tools in delineating the two broke. The country's 24-hour politico-pundit-perpetual-panic conflictinator did not cause our problems, but its existence makes solving them that much harder.

"The press can hold its magnifying glass up to our problems, bringing them into focus, illuminating issues heretofore unseen. Or they can use that magnifying glass to light ants on fire, and then perhaps host a week of shows on the sudden unexpected dangerous flaming ant epidemic.

"If we amplify everything, we hear nothing.

"There are are terrorists and racists and Stalinists and theocrats, but those are title that must be earned, You must have the resume. Not being able to be able to distinguish between real racists and Tea Partiers, or real bigots and Juan Williams or Rick Sanchez is an insult, not only to those people but to the racists themselves, who have put in the exhausting effort it takes to hate. Just as the inability to distinguish terrorists from Muslims makes us less safe, not more. The press is our immune system. If it overreacts to everything, we actually get sicker...

"We hear every damn day about how fragile our country is, on the brink of catastrophe, torn by polarizing hate. And how it's a shame that we can't work together to get stuff done. The truth is, we do. We work together to get stuff done every damn day. The only place we don't, is HERE [motions to Capitol Building] or on cable TV. But Americans don't live here or on cable TV. Where we live, our values and principles form the foundation that sustains us while we get things done, not the barriers that prevent us from getting things done.

"Most Americans don't live their lives solely as Democrats, Republicans, Liberals, or Conservatives. Americans live their lives more as people that are just a little bit late for something they have to do. Often, something they don't want to do. But they do it. Impossible things every day that are only made possible through the little, reasonable compromises we all make...

‎"We know instinctively as a people that if we are to get through the darkness and back into the light, we have to work together. And the truth is there will always be darkness. And sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel isn't the promised land. Sometimes it's just New Jersey. But we do it anyway - together."