or where you come from or who your parents are， opportunity is yours if you re willing to reach for it and work for it. It s the idea that while there are few guarantees in life， you should be able to count on a job that pays the bills； health care for when you need it； a pension for when you retire； an education for your children that will allow them to fulfill their God？given potential. That s the America we believe in. That s the America I know.

This is the country that gave my grandfather a chance to go to college on the GI Bill when he came home from World War II； a country that gave him and my grandmother the chance to buy their first home with a loan from the government.

This is the country that made it possible for my mother a single parent who had to go on food stamps at one point to send my sister and me to the best schools in the country on scholarships.

This is the country that allowed my father？in？law a city worker at a South Side water filtration plant to provide for his wife and two children on a single salary. This is a man who was diagnosed at age thirty with multiple sclerosis who relied on a walker to get himself to work. And yet， every day he went， and he labored， and he sent my wife and her brother to one of the best colleges in the nation. It was a job that didn t just give him a paycheck， but a sense of dignity and self？worth. It was an America that didn t just reward wealth， but the work and the workers who created it.

Somewhere along the way， between