I think Democrats are right. We fight for the American dream, for

The words of Barbara Boxer—“I think Democrats are right. We fight for the American dream, for the environment, for privacy rights, a woman’s right to choose, a good public education system.”—resound like a call to arms, not in the clash of steel, but in the struggle of ideals. In these words lies the spirit of those who contend not for their own gain, but for the common good. She names the pillars of a just society—the American dream, the environment, privacy, choice, and education—as treasures worth defending, for they are not given once and forever, but must be renewed by each generation.

To speak of the American dream is to speak of hope, that vision of a land where effort is met with opportunity, and where dignity belongs not to the few but to all. This dream is fragile, like a flame carried through storm winds, yet it burns still because men and women choose to shelter it with their lives and their labor. Boxer’s words remind us that the dream is not idle fantasy, but a covenant: the promise that each soul may rise, provided we do not abandon fairness and compassion.

She speaks also of the environment, the earth that cradles us all. To fight for it is to fight for life itself, for what good is wealth, power, or learning if the rivers run dry and the skies turn foul? The ancients revered nature as sacred, and though we dwell now in cities of glass and steel, the truth endures: we are bound to the soil and the sea. To ignore this bond is to court ruin; to honor it is to ensure survival for those yet unborn.

Then comes the cry for privacy rights, the shield of the individual against tyranny. In every age, rulers and powers have sought to peer into the secrets of the heart, to claim mastery over thoughts and choices. But freedom cannot live without privacy. The sanctity of one’s own mind, one’s own home, one’s own life—this is the fortress of liberty. To fight for privacy is to defend the very core of what it means to be human, unchained and unbroken.

Boxer names also a woman’s right to choose, a struggle both ancient and modern. Throughout history, women have been silenced, confined, stripped of authority over their own bodies and destinies. To reclaim choice is to reclaim personhood itself. It is not merely a question of law, but of justice—the recognition that no life is truly free until women are free. The battles fought for this right are the battles of mothers and daughters, carried forward through hardship into the dawn of greater equality.

Finally, she exalts a good public education system, that sacred forge where minds are shaped and futures are cast. Without education, the poor remain bound in chains, the powerful go unchallenged, and the dream of democracy withers. But with education, the child of a farmer may become a leader, the daughter of immigrants may become a voice in the Senate, the son of workers may become a teacher who lifts countless others. Education is the great equalizer, the weapon that does not wound but heals, that does not destroy but creates.

Let us recall the tale of Lyndon B. Johnson, who as a young man taught poor Mexican children in Texas. He saw their hunger, their lack of books, their yearning for dignity. That memory drove him, decades later as president, to expand public education and civil rights, knowing that opportunity begins in the classroom. His story is proof that the fight Boxer describes is not abstract, but real—lived out in the struggles of leaders who saw injustice and chose to act.

So what lesson shall we take from this? It is that the causes Boxer names are not the work of one party or one time, but of all who cherish freedom and justice. Whether you call yourself Democrat, Republican, or none at all, you too must fight for the dream, the earth, the rights, the freedom, the schools that make civilization worthy of its name. In daily life, this means voting with conscience, speaking against injustice, teaching the young, protecting the vulnerable, and living in reverence toward the world that sustains us.

For the fight is never over. Each age brings new storms, new adversaries, new trials. But if we take these words to heart, and act not in fear but in faith, then the dream shall not die, the earth shall not wither, and justice shall not fail. Let us therefore walk boldly, carrying the torch of those who came before, so that generations to come may say of us: they did not falter; they fought for what was right.