From: drp@dosbears.UUCP (David R. Preston)
Newsgroups: soc.motss
Subject: Re: Bob Hattoy's Speech (excerpts)
Date: 21 Jul 92 23:54:38 GMT
Reply-To: drp@dosbears.uucp
Organization: DosBears

In article <1992Jul17.190225.15434@PacBell.COM> rjwill6@pbsdts.sdcrc.pacbell.com (Rod Williams) writes:
>I don't have the complete text of Bob Hattoy's speech
>to the Democratic National Convention.  But I do have
>the excerpts from it that were printed in The New York
>Times the following day -- taken from a written text
>provided to them before the speech was delivered...

Here's the complete speech, with deviations marked with <> for
words that appeared in the excerpt but were not spoken, and []
for words that were spoken but are not in the excerpt. The last
third was not in the excerpt.

____________________________________________________________________

I have AIDS.

I could be an African-American woman, a Latino man, a 10-year-old
boy or girl.  AIDS has many faces.  And AIDS knows no class or
gender, race or religion, or sexual orientation.

AIDS does not discriminate.  But George Bush's White House does.
AIDS is a disease of the Reagan-Bush years.  The first case was
detected in 1981.  But it took 40,000 deaths and seven years for
Ronald Reagan to say the word "AIDS."

It's five years later, 70,000 more are dead.  And George Bush
doesn't talk about AIDS, much less do anything about it.  Eight
years from now, there will be two million cases in America.

If George Bush wins <again> we're all at risk [in America].  It's 
that simple. It's that serious.  It's that terrible.

[at this point, delegates broke into a chant of "No Second Term!"
which Hattoy paused to acknowledge.  He cleared his throat, said
"this is hard," and continued...rjw]

I am a gay man with AIDS.  [and] If there is any honor in having this
disease, it's the honor of being part of the gay and lesbian
community in America.  We have watched our friends and lovers
die, but we have not given up [hope].

Gay men and lesbians created community health clinics, provided
educational materials, opened food kitchens, and held the hands
of the dying in hospices.

The gay and lesbian community is <a> [an American] family in the 
best sense of the word.  President Bush, we are a million points of 
light.  But you are [just] too [morally] blind to see us.

Mr. President, you don't see AIDS for what it is.  It's a crisis
in public health that demands medical experts, not moral judges.
And it's time to move beyond your politics of denial, division
and death.  It's time to move George Bush out of the White House.
We need a president who will take action.

A president strong enough to take on the insurance companies that
drop people with the HIV virus.  A president courageous enough to
take on the drug companies who drive AIDS patients into poverty
and deny them life-saving medicine.

[and we need] A president who is not terrified of the word 
"condom."  Every single person with AIDS is someone worthy of <your> 
caring [for].  After all, we are your sons and daughters.  Fathers 
and mothers.

We are doctors and lawyers.  Folks in the military.  Ministers
and rabbis and priests.  We are Democrats.  And yes, Mr. President,
Republicans.  We're part of the American family.

[and] Mr. President, your family has AIDS.

[and] We're dying.  And you are doing nothing about it.

[Listen, I don't want to die, I don't want to die, but I don't want 
to live in an America where the president sees me as the enemy. I 
can face dying because of a disease, but not because of politics. So 
I stand here tonight in support of Bill Clinton, a man who sees the 
value in each and every member of the American family. And although 
I am a person with AIDS, I am a person with hope, because I know how 
different my life and all our lives could be if I could call my boss 
Mr. President.

Martin Luther King once said that our lives begin to end the day we 
become silent about things that matter. 50,000 people took to the 
streets in New York today because they will no longer be silent 
about AIDS. Their action gives me hope. All of you came here tonight 
-- millions more are watching in America; obviously we have hope. 
And hope gives me the chance of life. I think it's really important 
to understand that this year, more than any other year, we must vote 
as if our lives depended on it. Mine does, yours could, and we all 
have so much to live for.

Thank you.

Act up, fight back, fight AIDS.

Now I am honored to introduce a woman who has been an inspiration to 
millions. Who has been living with HIV for 11 years. The co-founder 
of the Pediatric AIDS Foundation. Elizabeth Glaser.]

_______________________________________________________________________



--
       David R. Preston  drp@dosbears.uucp dosbears@netcom.com
          We're here, we're bored, but we won't be ignored!
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          D. R. Preston 584 Castro St. #614 SF CA 94114 USA