Obama Names Kaine DNC Chairman

In promoting the president's agenda, we're at a crossroads time for this nation. It is truly a time of momentous import as we confront challenging economic circumstances in a troubled international environment.

All Americans, however they voted on November 4th, have a huge stake in this presidency being successful. And so I will be a passionate and positive promoter of President Obama's agenda. And that will be my first goal as DNC chair.

My second goal is to carry a proud banner for a proud party. The Democratic Party has a long pedigree and the basic values, the best of what being a Democrat is about, belief in the equality of all, the lifting and leveling power of education, the dignity of work, the power of innovation in America, our responsibilities to each other, especially to the least of these, and internationally that we're strong when we're strong militarily and economically, but that we also have to be strong diplomatically and in our moral example.

Those are the basic values of the Democratic Party that I cherish and that Americans of all parties cherish those values, as well.

In Virginia, we've managed to do some good as Democrats. When I started as a statewide candidate in state politics in 2000, our party was moribund, but we, beginning with a great leader, Mark Warner, Jim Webb, so many other great Democrats, we've won a lot of seats, but we haven't done it because of the letter after our name. We've done it because we have made the party in Virginia, working every day, a party of problem-solvers and unifiers.

We're not the ideologues, the obstructionists, the gridlock folks. We're the problem-solvers.

And we're not the dividers. In Virginia, we've rejected the politics of negativity, the politics that, you know, often energizes the 51 percent by beating up on the 49 percent, and instead try to unify people. And so that will be the same model that I will try to carry here at DNC chair as I carry the banner for this great party.

And, finally, the thing I'm most excited about, being able to engage Americans in -- in new ways in politics. Chairman Dean, with the 50-state strategy here at the DNC, has just done a remarkable job, as the president-elect said, in recognizing that we can't be a regional party or a party of a few states that might get us to 270 electoral votes, but that we've got to be a party that plays everywhere.

And what a remarkable job he did in his four-year tenure. I've got huge shoes to fill.

And then Senator Obama in his campaign, they campaigned in truly a different way. I remember early in the campaign, a friend of mine in Virginia said, "Well, he's good on the inspiration." But I thought, "You know, you just don't see it, because at the end of the day, the story of this campaign was less about the inspiration than about the organization," an organization around what I think is a pretty basic principle, the principle that everybody matters.

You don't have to be a big donor for your donation to matter. You don't have to be a Ph.D. or a foreign policy expert for your idea to matter. And you don't have to be a full-time campaign worker for your effort to matter.

And so if we could engage people as we did in this campaign in remarkable ways -- many coming in to politics for their first time, many without a party affiliation who just felt excited that a candidate was offering them a chance to engage -- we can do the same thing in politics not just around election cycles, but also around making change, changes that this president wants in our economy, in our health care system, in our need to find a brighter and cleaner energy future. And so in those three areas, I'm going to do my best. For my friend -- I consider Barack a great friend. I can -- I'll call him Barack until January 18th, and then thereafter there will be a different title.

But I am -- I'm very, very humbled at this opportunity and excited to take it on. And we'll do great work together.

OBAMA: Thank you, guys.

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