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"GOV. PALIN: Now, to win, to reform Washington, to help reform our country, Senator McCain and I are going to take our case for reform to voters of every background, in every party, or no party at all. And with your vote, we're going to Washington to shake things up. (Cheers, applause.)
See, John McCain is a guy who's been through a few tough battles before, and he has served America in good times and in bad. (Cheers, applause.) He knows what it takes to overcome great challenges. And for the job of leading our country, he's the only man in this race who's got what it takes. (Cheers, applause.)
Remember it was just about a year ago when the war in Iraq looked very bad.
And the consequences of failure would have been terrible for our country, for our troops. Defeat at the hands of al Qaeda in Iraq would have left millions to a violent fate and would have left our own nation much less secure.
Some in Washington at the time said that all was lost. All was lost in the war, they presumed -- they assumed. There was no hope for victory. (Boos.) And they said there was no hope for the candidate who had said he would rather lose an election than see our country lose a war. (Cheers, applause.)
But the pollsters and the pundits, they forgot one thing when they wrote him off. They forgot the caliber of the man himself, the determination and the resolve and the sheer guts of Senator John McCain. (Cheers, applause.)
But you all knew better. You all knew better, Americans. The American people understand that there is a time for politics and a time for leadership, a time to campaign and a time to put our country first. (Cheers, applause.)
AUDIENCE: (Chanting.) Country first! Country first! Country first! Country first! Country first! Country first! Country first!
GOV. PALIN: John McCain is a man who wore the uniform of this country for 22 years. (Cheers, applause.) He refused to break faith with the troops who have now brought victory within sight. (Cheers, applause.)
And as the mother of one of those troops, that is exactly the kind of man I want as commander in chief. (Cheers, applause, chanting.)
Now, for his part, our opponent, he still just can't bring himself to acknowledge the coming victory in Iraq. He couldn't just the other day in an interview. He says he's for change, but look there in Iraq. Change happened, and that's a great thing for America, Senator. (Cheers, applause.)
Here's how I look at the choices that we have in this election. In politics, there are some candidates who use change to promote their careers, and then there are those, like John McCain, who use their careers to promote change. (Cheers, applause.)
Americans, this is a moment when principles and political independence and those things that this man will bring to the office -- those things that are going to matter a heck of a lot more that a party line --
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Yeah!
GOV. PALIN: He doesn't run with the Washington herd. He's willing to shake things up in Washington, and that is only one more reason to bring the maverick of the Senate -- put him into the White House. (Cheers, applause.)
Senator McCain has called the two of us a team of mavericks, and he knows that we've done some shaking up up there in Alaska. As mayor, I shook up the old system and took on the good old boys. (Cheers, applause.) I reminded people that government is not always the answer. In fact, too often government is the problem. (Cheers, applause.)
So -- so we got back to basics, and we put government back on the side of the people.
What I did was eliminate taxes on personal property and -- (cheers, applause) -- I eliminated taxes that were hurting small business. And property taxes were too high, so every year in office, we cut the mill levy. We cut that rate. And these reforms worked and our community took off. We started prospering.
And as governor, then, I brought that same agenda of positive change. We took on the old politics as usual in Juneau and we broke the monopoly that had controlled our state. And that was the lobbyists and the special interests behind Big Oil. (Cheers.) We came to office promising major ethics reform to end the culture of closed doors and self-dealing and today that ethics reform is the law of the state. (Cheers, applause.)"
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