Obama: 'America, we are better than this'

DENVER, Aug. 28 (UPI) -- The United States cannot look back, "not with so much work to be done," Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama said Thursday in Denver.

"With profound gratitude and great humility," he told the Democratic National Convention delegates in Denver, "I accept your nomination for the presidency of the United States."

He thanked "the historic slate of candidates" -- Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York, former President Bill Clinton and Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts -- and "the love of my life," his wife, Michelle Obama.

"We meet ... at a moment when our nation is at war, our economy is in turmoil and the American promise is threatened once more," Obama said. "America, we are better than this."

More citizens are out of work, face foreclosure and rising prices for food and fuel and have fallen deeper into debt, Obama said.

"These challenges are not all of government's making," he said. "But the failure to respond is a direct result of a broken politics in Washington and the failed policies of George W. Bush."

"Tonight, I say to the American people, to Democrats and Republicans and Independents across this great land -- enough!" he said to a cheering crowd. "This moment, this election, is our chance to keep, in the 21st century, the American promise alive."

America cannot return to the past, the Illinois senator said, "not with so much work to be done."

"What the nay-sayers don't understand is that this election has never been about me," he said. "It's been about you."

In closing, Obama asked listeners to pledge "to march into the future ... without wavering, to the hope that we confess."