My conviction is that those fights need to be fought right now and can be won. And if in fact we have finite political capital, energy, resources, we need to win those fights.

... the fact is it didn't happen in the first month, the first six weeks, in a way that was at all acceptable. And since I'm in charge, obviously, we screwed it up.

Around the world, Gandhi, Nelson Mandela -- what they did was hard. It takes time. It takes more than a single term. It takes more than a single president. It takes more than a single individual.

Africa doesn't need strongmen, it needs strong institutions.

I have nothing to hide. I enjoy being myself. I'm not going to change who I am just because it's Halloween.

We don't have this huge footprint, we are less likely to be targeted as, you know, occupiers [in Afghanistan and Iraq].

There's no reason why Americans should die when Afghans are perfectly capable of defending their own country.