I wonder, sometimes, whether men and women in fact are capable of learning from history--whether we progress from one stage to the next in an upward course or whether we just ride the cycles of boom and bust, war and peace, ascent and decline.

Scripture tells us that we shall not oppress a stranger, for we know the heart of a stranger. We were strangers once, too.

The most important thing we can do is to make sure that we've got very high standards, we expect a lot out of all of our young people, and we make sure that we have the best teachers possible in every classroom.

And I do not want, and I will not accept, a deal in which I am asked to do nothing, in fact, I'm able to keep hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional income that I don't need, while a parent out there who is struggling to figure out how to send their kid to college suddenly finds that they've got a couple thousand dollars less in grants or student loans.

When I was a kid, I inhaled. Frequently. That was the point.

Oftentimes, misunderstandings and antagonism surfaces most strongly when economic times are tough. And that's not surprising. If everybody is working and feeling good and making money and buying a new house and a big screen TV, you're less worried about what other folks are doing.

Everybody acknowledges that the current path we're on is unsustainable, not just for the people who don't have health insurance but for those who do.