China is both an adversary, but also a potential partner in the international community if it's following the rules. So my attitude coming into office was that we are going to insist that China plays by the same rules as everybody else.

I am confident that Assad's days are numbered. But what we can't do is to simply suggest that, as Governor Romney at times has suggested, that giving heavy weapons, for example, to the Syrian opposition is a simple proposition that would lead us to be safer over the long term.

I think I did in the sense that there's a whole generation coming up behind us that was engaged, inspired, worked for change during the course of my presidency, saw what was possible. And that generation, it's coming.

I'm measuring my actions against that inner voice that for me at least is audible, is active, it tells me where I think I'm on track and where I think I'm off track.

If you listen to the rhetoric, it is so over-the-top and so overheated, and most importantly, is not acknowledging the fact that there's nothing else [like guns] in our lives that we purchase where we don't try to make it a little safer if we can.

The boarded-up homes, the decaying storefronts, the aging church rolls, kids from unknown families who swaggered down the streets - loud congregations of teenage boys, teenage girls feeding potato chips to crying toddlers, the discarded wrappers tumbling down the block - all of it whispered painful truths.

You know, I have more than enough to do without having to worry about the financial system.