I'm a strong believer in strong encryption.

My hope is that we can get a Republican-Democratic agreement on how we strengthen Social Security as well as looking at some of these other major expenditures that we have that we've got to deal with to make sure that we're not just leaving you guys with a mountain of debt.

I hope we can all agree that, instead of continuing to subsidize yesterday's energy sources. We need to invest in tomorrow's.

I do not accept that we cannot find a common sense way to preserve our traditions, including our basic second amendment freedoms and the rights of law abiding gun owners, while at the same time reducing the gun violence that unleashes so much mayhem on a regular basis.

I don't want to make decisions about what I'm eating or wearing. Because I have too many other decisions to make.

And, as a consequence of the pressure that we've applied over the last couple of weeks, we have Syria -- for the first time -- acknowledging that it has chemical weapons, agreeing to join the convention that prohibits the use of chemical weapons, and the Russians -- their primary sponsors -- saying that they will push Syria to get all of their chemical weapons out. The distance that we've traveled over these couple of weeks is remarkable.

One of the great things about being commander in chief is getting to know our men and women in uniform in a very intimate way, whether it's visiting Walter Reed and seeing our wounded soldiers, or being on a base and talking to families, or interacting with them on missions. They're the best of the best: always thinking about the mission, not thinking about credit, not thinking about who's up front.