I don't oppose all wars. What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war.

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.

In my heart I know you didn't come here just for me, you came here because you believe in what this country can be. In the face of war, you believe there can be peace. In the face of despair, you believe there can be hope. In the face of a politics that's shut you out, that's told you to settle, that's divided us for too long, you believe we can be one people, reaching for what's possible, building that more perfect union.

If I did not love America, I wouldn't have moved here from Kenya.

Part of what we have to do a better job of, if our democracy is to function in a complicated diverse society like this, is to teach our kids enough critical thinking to be able to sort out what is true and what is false, what is contestable and what is incontestable. And we seem to have trouble with that. And our political system doesn't help.

We lose ourselves when we compromise the very ideals that we fight to defend. And we honor those ideals by upholding them not when it's easy, but when it is hard.

Health care got done because there were a lot of people out there who aren't professional politicians, but are citizens, who pushed for it even when the politics was hard.