I get letters from [people getting insurance] right now. "You saved my child's life." "I did not have to sell my home when my wife got sick." And that is what, as a policy maker, I'm trying to achieve during the short period of time that I'm here.

It may be something that future generations are more open to, but I am pretty confident that for the foreseeable future, using the argument of nondiscrimination, and "Let's get it right for the kids who are here right now," and giving them the best chance possible, is going to be a more persuasive argument.

There are some exceptions: Chicago, my hometown, in particular. But overall in the country this is a much safer place than it used to be.

We have a stake in one another...what binds us together is greater than what drives us apart.

Even when our heart aches, we summon the strength that maybe we didn't even know we had, and we carry on; we finish the race.

Slowly, but surely, we are moving in the right direction. We're on the right track. The economy is getting stronger

We need fathers to step up, to realize that their job does not end at conception; that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child but the courage to raise one.