I was reminded that it is my obligation not only as an elected official in a pluralistic society, but also as a Christian, to remain open to the possibility that my unwillingness to support gay marriage is misguided.

Cynicism is a sorry kind of wisdom.

The biggest deficit that we have in our society and in the world right now is an empathy deficit. We are in great need of people being able to stand in somebody else's shoes and see the world through their eyes.

We have not always been in sync on every issue in terms of our core values, in terms of her integrity, her truthfulness, her thoughtfulness, [Angela Merkel] doing her homework, knowing her facts, her commitment to looking out for the interests of the German people first, but recognizing that part of good leadership on behalf of the nation requires engaging the world as a whole, and participating effectively in multilaterally institutions, I think she's been outstanding.

I've now been in 57 states. I think one left to go.

When you take on the position of president, you are committing yourself to, first and foremost, protecting the American people. You are accepting an institutional role that requires you to make hard decisions and hard choices, and as a consequence you have to take your moral sense and not put it aside.

ISIS is not an organization that can destroy the United States. This is not a huge industrial power that can pose great risks to us, institutionally or in a systematic way. But they can hurt us. And they can hurt our people and our families.