If poverty is a disease that infects the entire community in the form of unemployment and violence, failing schools and broken homes, then we can't just treat those symptoms in isolation . We have to heal that entire community.

I'm a warrior for the middle class.

Politics didn't lead me to working people. Working people led me into politics.

There's no one who I believe has ever captured the soul of America more profoundly than Abraham Lincoln has.

You know, sometimes I'll go to an 8th-grade graduation and there's all that pomp and circumstance and gowns and flowers. And I think to myself, it's just 8th grade ... An 8th-grade education doesn't cut it today. Let's give them a handshake and tell them to get their butts back in the library!

I want to make sure America has got the best education system in the world. And we're retaining our workers for the jobs of tomorrow.

So just to be clear, I'm not going to sign any package that somehow prevents the top rate from going up for folks at the top 2 percent.