Sticking your head in the sand might make you feel safer, but it’s not going to protect you from the coming storm.

Ultimately, I remain optimistic about not just America's future, but the direction that the world is growing.

Hope is not blind optimism. It's not ignoring the enormity of the task ahead or the roadblocks that stand in our path. It's not sitting on the sidelines or shirking from a fight. Hope is that thing inside us that insists, despite all evidence to the contrary, that something better awaits us if we have the courage to reach for it, and to work for it, and to fight for it. Hope is the belief that destiny will not be written for us, but by us, by the men and women who are not content to settle for the world as it is, who have the courage to remake the world as it should be.

If Iran does not take steps in the near future to live up to its obligations, then the United States will not continue to negotiate indefinitely... Our patience is not unlimited.

Elections matter and voting counts.

Lincoln basically pulled in all the people who had been running against him into his Cabinet because, whatever personal feelings there were, the issue was 'How can we get this country through this time of crisis?' 

That's part of what I tried to describe to my team and supporters after the election, there was a lot of disappointment.