We can rattle our sabers all we want but, realistically, we don't have troops for an invasion [Iran] and surgical strikes aren't going to work.

This week I've travelled more than 15,000 miles from America to China to Burma to Australia. I have no idea what time it is right now.

Never read Who Moved My Cheese in the workplace when you can read The Joy of Not Working.

I have Muslim members of my family. I have lived in Muslim countries.

What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task. This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

The notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8 years old, somehow reflects on me and my values doesn't make much sense.

What we should be asking is not whether we need a big government or small government, but how we can create a smarter and better government.