You take what you've learned, you pass it down, and you keep working.

When you take a stand out of deep conviction, people know. They may not even agree, but they ask, 'Do I want someone who is willing to take a hard stand and someone I can trust to do that when the chips are down?' They want that.

With so many of our fundamental rights hanging in the balance, it is not good enough to simply roll the dice, hoping a nominee has changed his past views. It's not good enough to think, 'This is the best we can expect from this president'.

Our message will be that we're going to make federal government buildings a model - an energy-efficient model - and also start matching grants for cities and counties so that they can also do the same with their government buildings.

I know from my constituency what is going on. Doctors that are told, begged, by mothers, 'Please don't write down that my child as asthma. Please lie and say it's bronchitis, because if you write down asthma, when my child turns 18 or 20 and has to get his or her own insurance, it will be a pre-existing condition.'

The press is critical at this time, and if you look at history, this is so critical.

You have to be an optimist to be in politics.