America has a terrible educational problem in the sense that we have too many youngsters not finishing school. A third of our kids don't finish high school, 50 percent of minorities don't finish high school.

I don't think anyone would disagree with the conclusion that Saddam [Hussein] was a terrible dictator. He had gassed his own people and his neighbors. He had killed thousands of people, and he had started a couple of wars and destroyed his country.

Don't let your ego get too close to your position, so that if your position gets shot down, your ego doesn't go with it.

Always find different ways to accomplish the mission. Then run a counter-analysis and list the advantages and disadvantages. When you have done that, you are ready to make a decision.

Organization doesn't really accomplish anything. Plans don't accomplish anything, either. Theories of management don't much matter. Endeavors succeed or fail because of the people involved. Only by attracting the best people will you accomplish great deeds.

We are rather candid with them about the nature of their political processes and the state of development of their institutions, but they are looking to the West because they know that's where success lies.

The claims made about Iraq's WMD capabilities before the invasion were inaccurate, wrong, and in some cases, deliberately misleading.