It takes courage to set priorities because doing so is an admission that American policy cannot be all things to all people - or rather to all interest groups

U.S. officials never expected that 'we were going to open garages and find' weapons of mass destruction.

Every life is capable of greatness.

I get letters from kids from all over the country. I always try to answer them because there were people I looked up to in my youth and just wanted to be in contact with. It's also important to realize that you find your role models in a lot of different places. I've never believed that your role models have to look like you. You can find them in all sort of colors, shapes and sizes.

We can't rely - or no country can rely on just a single personality to carry it forward. And so what the American founding fathers understood was that institutions were built for human imperfection not human perfection.

I've always said that I expected to grow up and get married like any nice southern girl, but the fact is you don't get married in the abstract. You find someone that you'd like to be married to.

I was born in segregated Birmingham, Alabama. I didn't have a white classmate till we moved to Denver.