I really wish that we had passed a comprehensive immigration bill because that would've really helped our country.

Democracy is the most realistic way for diverse peoples to resolve their differences, and share power, and heal social divisions without violence or repression.

Today's headlines and history's judgment are rarely the same. If you are too attentive to the former, you will most certainly not do the hard work of securing the latter.

I feel that we're dividing along class lines for the first time in our history. Now one thing that has happened in this reaction to globalization is that the elites are not respectful of the values of those who are ordinary citizens, so we seem to be dividing ourselves into ever-smaller identity groups, each with its own narrative, each with its own grievance, and that's a problem.

It was actually fun to write [memoir], because I went back to interview people my parents had taught or who had worked with them, and I learned a lot about them that I hadn't known.

I worry that the weakness - particularly of our public schools - is going to make that less and less true for everybody. And if we ever lose that as our core, then we're going to lose our confidence. We're not going to lead. We're going to protect. We're going to turn inward. That would be very bad for the world. So as a former Secretary of State, I think I can advocate for education as a national security priority.

The problem here is that there will always be some uncertainty about how quickly Saddam can acquire nuclear weapons. But we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.