One of the reasons the deficit got as big as it did, frankly, was because of the economic slowdown, the fall-off in deficits, the terrorist attacks. A significant chunk was taken out of the economy by what happened after the attacks of 9/11.

Two days ahead of schedule, the world witnessed the arrival of a free and sovereign Iraq.

It’s clearly established in terms of training, provision of bomb-making experts, training of people with respect to chemical and biological warfare capabilities, that al-Qaeda sent personnel to Iraq for training and so forth.

Remember, success for a politician is 50% plus one. You don't have to have everybody on board.

In our own country, we take democratic values seriously - and so we always have a vigorous debate on the issues. That's part of the greatness of America, and we wouldn't have it any other way.

We have to deal with this new type of threat in a way we haven’t yet defined. . . . With a low-probability, high-impact event like this . . . If there’s a one percent chance that Pakistani scientists are helping al Qaeda build or develop a nuclear weapon, we have to treat it as a certainty in terms of our response.

If you're going to go increase taxes on small businesses, you're going to slow down the extent to which we're able to reduce unemployment. So I think it's a serious mistake; the wrong time to raise taxes.