The president [Barak Obama] had been asked some questions by George Stephanopoulos on a news show about whether it was a tax. And he had given an answer that you might read as him saying it wasn't a tax. I think what he said was, "It isn't a tax increase on all Americans."

I do think it's true that a huge amount of the oversight that the White House engages in with respect to the Executive Branch is out of fear that somebody's going to do something crazy and drive the president off a cliff.

When we're not a party, we sometimes file as amicus, as friend of the court, 25, 30 times a term, sometimes more. And in each of those cases, we've got to decide what position the government's going to take. And that is the solicitor general's job to make that decision.

Sometimes one of the justices, because they're, you know, they're brilliant lawyers themselves, can put the question in a particular way so that, even if you've prepared to talk about the topic, the question is put in such an excruciatingly difficult way that there's just no good way to handle it.

The president [Barak Obama] had been asked some questions by George Stephanopoulos on a news show about whether it was a tax. And he had given an answer that you might read as him saying it wasn't a tax. I think what he said was, "It isn't a tax increase on all Americans."

I had a great deal of independence from the president and the White House during the entirety of my five years. And I'm not sure exactly what that is, but our friend, Walter Dellinger, has a theory about it, and I think he's probably right. And the theory starts with the fact that I worked in the White House for a year and a half before coming over to the position of SG. And because of that, when I was nominated, there was some chatter out there that, "Oh. They're putting a political hack in. This has never happened before."

I feel so blessed to have had the chance to do this job [ U.S. Solicitor General] in this moment in our history. It's been an incredible thing.