I'd be kidding if I said that I predicted the financial collapse.

It is absolutely clear that government plays a key role, as a catalyst, in promoting long-run growth.

The markets are much more interested in America's long-term trajectory than they are in feeling that there is an acute short-term crisis.

If a senator calls me up and asks me what should we do in Iraq, I'm happy to talk to him.

The Berlin Wall wasn't the only barrier to fall after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War. Traditional barriers to the flow of money, trade, people and ideas also fell.

China is ruthlessly pragmatic. It supports North Korea for its own selfish interests. And I believe that China no longer considers us an ally. The current president, Xi Jinping, cultivates close relations with South Korea. He has never met with me, the leader of North Korea, something that the leader of China has always done. At the grand celebrations in Beijing two years ago commemorating the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, he placed the president of Russia and the president of South Korea at his side. In North Korea, we pay a lot of attention to ceremonies and what they signal.

I'm largely in favor of financial reform.