Iran is a country of 80 million people, educated and dynamic. It sits astride a crucial part of the world. It cannot be sanctioned and pressed down forever. It is the last great civilization to sit outside the global order.

One of the things that has been very difficult in Libya is the sense of uncertainty - the sense that they haven't actually finished the revolution, that there was still a great deal of uncertainty. That uncertainty has made Libya harder for business in terms of oil and other things as well.

I'm largely in favor of financial reform.

But as the arms-control scholar Thomas Schelling once noted, two things are very expensive in international life: promises when they succeed and threats when they fail.

If we didn't have the rest of the world growing, the United States economy would be in much worse shape than it is today.

There is very strong historical data that suggest the way societies grow is by making large, long-term investments.

I am an American, not by accident of birth but by choice. I voted with my feet and became an American because I love this country and think it is exceptional.