We're going to have the best educated American people in the world. People that are really very weird can get into sensitive positions and have a tremendous impact on history.

We go forward with complete confidence in the eventual triumph of freedom. Not because history runs on the wheels of inevitability; it is human choices that move events. Not because we consider ourselves a chosen nation; God moves and chooses as He wills.

"Statesman" presumes I'm out there giving opinions all the time about things, and no, I'm not interested in opining on a lot of subjects.

The Patriot Act closed dangerous gaps in America's law enforcement and intelligence capabilities, gaps that terrorists exploited when they attacked us.

I talked about the human suffering in Iraq. And I also saw the need to advance a freedom agenda. Imagine a world in which Saddam Hussein was there, stirring up even more trouble in a part of the world that had so much resentment and so much hatred that people came and killed 3,000 of our citizens. I've heard this theory about everything was just fine until we arrived and the stir-up-the-hornet's- nest theory. It just doesn't hold water, as far as I'm concerned. The terrorists attacked us and killed 3,000 of our citizens before we started the freedom agenda in the Middle East.

War crimes will be prosecuted. War criminals will be punished. And it will be no defense to say, 'I was just following orders.'

we're too great a nation to allow the evil-doers to affect our soul and our spirit.