I have never lost faith in America's essential goodness and greatness.

We are at a stage in history in which remolding society is one of the great challenges facing all of us in the West.

I did put together the coalition to impose sanctions. I actually started the negotiations that led to the nuclear agreement, sending some much my closest aides to begin the conversations with the Iranians.

Presidents should be very careful at all times in discussing the use or non-use of nuclear weapons. Presidents since the cold war have used nuclear deterrence to keep the peace, and I don't believe that any president should make any blanket statements with respect to the use or non-use of nuclear weapons.

On the spending, don't forget bridges and roads. It's like puppies and ice cream - who doesn't like them?

On healthcare we are the prisoner of our past. The way we got to develop any kind of medical insurance program was during World War II when companies facing shortages of workers began to offer healthcare benefits as an inducement for employment. So from the early 1940s healthcare was seen as a privilege connected to employment. And after the war when soldiers came back and went back into the market there was a lot of competition, because the economy was so heated up.

The challenges of change are always hard. It is important that we begin to unpack those challenges that confront this nation and realize that we each have a role that requires us to change and become more responsible for shaping our own future.