I also know that there have been many times in our history when the proximity of an election has induced exactly the kind of leadership and consensus-building that produce progress in our democracy.

I support development and deployment of a limited national missile defense. Few if any of our duties surpass our obligation to provide for the common defense of our nation.

Hollywood has glorified adult premarital sex, and that is unhelpful if your goal is to reduce teen pregnancy and out-of-wedlock births.

[People of faith must] reassure them [atheists] that we share with them the core values of America, that our faith is not inconsistent with their freedom and our mission is not one of intolerance, but one of love.... I stand before you today as a witness to the goodness of God. For me, like you and like my running mate Al Gore, faith provided a foundation, order and purpose in my life.

The essential facts are known. We know of the weapons in Saddam's possession: chemical, biological, and nuclear in time. We know of his unequaled willingness to use them. We know his history. His invasions of his neighbors. His dreams of achieving hegemonic control over the Arab world. His record of anti-American rage. His willingness to terrorize, to slaughter, to suppress his own people and others. We need not stretch to imagine nightmare scenarios in which Saddam makes common cause with the terrorists who want to kill us Americans and destroy our way of life.

I've spent the last year listening to Americans, and the state of the union that George W. Bush lives in is very different from the state that most hardworking Americans are living in.

It is time for Democrats who distrust President Bush to acknowledge that he will be commander in chief for three more critical years, and that in matters of war we undermine presidential credibility at our nation's peril.