[Barack Obama] needs to really engage both Republicans and Democrats.

In this country, people are concerned about their economic future. They're very concerned about it. And they wonder whether somebody is getting something to - keeping them from getting it. That's not the America that I've ever known.

Politics can not only be drudgery and Captain Queeg with the balls in his hands.

Let me just suggest to everybody, and I hear - last February [2015], I said we needed to have people on the ground in a coalition with Europe and our allies. This is not going to get done just by working with the Sunnis. And it is not going to get done if we just embed a few people.

I think that's coming to an end. And, you know, when we ... we can't beg them [russians] to get along with us. And I think there was some of that going on, which has now ended.

A great power has to have the discipline not only to go when necessary but to know when not to go. Getting involved in ethnic, religious civil wars is a recipe for disaster.

Somebody tells me no, they're not going to keep telling me no, because I'm going to bother them to the point where it's a lot easier for them to say yes than keep saying no.