But I'm still a work in progress. My mother calls me quite frequently with various critiques of my performance on TV and other public events. She's usually pretty severe with her comments.

Right now there’s kind of a generational change. Young Americans do not trust this government. Without trusting government you can't do a lot of things.

They're all tied together: taxes, Medicare, Social Security, and the debt. We've got to have a setting of priorities, and looking at it - at each of them as disconnected, I think, doesn't properly address these major challenges.

What I don't know is what the unexpected might be.

Inexperience because of (President Barack) Obama's inexperience.Look that would be one of the challenges.

I think they put some lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig.

We want to work with the Russians. But we also have every right to expect the Russians to behave in a fashion and keeping with a - with a - with a country who respects international boundaries and the norms of international behavior.