China is a major power in the Pacific and I think we are dealing with some common threats in that region: the whole issue of Korea and the stability of Korea, the whole issue of nuclear proliferation, the whole issue of providing free access to our ships that are operating in that area.

The Taliban is resilient.

It doesn't make a lot of sense for us to borrow money from the Chinese to go give to another country for humanitarian aid. We ought to get the Chinese to take care of the people.

In this century, the 21st century, the U.S. recognizes our prosperity and our security depends even more on the Asia-Pacific region.

The most important thing we can do is prosecute the offenders, deal with those that have broken the law and committed this crime. And if we can do that then we can begin to deal with this issue and send a signal this is not a problem that we are going to ignore in the United States military.

The president is out there today trying to talk about health care, and the reality is nobody cares about what he's saying on health care because this news is consuming everything. No president could tolerate that or should tolerate it.

I know that young people sometimes, caught up in the moment, make some very foolish decisions.