I am by nature a worried optimist.

As strong as the United States is, we can't deal with terrorism alone.

Really, I have to laugh because there was a whole set of stories that made me sound like the Dragon Lady, you know, 'tough this and tough that.' Then there is this business about 'gooey.' The bottom line is I am a pragmatic idealist.

As a leader, you have to have the ability to assimilate new information and understand that there might be a different view.

I enjoy wearing pins, and nobody tells me to do it.

We have a responsibility in our time, as others have had in theirs, not to be prisoners of history but to shape history, a responsibility to fill the role of path-finder, and to build with others a global network of purpose and law.

One of the things I write about a bit in my Madam Secretary memoir is on Rwanda, where I was an instructed ambassador at the U.N., and my instructions were to not vote for increased forces there, and I didn't like my instructions. So I got up and called Washington and said, "Change my instructions," and they didn't.