History is written backwards but lived forwards.

I had more problems with the men in our own government, and not because they were male chauvinistic pigs but because they had known me for so long. I might have been a carpool mother and a friend of their wife, and so they'd been to my house for dinner and things like and they thought 'how did she get to be secretary of state when I should be secretary of state?' So that was more of a problem.

After the Cold War, to rally the American people to understand that we had to be a part of solutions. It's one thing to say that we have to run everything, it's another to say we don't want anything to do with it.

I think women are really good at making friends and not good at networking. Men are good at networking and not necessarily making friends. That's a gross generalization, but I think it holds in many ways.

If there's nobody in your way, you're not going anywhere.

I think that the Middle East is the largest piece of unfinished business that we all have. I happen to believe in the democratization process.

I am often asked if, when I was secretary, I had problems with foreign men. That is not who I had problems with, because I arrived in a very large plane that said United States of America. I had more problems with the men in our own government.