A competition of the best ideas - that should be what Congress is about.

Mitt Romney is a businessman, a turnaround artist, a CEO. That is who he is. The former governor has experience in the public and private sector.

I've spent the better part of my career in politics and public policy working on and fighting for education reforms.

I don't really care how or why Obama got to the right place on gay marriage. I'm just glad he got there.

Mention the name George W. Bush in mixed company, and you're likely to spark a lot of debate and emotion - hot and cold, good and bad. Not a lot of neutral reaction. He was elected in the most controversial contest in American electoral history and governed during one of the most tumultuous decades.

It's much more powerful and compelling to create a positive vision than it is to tear somebody down.

America glories in its tradition of the self-made individual. Political candidates compete to be a friend to entrepreneurs, and policymakers, imagining the next Microsoft or Google, design laws to back the innovator in the garage.