Facts are facts: No president since Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the Great Depression inherited a worse economy, bigger job losses or deeper problems from his predecessor. But President Obama is moving America forward, not back.

Romney economics would spell disaster for America's middle class. In this economy there are shipbuilders and ship wreckers.

But we should not lose sight of how far we are coming and what a big hole we were left by George W. Bush.

Our role in the world is not to roam the globe looking for new dictators to topple. Our role in the world is to make ourselves a beacon of hope. Make ourselves stronger at home, but also our role in the world, yes, is also to confront evil when it rises.

If you give voters a choice between a Democrat who promises to do nothing and a Republican who promises to do nothing, they’re generally going to side with the Republican, because they’re better at that than we are.

As Americans, we have shown ourselves to have the greatest military on the face of the planet, but we are not so very good at anticipating threats and appreciating just how difficult it is to build up stable democracies, to make the investments and sustainable development that we must as a nation if we are to attack the root causes of these sorts of instability.

The only thing that's consistent in politics is change.