To me, the failure of liberalism - the tradition I come from - was not recognizing there has to be justice across the generations.

Politics, like theater, is one of those things where you've got to be wise enough to know when to leave.

Amnesty is a big billboard, a flashing billboard, to the rest of the world that we don't really mean our immigration law.

Many seniors understand that Social Security is social insurance as opposed to a program where we put money aside for our own retirement. But most elderly individuals think they're getting their money back. So it isn't selfishness as much as a misunderstanding.

The biggest challenge of public policy is to know when and how the world has changed. We are no longer an empty continent with endless absorptive capacity. We have a cash-wage economy that is having terrible problems finding jobs for its own people. The concern about immigration is not nativism but common sense.

I had a group of Hispanic Americans come into my office in 1976 who worked in a Denver packing plant. They had just been fired by their employer who turned around and hired illegal aliens for a lot less money. That had a big impact on me.

A nation can't get strong on political pablum.