In journalism, there are only two stories - "Oh, the wonder of it," and "Oh, the shame of it."

If leadership is about anything, it's about leading. Not leading people back to where they already are, because they don't need that. They're already there.

The largest party in America, by the way, is neither the Democrats nor the Republicans. It's the party of non-voters.

The presidency is probably the loneliest office in America. Regardless of your friends, regardless of how good your marriage is, regardless of anything, you are alone there at the top.

True patriotism isn't cheap. It's about taking on a fair share of the burden of keeping America going.

Anyone believing the TPP is good for Americans take note: The foreign subsidiaries of U.S.-based corporations could just as easily challenge any U.S. government regulation they claim unfairly diminishes their profits - say, a regulation protecting American consumers from unsafe products or unhealthy foods, investors from fraudulent securities or predatory lending, workers from unsafe working conditions, taxpayers from another bailout of Wall Street, or the environment from toxic emissions.

Yale Law School was the kind of place you went if you felt you needed to go to law school, maybe, for your resume, but you really didn't want to practice law. You wanted to do public policy, or maybe go into politics.