A Pentagon official once said the people who would actually push the button probably have never seen a person die. He said the only hope -and it's a strange thought - is if they put the button to launch the nuclear war behind a man's heart. The President, then, with a rusty knife, would have to cut out the man's heart, kill the man, to get to the button.

As intellectual as we think we are, you still trip, we still have human foibles, sexuality, all the different things to still make you aware of your humanity.

In down times I do things like go for a long bike ride or run. The other thing I'm doing in that quiet time is just observing.

I don't have a college degree, and my father didn't have a college degree, so when my son, Zachary, graduated from college, I said, "My boy's got learnin'!"

Sometimes you got to specifically go out of your way to get into trouble. It's called fun.

One day [when I relapsed] I walked into a store and saw a little bottle of Jack Daniel's. And then that voice - I call it the 'lower power' - goes, 'Hey. Just a taste. Just one.' I drank it, and there was that brief moment of 'Oh, I'm okay!' But it escalated so quickly. Within a week I was buying so many bottles I sounded like a wind chime walking down the street.

I was in Iraq, Afghanistan, Djibouti, Bahrain. The first year I went pretty much by myself. Then I went with General [Richard] Myers, head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The shows and audiences were amazing. You'll never get a better group of people.