To determine whether or not you have the ingredients to be charismatic, answer the following questions: What are your real feelings about who you are? What do you believe in? Do you have goals or a mission in life? Do you project optimism? Do others turn to you for leadership? Noncharismatic people spend their lives auditioning for others and hoping they'll be accepted. Charismatic people don't doubt their ability to add value to a situation, so they move forward with their mission.

I think the media is dangerously close to creating their own product. They used to cover the product, which was whatever's happening.

You can't sell a book in America if you don't dump on Bush. That's the cheapest shot in the world. You cannot get an advance, and you can't sell a book because the publishers are all people who hate Bush and hate Republicans.

An enormous problem with paid media, especially at the congressional level, is it all starts to look alike.

Fighting with the media almost always is a mistake. You can't win the argument, the media has the last word, and most times your argument is not justified.

They [NPR] are, of course, Nazis. They have a kind of Nazi attitude. They are the left wing of Nazism. These guys don't want any other point of view. They don't even feel guilty using tax dollars to spout their propaganda. They are basically Air America with government funding to keep them alive.

I would advise people occasionally to take the media on, but only when you know it's a manufactured product and not a news interview.