Confidence is the immaterial residue of material actions. Confidence is the public face of competence.

If you write something that gets a bad response, or someone commits candor or is off message, there are often consequences almost immediately when it appears in the paper or a magazine, that somebody gets called into the boss's office. And sometimes it can result in a loss of access for the reporter.

To try to be authentic these days, to ask questions of the people in power - it's difficult. This administration has evolved new techniques to handle people like me. Their strategy, in a word, is simple: ignore them.

I don't have to deal with the issues of the daily news cycle.

There are many instances in which those at the uppermost levels of the White House were feeling the President [Barack Obama] was not fully informed of the flow of events and, in some cases, where policies were going in the White House.

Civilizations rise and fall on confidence. America had figured out a way to borrow money to manufacture it.

It's exciting to work with the kids so devoid of irony, so unguarded. And also terrifying