All my life, the naysayers have told me that I can't win because I'm a progressive... because I'm a woman... even because I'm a lesbian.

I have no idea what goes on in another person's mind. As a legislator, I need to be good at persuading people, counting votes and getting to 50 percent plus one. I don't go back and say, 'Why did this person get to the right position?' It's only, 'Are you yes or are you no?

In my grandfather's lab, scientists did independent research, and peers reviewed and commented on its merits. Politics, he taught me, had no place in the scientific process.

There will not be a magic day when we wake up and it's now okay to express ourselves publicly. We make that day by doing things publicly until it's simply the way things are.

Americans are not saving enough for retirement.

I think that that integrity is something that is important to voters.

It is hard to look the other way when a dictator is being so cruel and violent with his own people.