...More important than the deficit, more important then healthcare-more important than anything-we have got to do something about our energy strategy. Because if we permit the climate to continue to warm at an unsustainable rate, and if we keep on doing what we're doing until we're out of oil and we haven't made the transition, then it's inconceivable to me that our children and grandchildren will be able to maintain the American way of life and that the world won't be much fuller of resource-based wars of all kinds.

It simply doesn't make any sense for us to have illegal aliens in our custody in our courts and then let them go back to living here illegally. That's wrong and we should stop it.

Now, people ask me all the time how we got four surplus budgets in a row. What new ideas did we bring to Washington? I always give a one-word answer: Arithmetic.

The most important question of the 21st century is not what or how much, it is 'How?' How do you propose to turn your good ideas into positive changes in other people's lives? You must be the 'how generation.'

I don't know in my long life that I ever worked with anybody that has quite the combination of policy knowledge and concern, political skills, of a personal touch with people, and a sense of innate fairness that inspires confidence.

We know there are billions of stars and planets literally out there, and the universe is getting bigger. We know from our fancy telescopes that just in the last two years more than 20 planets have been identified outside our solar system that seem to be far enough away from their suns - - and dense enough - - that they might be able to support some form of life. So it makes it increasing less likely that we're alone. But if we were visited someday, I wouldn't be surprised.

Literacy is not a luxury, it is a right and a responsibility.