I like the job. That's what I'll miss the most... I'm not sure anybody ever liked this as much as I've liked it.

I liked working with Republicans. We had five pretty good years after we had that bad year in '95 that culminated in two government shutdowns. But then they really decided that they liked being in the majority for the first time in forty years, and they wanted to get some things done, and I agreed, to get things I wanted. It was all perfectly transparent. Everybody knew what they wanted and what I wanted.

The Kyoto Treaty wasn't perfect, but we signed it, in fact, helped to draft it. And I'm very proud of it, it was the world's first commitment to doing something comprehensive on greenhouse gases and trying to reduce global warming before we do irreversible damage to many civilizations around the world.

There are fewer chemical pollutants in the air. Our drinking water is safer. Our food standards have been raised. We've cleaned up more toxic waste sites in three years than the previous administrations did in twelve. The environment is cleaner, and we have fought off the most vigorous assault on environmental protection since we began to protect the environment in 1970. We are moving in the right direction to the 21st century.

Sharing in God's blessings is at the heart of Thanksgiving and at the core of the American spirit.

Life is a journey towards truth, we have something to learn from each other, and everybody ought to have a chance to make the journey. So for us, a community is just made up of anybody who accepts the rules of the game, everybody counts, everybody has a role to play, everybody deserves a chance and we all do better when we work together

It was Mario Cuomo's great gift and our good fortune that he was both a sterling orator and a passionate public servant. His life was a blessing.