My father left me with the feeling that I had to live for two people, and that if I did it well enough, somehow I could make up for the life he should have had. And his memory infused me, at a younger age than most, with a sense of my own mortality. The knowledge that I, too, could die young drove me both to try to drain the most out of every moment of life and to get on with the next big challenge. Even when I wasn't sure where I was going, I was always in a hurry.

So we, Democrats, have a responsibility there, every one of us, both to try to treat the Republicans with respect and as human beings to try to work with them on every issue we can, and then if those cannons are fired at us, we've got to stand up and fight back. If you lay down and you look like a deer caught in the headlights, then you will confirm the assault. And so we have to fight back.

Americans - not just starting thirty years ago but going back to the beginning, when we were rebelling against King George - we've always been of two minds about the government, which is why the framers wrote the Constitution the way they did.

Global poverty is a powder keg that could be ignited by our indifference.

We have no intention of abandoning the American people to unproven theories and extreme positions. We're the people party and we're going to stick up for the people.

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

When, President Bush asks me to go with his father to the Tsunami impacted areas and help raise money, I was thrilled to do that, because I think we have to always keep looking for common ground.