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I Have Much More Confidence In My Ability, Or Any President Or Any Leader's Ability, To Mobilize The American People Around A Multiyear, Multibillion-dollar Investment To Help Every Child In Poverty In This Country Than I Am In Being Able To Mobilize The Country Around Providing A Benefit Specific To African Americans As A Consequence Of Slavery And Jim Crow.

-Barack Obama

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I Have Much More

Barack Obama

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I Have Much More Confidence In My Ability, Or Any President Or Any Leader's Ability, To Mobilize The American People Around A Multiyear, Multibillion-dollar Investment To Help Every Child In Poverty In This Country Than I Am In Being Able To Mobilize The Country Around Providing A Benefit Specific To African Americans As A Consequence Of Slavery And Jim Crow.

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I Became A Lightning Rod For Some Partisan Battles. I Could Not Be Prouder Of The Track Record We've Put Together. By Almost Every Measure, The Country Is Significantly Better Off Than When I Came In.

I Look At Some Of The Kids That I Interact With, And They Were Born With So Many Disadvantages. And You Could Start Off In Your First Interaction With Them Saying, "unless They Get A Lot Of Compensatory Help, They're Not Going To Be Able To Compete; They're Just So Far Behind, And They're Wounded And They're Hurt."

My First Job Is To Say Thank You To Those Who Voted Me. Those Who Didn't, I'm Going To Get Your Vote Next Time.

Elections Are Always A Little Bit Funny. People Start Saying Things And Emphasizing Differences. After The Election, My Hope Is, Is That People Start Emphasizing What We Have In Common.

What Do You Think A Stimulus Is? It’s Spending - That's The Whole Point! Seriously.

A Relentless Focus On The Outward Markers Of Success Can Lead To Complacency. It Can Make You Lazy.

Funny Graduation

Young Men Need To Show Women The Respect They Deserve And Recognize Sexual Assault And To Do Their Part To Stop It.

Domestic Violence

Germany, South Korea - These Are All Countries That Are Investing Massively In Education. We've Got To Do The Same Thing In America.

I Believe There Are Too Many Children Who Need Loving Parents To Deny One Group Of People Adoption Rights. A Child Will Benefit From A Healthy, Loving Home, Whether The Parents Are Gay Or Not.

I Have Always Believed That Hope Is That Stubborn Thing Inside Us That Insists, Despite All The Evidence To The Contrary, That Something Better Awaits Us So Long As We Have The Courage To Keep Reaching, To Keep Working, To Keep Fighting." (victory Speech, Nov. 7, 2012)

The Iranians May Simply Try To Run Out The Clock.

So I'm Not Proposing Anything Radical. I Just Believe That Anybody Making Over $250,000 A Year Should Go Back To The Income Tax Rates We Were Paying Under Bill Clinton. Back When Our Economy Created Nearly 23 Million New Jobs, The Biggest Budget Surplus In History, And Plenty Of Millionaires To Boot. ... At The Same Time, Most People Agree That We Should Not Raise Taxes On Middle-class Families Or Small Businesses -- Not When So Many Folks Are Just Trying To Get By.

One Of The Things I Advised Donald Trump To Do Was To Make Sure That, Before He Commits To Certain Courses Of Action, He Has Really Dug In And Thought Through How Various Issues Play Themselves Out.

Undocumented Workers Can't Report If They're Not Being Paid Overtime, Or If Their Health And Safety Laws Are Being Violated, Of If They're Not Getting The Minimum Wage. And So A Lot Of Times Companies Prefer To Hire Them In Order To Take Advantage Of Them. We've Got To Crack Down On Those Employers.

Now, I Know That He's Taken Some Flak Lately, But No One Is Prouder To Put This Birth Certificate To Rest Than The Donald. Now He Can Get To Focusing On The Issues That Matter. Like, Did We Fake The Moon Landing? What Really Happened In Roswell? And Where Are Biggie And Tupac?

And Joe Biden, Thank You For Being The Best Vice President I Could Ever Hope For.

I Think The Most Important Thing Is To Take The Long View On Things. We Live In Such A 24/7, Twitter-fed, Constant News Cycle, And Everything's A Crisis, Everything Is Terrible, Everything Is Doomsday, Everything Is - If It Doesn't Get Solved Tomorrow, Your Presidency Is Going Off The Rails.

I'm So Overexposed, I'm Making Paris Hilton Look Like A Recluse.

We've Got To Identify New Strategies To Use Cleaner Energy, Because That Is A Recipe For Reducing The Overall Amount Of Pollution That's Out There.

I've Got Certain Responsibilities That I Have To Carry Out In A Very Specific Institution And In A Specific Moment In Time.

I Think We Can Provide Common-sense Approaches To The Issue Of Illegal Guns That Are Ending Up On The Streets. We Can Make Sure That Criminals Don't Have Guns In Their Hands. We Can Make Certain That Those Who Are Mentally Deranged Are Not Getting A Hold Of Handguns. We Can Trace Guns That Have Been Used In Crimes To Unscrupulous Gun Dealers That May Be Selling To Straw Purchasers And Dumping Them On The Streets.

I've Been Fighting With Acorn, Alongside Acorn, On Issues You Care About, My Entire Career.

[...] We Must Start By Inspiring Our Children With A Sense Of Purpose...by Nurturing Their Imagination So That They May Dream Big And Then Work Hard To Reach Those Dreams. Too Often, Our Children Spend Hours Playing Playstation Without Ever Finding Out How To Build Playstation. They Watch Television But Never Wonder How It's Put Together. They Surf Web Page After Web Page On The Internet, But Are Never Taught How To Design One.

Why Can't I Just Eat My Waffle?

For Everywhere We Look, There Is Work To Be Done. The State Of Our Economy Calls For Action: Bold And Swift. And We Will Act Not Only To Create New Jobs But To Lay A New Foundation For Growth. We Will Build The Roads And Bridges, The Electric Grids And Digital Lines That Feed Our Commerce And Bind Us Together. We Will Restore Science To Its Rightful Place And Wield Technology's Wonders To Raise Health Care's Quality And Lower Its Costs.

Only A Handful Of Men And Women Leave An Imprint On The Conscience Of A Nation And On The History That They Helped Shape.

When We Don't Pay Close Attention To The Decisions Made By Our Leaders, When We Fail To Educate Ourselves About The Major Issues Of The Day, When We Choose Not To Make Our Voices And Opinions Heard, That's When Democracy Breaks Down. That's When Power Is Abused. That's When The Most Extreme Voices In Our Society Fill The Void That We Leave. That's When Powerful Interests And Their Lobbyists Are Most Able To Buy Access And Influence In The Corridors Of Power - Because None Of Us Are There To Speak Up And Stop Them.

Number One, It Is Important That We Fix The Legal Immigration System, Because Right Now We've Got A Backlog That Means Years For People To Apply Legally. And What's Worse Is, We Keep On Increasing The Fees, So That If You've Got A Hard Working Immigrant Family, They've Got To Hire A Lawyer; They've Got To Pay Thousands Of Dollars In Fees. They Just Can't Afford It. And It's Discriminatory Against People Who Have Good Character, We Should Want In This Country, But Don't Have The Money. So We've Got To Fix That.

Our Kids Grew Up Here [in The White House]. Some Of Our Best Friends Have Been Made Here In This Place. There Have Been Moments That Were Highlights For Us - That - You Know, Are Going To Be Hard To Duplicate.

I Then Spoke To Chancellor (angela) Merkel Of Germany And We Agreed That The United States And Our European Allies Will Work Closely Together In The Weeks And Months Ahead.

The Fear Among Economists Across The Political Spectrum That Was - Was That We Were Rapidly Plummeting Towards A Second Great Depression. So, In The Weeks And Months That Followed, We Undertook A Series Of Difficult Steps To Prevent That Outcome. And We Were Forced To Take Those Steps Largely Without The Help Of An Opposition Party, Which, Unfortunately, After Having Presided Over The Decision-making That Had Led To The Crisis, Decided To Hand It Over To Others To Solve.

In December, I Agreed To Extend The Tax Cuts For The Wealthiest Americans Because It Was The Only Way I Could Prevent A Tax Hike On Middle-class Americans. But We Cannot Afford $1 Trillion Worth Of Tax Cuts For Every Millionaire And Billionaire In Our Society. We Can't Afford It. And I Refuse To Renew Them Again.

We May Have Different Backgrounds, But We Believe In The Same Dream That Says This Is A Country Where Anything's Possible. No Matter Who You Are. No Matter Where You Come From.

If We Have Actionable Intelligence About High Value Terrorist Targets And President [pervez] Musharraf Will Not Act, We Will.

We Are Still The America That Does The Hard Things, That Does The Great Things. We're The Nation That Always Dared To Dream. We're The Nation That Dared To Take Risks.

I Have Fought Against Spending. I Have Fought Against Special Interests. I Have Fought For Reform.

My Hope And Expectation Is That Regardless Of What Donald Trump Said During The Campaign, He's Going To Have To Look Carefully At The Realities When He Moves Forward.

If We Have Osama Bin Laden In Our Sights And The Pakistani Government Is Unable Or Unwilling To Take Them Out, Then, I Think That We Have To Act And We Will Take Them Out. We Will Kill Bin Laden. We Will Crush Al Qaeda. That Has To Be Our Biggest National Security Priority.

The Greek People Have Gone Through Some Very Difficult Times And There's Still A Hard Road Ahead, But Despite Those Hardships, Greece Has Continued To Be A Reliable Ally, Has Shown True Compassion To Fellow Human Beings In Need. It's An Example Of The Greek Character.

I'll Remember The View Out This Window [from Oval Cabinet], Because This Is Where We Had Our - The Playground That We Put In When Malia And Sasha Came In. Being Able Every Once In Awhile To Look Out The Window And See Your Daughters During The Summer, Swinging On That Swing Set, That Made The Presidency A Little Bit Sweeter.

I Know Cnn Has Taken Some Knocks Lately But The Fact Is, I Admire Their Commitment To Covering All Sides Of The Story, Just In Case One Of Them Happens To Be Accurate.

The Two Inaugurations Were Different. The First Inauguration I Was Thinking To Myself, "let's Make Sure I Don't Screw This Up." I Think There Is - People Always Talk About How Cool I Am. I Don't Care How Cool You Are.

We're Going To Make Sure, Regardless Of Disagreements We Have On Policy, That Our Military And Intelligence Cooperation To Keep The Israeli People Safe Continues And That Cooperation Also Helps The American People Stay Safe.

We Need Somebody Who's Got The Heart, The Empathy, To Recognize What It's Like To Be A Young Teenage Mom, The Empathy To Understand What It's Like To Be Poor Or African-american Or Gay Or Disabled Or Old - And That's The Criterion By Which I'll Be Selecting My Judges.

Three Months Is A Lifetime In Politics.

If You Want To Know Who We Are, Who America Is, How We Respond To Evil-that's It: Selflessly, Compassionately, Unafraid.

I Don't Have Time To Complain. I'm Going To Press On.

In Africa, You Often See That The Difference Between A Village Where Everybody Eats And A Village Where People Starve Is Government. One Has A Functioning Government, And The Other Does Not. Which Is Why It Bothers Me When I Hear People Say That Government Is The Enemy. They Don't Understand Its Fundamental Role.

Obviously I'm Grayer, A Few More Wrinkles. One Of The Things I'm Proud About Is That I Think My Basic Character And Outlook Actually Have Not Changed Much. And People Who Are Closest To Me Will Tell You That The Guy Who Came Here Is The Same Guy Who's Leaving.

The Only Time I Get Frustrated With Activist Criticism Is If I Have Recognized Them, And Invited Them To Work With Me To Figure Out How We Solve This Problem That They're Concerned About, And Either They Don't Engage Out Of The Sense Of Purity - "i'm Not Going To Shake His Hand" - Or You're Not Sufficiently Prepared So You Don't Even Know What To Ask For, Or You're Not Being Strategic As An Activist And Trying To Figure Out How The Process Has To Work In Order For You To Get What You Want.

I Think That The Democrats Can Be Successful Nationally In The Future If We Are Able To Capture Some Of The Complexity Of People's Lives Right Now.

If Some Of These [republican] Folks Were Around When Columbus Set Sail, They Must Have Been Founding Members Of The 'flat Earth Society.' They Would Not Believe That The World Was Round.

[we] Are Focused On Protecting And Defending Our Common Security And Upholding A Rules-based Order That Undergirds The Peace And Prosperity Of The Region And The World. In This Work, We Are Grateful For Our Continued Partnership With Singapore.

With The World's Unprecedented Inspections And Access To Iran's Program, We'll Know If Iran Ever Tries To Break Out.

Markets Will Rise And Fall, But This Is The United States Of America. No Matter What Some Agency May Say, We've Always Been And Always Will Be A Triple A Country.

[young People] Are Showing Enormous And Entrepreneurship And Working With Each Other Across Borders.

Entrepreneurship

Let's Face It, Fox News, You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone. It'll Be Harder To Convince The Public That Hillary Clinton Was Born In Kenya.

Iraq Is Sort Of A Situation Where You've Got A Guy Who Drove The Bus Into The Ditch. You Obviously Have To Get The Bus Out Of The Ditch, And That's Not Easy To Do, Although You Probably Should Fire The Driver.

Nobody's Madder Than Me About The Website Not Working As Well As It Should, Which Means It's Going To Get Fixed.

Women Deserve Equal Pay For Equal Work.

No One In The United States Of America Should Ever Be Targeted Because Of Who They Are, What They Look Like, Or How They Worship.

Donald Trump Is Like Hillary Clinton Said, A Man You Can Bait With A Tweet Is Not A Man You Can Trust With Nuclear Weapons. You Can`t Do It.

And I Will Do Everything That I Can As Long As I Am President Of The United States To Remind The American People That We Are One Nation Under God, And We May Call That God Different Names But We Remain One Nation.

Our Tears Are Not Enough. Our Words And Our Prayers Are Not Enough. If We Really Want To Honor These Twelve Men And Women, If We Really Want To Be A Country Where We Can Go To Work And Go To School And Walk Our Streets Free From Senseless Violence, Without So Many Lives Being Stolen By A Bullet From A Gun, Then We're Gonna Have To Change. We're Gonna Have To Change.

Part Of The Power Of The Internet Is That Information Flows Out There And It's Generally Not Censored And It's Generally Not Controlled By Any Single Authority.

Information Flow

Hunger, Disease And Poverty Can Lead To Global Instability And Leave A Vacuum For Extremism To Fill. So Instead Of Just Managing Poverty, We Must Offer Nations And People A Pathway Out Of Poverty. And As President I've Made Development A Pillar Of Our Foreign Policy, Alongside Diplomacy And Defense.

American Leadership Is Not Simply A Matter Of Going It Alone And Bearing All Of The Burden Ourselves.

The Supreme Court Nominations [example]. I Mean, The Fact That Mitch Mcconnell, The Leader Of The Republicans, Was Able To Just Stop A Nomination Almost A Year Before The Next Election And Really Not Pay A Political Price For It, That's A Sign That The Incentives For Politicians In This Town To Be So Sharply Partisan Have Gotten So Outta Hand That We're Weakening Ourselves.

The Map Isn't Always The Territory, And You Have To Kind Of Walk Through It To Get A Feel For It.

In Order To Make The Tough Decisions We Have To Know What Our Values Are And Who We're Fighting For And Our Priorities And If We Are Spending $300 Billion On Tax Cuts For People Who Don't Need Them And Weren't Even Asking For Them, And We Are Leaving Out Health Care Which Is Crushing On People All Across The Country, Then I Think We Have Made A Bad Decision And I Want To Make Sure We're Not Shortchanging Our Long Term Priorities.

Those Who Oppose Reform Will Also Tell You That Under Our Plan, You Won't Get To Choose Your Doctor - That Some Bureaucrat Will Choose For You. That's Also Not True.

Solyndra Is A Great Investment In Our Future

I Don't Think Donald Trump Is Ideological.

I Can Guarantee That Not Because I Give Attorney General [loretta] Lynch A Directive. That Is Institutionally How We Have Always Operated. I Do Not Talk To The Attorney General About Pending Investigations [on Hillary Clinton].

Guarantees That

Part Of People's Concern Is Just The Sense That Around The World The Old Order Isn't Holding And We're Not Quite Yet To Where We Need To Be In Terms Of A New Order That's Based On A Different Set Of Principles, That's Based On A Sense Of Common Humanity, That's Based On Economies That Work For All People.

Common Humanity

All This Marked Them As Vaguely Liberal, Although Their Ideas Would Never Congeal Into Anything Like A Firm Ideology; In This, Too, They Were American.

Without A Deal [with Iran], The International Sanctions Regime Will Unravel With Little Ability To Reimpose Them. With This Deal, We Have The Possibility Of Peacefully Resolving A Major Threat To Regional And International Security. Without A Deal, We Risk Even More War In The Middle East And Other Countries In The Region Would Feel Compelled To Pursue Their Own Nuclear Programs, Threatening A Nuclear Arms Race In The Most Volatile Region In The World.

So We Don't Need More Top-down Economics. We've Tried That Theory. We've Seen What Happens. We Can't Afford To Go Back To It.

On This Thanksgiving, As We Spend Time With Our Family And Friends, Let's All Reflect On What We're Thankful For In Our Own Lives. And Let's Remember Those Who Cannot Be With Their Loved Ones Because They're Serving Overseas. But Let's Also Do Our Part To Help Those Who Have No Place To Go For A Meal. I Encourage All Americans To Do What They Can To Help Those In Need-because The Best Way To Show Our Gratitude For What We Have Is By Doing Our Part For Those Who Have Less.

Family And Friends

Mitt Romney Is Familiar With Jobs Being Shipped Overseas Because He Invested In Companies That Were Shipping Jobs Overseas.

On September 11th, 2001, In Our Time Of Grief, The American People Came Together. We Offered Our Neighbors A Hand And We Offered The Wounded Our Blood. We Reaffirmed Our Ties To Each Other And Our Love Of Community And Country. On That Day, No Matter Where We Came From, What God We Prayed To, Or What Race Or Ethnicity We Were, We Were United As One American Family.

Let's Face It, I Like Stanford Grads. I'd Always Hear About This Campus, And Everybody Is Riding Bikes, And People Hopping Into Fountains.

I Think I Was Able To Talk To People About Values In Ways That People - In Ways That Resonated With Folks.

My Only Agenda For The Next Two Years Is The Same As The One I’ve Had Since The Day I Swore An Oath On The Steps Of This Capitol — to Do What I Believe Is Best For America.

Most Americans Believe That Escalation Will Not Bring The War In Iraq To A Responsible End, And That's Why I've Proposed Not Just A Troop Cap, But A Phased Redeployment That Will Start Bringing Our Troops Home.

Let It Be Said To Our Children's Children That When We Were Tested We Refused To Let This Journey End, That We Didn't Turn Our Back Nor Did We Falter; And With Eyes Fixed On The Horizon And God's Grace Upon Us, We Carried Forth That Great Gift Of Freedom And Delivered It Safely To Future Generations.

Love And Hope Can Conquer Hate.

I Don't Wanna Preempt An Announcement Next Week. And There's A Lot Of Technical Aspects To It. And If I - Say - That We're Doing One Thing. Then The Markets Might Interpret It Differently From What It Ends Up Being.

I Am Designating A New Director Of Recovery For Auto Communities And Workers To Cut Through Red Tape And Ensure That The Full Resources Of Our Federal Government Are Leveraged To Assist The Workers, Communities, And Regions That Rely On Our Auto Industry.

I See Tragedy And Comedy And Pain And Irony And All That Stuff. But In The End I Think Life Is Fascinating, And I Think People Are More Good Than Bad, And I Think That The Possibilities Of Progress Are Real.

America, This Is Our Moment. This Is Our Time. Our Time To Turn The Page Of The Policies Of The Past.

Part Of America's Genius Has Always Been Its Ability To Absorb Newcomers, To Forge A National Identity Out Of The Disparate Lot That Arrived On Our Shores.

The Truth Is That, In Trying To Get At Terrorists Who Are In Countries That Either Are Unwilling Or Unable To Capture Those Terrorists Or Disable Them Themselves, There Are A Lot Of Situations Where The Use Of A Drone Is Going To Result In Much Fewer Civilian Casualties And Much Less Collateral Damage Than If I Send In A Battalion Of Marines.

American Politics Is Always Somewhat Fluid. In This Age Of Social Media, It Means That Voters Can Swing Back And Forth.

I Think That Our Politics Everywhere Are Gonna Be Going Through This Bumpy Phase. But As Long As We Stay True To Our Democratic Principles, As Long As Elections Have Integrity, As Long As We Respect Freedom Of Speech, Freedom Of Religion, As Long As There Are Checks And Balances In Our Governments So That The People Have The Ability To Not Just Make Judgments About How Well Government Is Serving Them But Also Change Governments If They're Not Serving Them Well, Then I Have Confidence That Over The Long Term, Progress Will Continue.

The Challenges Posed By Threats Like Terrorism, Proliferation, And Cyber Attacks Are Not Going Away Any Time Soon, And For Our Intelligence Community To Be Effective Over The Long Haul, We Must Maintain The Trust Of The American People And People Around The World.

Progress In The Most Impoverished Parts Of Our World Enriches Us All.

For People Who Have Health Insurance, We Can Provide Health Insurance Reforms That Make The Insurance They Have More Secure. And We Can Do That Mostly By Using Money That Every Expert Agrees Is Being Wasted And Is Currently In The Existing Health Care System.

This Is American Leadership At Its Best: We Stand With People Who Fight For Their Own Freedom, And We Rally Other Nations On Behalf Of Our Common Security And Common Humanity.

These People Are A Part Of Me. And They Are A Part Of America, This Country That I Love.

Islam Is Not Part Of The Problem In Combating Violent Extremism - It Is An Important Part Of Promoting Peace.

We Can Lose So Much Of What We've Gained In Terms Of The Kind Of Democratic Freedoms And Market-based Economies And Prosperity That We've Come To Take For Granted.

[my Kids] Complained About Secret Service As They Became Teenagers, And Secret Service Has Done The Very Best Job They Could Accommodating Them, So It Hasn't Restricted Any Of Their Activities.

America Is An Unlikely Place - A Country Built On Defiance Of The Odds; On A Belief In The Impossible. And I Remind You Of This Because As You Set Out To Live Your Own Stories Of Success And Achievement, It's Now Your Turn To Help Keep It This Way.

But Shouldn't We Also Quit Marketing Murder As A Game?

My Mother Was The One Constant In My Life. When I Think About My Mom Raising Me Alone When She Was 20, And Working And Paying The Bills, And, You Know, Trying To Pursue Your Own Dreams, I Think Is A Feat That Is Unmatched.

The Belief That Peace Is Desirable Is Rarely Enough To Achieve It. Peace Requires Responsibility. Peace Entails Sacrifice.

The Issue Of Climate Change Is One That We Ignore At Our Own Peril. There May Still Be Disputes About Exactly How Much We're Contributing To The Warming Of The Earth's Atmosphere And How Much Is Naturally Occurring, But What We Can Be Scientifically Certain Of Is That Our Continued Use Of Fossil Fuels Is Pushing Us To A Point Of No Return. And Unless We Free Ourselves From A Dependence On These Fossil Fuels And Chart A New Course On Energy In This Country, We Are Condemning Future Generations To Global Catastrophe.

We Think Of Faith As A Source Of Comfort And Understanding But Find Our Expressions Of Faith Sowing Division; We Believe Ourselves To Be A Tolerant People Even As Racial, Religious, And Cultural Tensions Roil The Landscape. And Instead Of Resolving These Tensions Or Mediating These Conflicts, Our Politics Fans Them, Exploits Them,and Drives Us Further Apart.

People Always - I Think Were Surprised About Me Connecting With Folks In Small Town Iowa. And The Reason I Did Was - First Of All, I Had The Benefit That At The Time Nobody Expected Me To Win. And So I Wasn't Viewed Through This Prism Of Fox News And Conservative Media Making Me Scary. At The Time, I Didn't Think Seem Scary, Other Than Just Having A Funny Name. I Seemed Young.

Al Qaeda, The Taliban, A Whole Host Of Networks That Are Bent On Attacking America, Who Have A Distorted Ideology, Who Have Perverted The Faith Of Islam, And So We Have To Go After Them.

Those Jeans Are Comfortable, And For Those Of You Who Want Your President To Look Great In His Tight Jeans, I'm Sorry I'm Not The Guy. It Just Doesn't Fit Me. I'm Not 20.

Even As We Do All That's Necessary To Ensure Israel's Security, Even As We Are Clear-eyed About The Difficult Challenges Before Us, And Even As We Pledge To Stand By Israel Through Whatever Tough Days Lie Ahead, I Hope We Do Not Give Up On That Vision Of Peace. For If History Teaches Us Anything, If The Story Of Israel Teaches Us Anything, It Is That With Courage And Resolve, Progress Is Possible. Peace Is Possible.

We All Knew This. We All Knew That It Would Take More Time Than Any Of Us Want To Dig Ourselves Out Of This Hole Created By This Economic Crisis.

We Live In A Culture That Discourages Empathy. A Culture That Too Often Tells Us Our Principle Goal In Life Is To Be Rich, Thin, Young, Famous, Safe, And Entertained.

What Is True, Though, Is Now We've Got A Bunch Of Videos That Whatever Side Of The Issue You're On, Raises The Temperature On These Issues And Makes People Really Focused .

I Cannot Swallow Whole The View Of Lincoln As The Great Emancipator.

Stamina. There Is A Greater Physical Element To This Job Than You Would Think, Just Being Able To Grind It Out. And I Think Your Ability To Not Just Mentally And Emotionally, But Physically Be Able To Say, "we Got This. We're Going To Be Ok."

All Across The World, ...increasingly Dangerous Weather Patterns And Devastating Storms Are Abruptly Putting An End To The Long-running Debate Over Whether Or Not Climate Change Is Real. Not Only Is It Real, It's Here, And Its Effects Are Giving Rise To A Frighteningly New Global Phenomenon: The Man-made Natural Disaster.

I Think That The Issues We Have With Science These Days Are Not Restricted To What's Happening With Respect To Religion. There Are A Lot Of Very Religious Scientists Around.

I Think The Prime Minister Is The First To Acknowledge That Malaysia's Still Got Some Work To Do. Just Like The United States, By The Way, Has Some Work To Do On These Issues. Human Rights Watch Probably Has A List Of Things They Think We Should Be Doing As A Government.

The World Must Come Together To Confront Climate Change. There Is Little Scientific Dispute That If We Do Nothing, We Will Face More Drought, Famine And Mass Displacement That Will Fuel More Conflict For Decades.

There Is A Reason Why George Washington Is Always One Of The Top Three Presidents, And It's Not Because Of His Prowess As A Military Leader; It's Not Because Of The Incredible Innovations In Policy That He Introduced. It's Because He Knew When It Was Time To Go.

And Let Me Say This As A Politician I Can Promise You This, Political Leaders Will Never Take Risks If The People Do Not Push Them To Take Some Risks. You Must Create The Change That You Want To See.

I Don't Think I Underestimated [vladimir Putin], But I Think That I Underestimated The Degree To Which, In This New Information Age, It Is Possible For Misinformation For Cyber Hacking And So Forth To Have An Impact On Our Open Societies, Our Open Systems, To Insinuate Themselves Into Our Democratic Practices In Ways That I Think Are Accelerating.

In The Unlikely Story That Is America, There Has Never Been Anything False About Hope.

At A Time When The European Project Is Facing Challenges, It's Especially Important To Show The Benefits Of Economic Integration By Continuing To Invest In Our People And Working To Reduce Inequality, Both Within And Across Our Countries.

We Ask Our Men And Women In Uniform To Leave Their Families, Our Guardsmen And Reservists To Leave Their Jobs. We Ask You To Fight, To Sacrifice, To Risk Your Lives For Your Country. The Last Thing You Should Have To Do Is Fight For A Job When You Come Home.

Don’t Ever Let Anybody Tell You That Your Efforts Don’t Matter Or That Your Voice Doesn’t Count. Don’t Ever Believe That You Can’t Make A Difference. You Have.

I Will Promise You This, That If We Have Not Gotten Our Troops Out By The Time I Am President, It Is The First Thing I Will Do. I Will Get Our Troops Home, We Will Bring An End To This War. You Can Take That To The Bank.

It Is That Fundamental Belief, It Is That Fundamental Belief, I Am My Brother’s Keeper, I Am My Sister’s Keeper That Makes This Country Work. It’s What Allows Us To Pursue Our Individual Dreams And Yet Still Come Together As One American Family. E Pluribus Unum. Out Of Many, One.

There Is A Big Part Of Me That Has A Writer's Sensibility. And So That's How I Think. That's How I Pursue Truth. That's How I Hope To Communicate Truth To People.

I Absolutely Think That When We Talk About Family, Faith, Community, I Think It's Important For Democrats To Be Able To Connect With Folks Where They Live.

Because Our Right To Worship Freely And Safely, That Right Was Denied To Christians In Charleston, South Carolina, And That Was Denied Jews In Kansas City, And That Was Denied Muslims In Chapel Hill, And Sikhs In Oak Creek. They Had Rights Too. Our Right To Peaceful Assembly, That Right Was Robbed From Movie Goers In Aurora And Lafayette.

At Least Romney And Mccain, They Respect The Rule Of Law. At Least Romney And Mccain, They Understand Their Limitations.

The Arts Are What Makes Life Worth Living. You've Got Food, You've Got Shelter, Yeah. But The Things That Make You Laugh, Make You Cry, Make You Connect - Make You Love Are Communicated Through The Arts. They Aren't Extras.

The Rise In Health Care Costs Since Obamacare, The Affordable Care Act Was Passed, Have Been At Their Lowest Rate In 50 Years. Those Savings Have Extended The Medicare Trust Fund By 11 Years. So We've Got A Baseline Of Facts.so It Is True Theoretically That All That Progress Can Be Undone, And Suddenly 20 Million People Or More Don't Have Health Insurance.

When I Talked To [donald Trump] About - Our Intelligence Agencies, What I've Said To Him Is - Is That There Are Gonna Be Times Where You've Got Raw Intelligence That Comes In And In My Experience, Over Eight Years, The Intelligence Community Is Pretty Good About Saying, "look, We Can't Say For Certain What This Means." But There Are Gonna Be Times Where The Only Way You Can Make A Good Decision Is If You Have Confidence That The Process Is Working, And The People That You Put In Charge Are Giving You Their Very Best Assessments.

The Pain I Felt Was My Father's Pain.

In Dealing With Those Nations That Break Rules And Laws, I Believe That We Must Develop Alternatives To Violence That Are Tough Enough To Actually Change Behavior -- For If We Want A Lasting Peace, Then The Words Of The International Community Must Mean Something. Those Regimes That Break The Rules Must Be Held Accountable. Sanctions Must Exact A Real Price. Intransigence Must Be Met With Increased Pressure -- And Such Pressure Exists Only When The World Stands Together As One.

Insist That The First Question Each Of Us Asks Isn't "what's Good For Me?" But "what's Good For The Country My Children Will Inherit?

Our Unalienable Right To Life And Liberty And The Pursuit Of Happiness, Those Rights Were Stripped From College Kids In Blackburg And Santa Barbara, And From High Schoolers At Columbine. And, And From First Graders In Newtown, First Graders.

Pursuit Of Happiness

My Hope Is That The President-elect [donald Trump] Coming In Takes A Similarly Constructive Approach, Finding Areas Where We Can Cooperate With Russia, Where Our Values And Interests Align. But That The President-elect Also Is Willing To Stand Up To Russia Where They Are Deviating From Our Values And International Norms.

When Times Change, So Must We.

Its Important For People To Know That I Will Make Many Promises To Get Their Votes.

I Think It's Really Important To Enlarge The Issue Behind Abortion. I Have Been Serving For Over Two Decades And I Have Seen Year In And Year Out Largely The Republicans Voting Against Women's Contraception, Family Planning.

I See Donald Trump As A Phenomenon Of An Expression Of Certain Fears, Certain Resentments, That Have Been A Running Thread In American History.

The President Is Eager To Get To Work And Looks Forward To Working With The New Congress On Policies That Will Make Sure Middle-class Americans Are Sharing In The Economic Recovery, But The President Is Clear That He Will Not Let This Congress Undo Important Protections Gained -- Particularly In Areas Of Health Care, Wall Street Reform And The Environment.

Military Surge In Afghanistan To Eliminate The Taliban.

The Greek People Are Entrepreneurial.

Entrepreneurial

I Just Want To Repeat That There's Nothing That We've Proposed That Would Make It Harder For You To Purchase A Firearm.

All I Care About Is Making Sure That I Leave Behind An America That Is Stronger, More Prosperous, More Stable, More Secure Than It Was When I Came Into Office And That's Going To Continue To Drive Me.

There's One Issue That Will Define The Contours Of This Century More Dramatically Than Any Other, And That Is The Urgent And Growing Threat Of A Changing Climate.

Climate Change Poses A Direct Threat To The Infrastructure Of America That We Need To Stay Competitive In This 21st-century Economy.

We Cannot Stop Every Act Of Senseless Violence. We Cannot Know Every Evil That Lurks In Troubled Minds. But If We Can Prevent Even One Tragedy Like This, Save Even One Life, Spare Other Families What These Families Are Going Through, Surely We've Got An Obligation To Try.

If We're Not There Making The Argument Then The Cultural Gulf That Republicans Try To Exploit Saying, "ah, These City Slickers: They're All Looking Down On You, They Don't Care About You. They're Just Trying To Help Out Their Various Special Interest Constituencies," That Argument Ends Up Being Successful.

The United States Has Been Enriched By Muslim Americans. Many Other Americans Have Muslims In Their Families Or Have Lived In A Muslim-majority Country - I Know, Because I Am One Of Them.

So Many Of My Staff Is Young Enough That They're Going To Do Amazing Things. And I'm Going To Be Helping Them Try To Do Them.

A Little Reminder To Those Who Don't Back Obama And Gay Marriage. It's Probably Cause You're Gay.

I Hope You Don’t Listen To This. I Hope You Choose To Broaden, And Not Contract, Your Ambit Of Concern.

As The World's Largest Economy And Second-largest Carbon Emitter, As A Country With Unsurpassed Ability To Drive Innovation And Scientific Breakthroughs, As The Country That People Around The World Continue To Look To In Times Of Crisis, We've Got A Vital Role To Play. We Can't Stand On The Sidelines. We've Got A Unique Responsibility.

One Of The Things I Think The Next President Has To Do Is To Stop Fanning People's Fears. If We Spend All Our Time Feeding The American People Fear And Conflict And Division, Then They Become Fearful And Conflicted And Divided. And If We Feed Them Hope And We Feed Them Reason And Tolerance, Then They Will Become Tolerant And Reasonable And Hopeful.

When What You’re Doing Doesn’t Work For 50 Years, It’s Time To Try Something New.

You Want To Be Commander-in-chief? You Can Start By Standing Up For The Men And Women Who Wear The Uniform Of The United States, Even When It's Not Politically Convenient.

The Memoir Was A Very Personal Book. I Wrote It As A Personal Journey And Search About Who My Father Was And How My Family Had Come Together And Come Apart - Sorting All That Out, You Know, Issues Of Personal Identity.

...started By Missionaries In 1841, Punahou Academy Had Grown Into A Prestigious Prep School, An Incubator For Island Elites...it Hadn't Been Easy To Get Me In, My Grandparents Told Her (my Mother); There Was A Long Waiting List, And I Was Considered Only Because Of The Intervention Of Gramps' Boss, Who Was An Alumnus (my First Experience With Affirmative Action, It Seems, Had Little To Do With Race).

You Are Part Of The First Generation Of Officers To Begin Your Service In A World Where The Effects Of Climate Change Are So Clearly Upon Us. Climate Change Will Shape How Every One Of Our Services Plan, Operate, Train, Equip, And Protect Their Infrastructure, Today And For The Long-term.

What We Want Is For People To Know That You Can Get Affordable Health Care And Most Young Americans, They're Not Covered And The Truth Is They Can Get Coverage All For What It Costs To Pay Your Cell Phone Bill.

Having The United Kingdom In The European Union Gives Us Much Greater Confidence About The Strength Of The Transatlantic Union And Is Part Of The Cornerstone Of Institutions Built After World War Ii That Has Made The World Safer And More Prosperous.

I Don't Oppose All Wars. What I Am Opposed To Is A Dumb War. What I Am Opposed To Is A Rash War.

I Find It Hard To Believe That My God Would Consign Four-fifths Of The World To Hell. I Can't Imagine That My God Would Allow Some Little Hindu Kid In India Who Never Interacts With The Christian Faith To Somehow Burn For All Eternity. That's Just Not Part Of My Religious Makeup.

In Iraq And Syria, American Leadership - Including Our Military Power - Is Stopping Isil's Advance, Instead Of Getting Dragged Into Another Ground War In The Middle East, We Are Leading A Broad Coalition, Including Arab Nations, To Degrade And Ultimately Destroy This Terrorist Group.

Republicans In Congress Have Two Choices Here: They Can Act Responsibly, And Pay America’s Bills; Or They Can Act Irresponsibly, And Put America Through Another Economic Crisis. But They Will Not Collect A Ransom In Exchange For Not Crashing The American Economy.

If We're Not Vigilant Foreign Countries Can Have An Impact On The Political Debate In The United States In Ways That Might Not Have Been True 10, 20, 30 Years Ago In - In Part Because Of The Way News Is Transmitted And In Part Because So Many People Are Skeptical Of Mainstream News Organizations That - Everything's True And Everything's False.

To Break Our Addiction To Oil Is One Of The Greatest Challenges That Our Generation Will Have To Master.

In The Campaign Back In 2007, 2008, People Would Say, "oh, He's Being Naïve. He Thinks That There's No Red States And Blue States. And Wait 'til He Gets Here." And I Will Confess That, I Didn't Fully Appreciate The Ways In Which Individual Senators Or Members Of Congress Now Are Pushed To The Extremes By Their Voter Bases. I Did Not Expect, Particularly In The Midst Of Crisis, Just How Severe That Partisanship Would Be.

Here`s A Guy Who Says He`s A Great Businessman. But It Seems Like A Lot Of Trump's Business Is Built Around Stiffing Small Businesses And Workers Out Of What He Owes Them, Work They`ve Done. He Thinks That`s Cute Or Smart Or Funny To Basically Not Pay Somebody Who`s Done Work For Him And Say Go Ahead And Sue Me Because I`ve Got More Money Than You And You Can`t Do Anything About It.

I Don't Want To Make Decisions About What I'm Eating Or Wearing. Because I Have Too Many Other Decisions To Make.

You Know, The Truth Is That Right After 9/11, I Had A (flag) Pin. Shortly After 9/11, Particularly Because As We're Talking About The Iraq War, That Became A Substitute For, I Think, True Patriotism, Which Is Speaking Out On Issues That Are Of Importance To Our National Security, I Decided I Won't Wear That Pin On My Chest.

The Conversations Have Been Cordial. [donald Trump] Has Been Open To Suggestions, And The Main Thing That I've Tried To Transmit Is That There's A Different Between Governing And Campaigning, So That What He Has To Appreciate Is As Soon As You Walk Into This Office After You've Been Sworn In, You're Now In Charge Of The Largest Organization On Earth.

You [as A President] Have To Have A Strong Team Around You. You Have To Have Respect For Institutions And The Process To Make Good Decisions Because You Are Inherently Reliant On Other Folks.

I Don’t Believe It Is Possible To Transcend Race In This Country. Race Is A Factor In This Society. The Legacy Of Jim Crow And Slavery Has Not Gone Away. It Is Not An Accident That African-americans Experience High Crime Rates, Are Poor, And Have Less Wealth. It Is A Direct Result Of Our Racial History.

That Window Is Closing. . . . Now, The Clock Is Ticking. . . . We're Not Going To Have These Talks Just Drag Out In A Stalling Process. . . . We Haven't Given Away Anything - Other Than The Opportunity For Us To Negotiate

Clock Is Ticking

I Mentioned Charter Schools, And Experimenting With Our School System, To Make It Work. I Think That's Something We Really Have To Pay Attention To.

I Am Willing To Work With Anybody Who Wants To Have A Serious Conversation About Our Fiscal Future. We're Not Going To Do This Under The Threat Of Blowing Up The Entire Economy. I Will Not Negotiate Over Congress' Responsibility To Pay The Bills That Have Already Been Racked Up. I Don't Know How I Can Be More Clear About This.

Winston Churchill Used To Say That We, Americans, Try Every Other Option Before We Finally Do The Right Thing. After Everything Else Is Exhausted We Eventually Do The Right Thing And I Think That's True For Congress As Well. And It's Important For Americans To Remember That Politics Has Always Been Messy.

I Try To Make It A Rule Not To Meddle In Other People's Politics.

My Administration Doesn’t Have Any Secrets, And From Now On, Neither Will You.

If You Think You Got A Better Idea In Terms Of How To Approach This That's Not Gonna Result In More Pollution, And More Asthma, And More Illness Then Put Your Ideas Out There. But Don't Just Oppose Things Because, "this Was Obama's Agenda."

Some Of Donald Trump's Gifts That Obviously Allowed Him To Execute One Of The Biggest Political Upsets In History, Those Are Ones That Hopefully He Will Put To Good Use On Behalf Of All The American People.

... Our Interests And Our Conscience Compel Us To Act On Behalf Of Those Who Long For Freedom. And We Must Be A Source Of Hope To The Poor, The Sick, The Marginalized, The Victims Of Prejudice.

If You Like Your Doctor Or Health Care Provider, You Can Keep Them. If You Like Your Health Care Plan, You Can Keep That, Too.

All Too Rarely Do I Hear People Asking Just What It Is That We've Done To Make So Many Children's Hearts So Hard, Or What Collectively We Might Do To Right Their Moral Compass - What Values We Must Live By.

Over The Last Few Years A Lot Of People Have Become Aware Of The Inequities In The Criminal Justice System, Right Now, With Our Overall Crime Rate And Incarceration Rate Both Falling, We're At A Moment When Some Good People In Both Parties, Republicans And Democrats And Folks All Across The Country, Are Coming Up With Ideas To Make The System Work Smarter And Better.

In Reaffirming The Greatness Of Our Nation, We Understand That Greatness Is Never A Given. It Must Be Earned. Our Journey Has Never Been One Of Shortcuts Or Settling For Less. It Has Not Been The Path For The Faint-hearted, For Those Who Prefer Leisure Over Work, Or Seek Only The Pleasures Of Riches And Fame. Rather, It Has Been The Risk-takers, The Doers, The Makers Of Things -- Some Celebrated, But More Often Men And Women Obscure In Their Labor -- Who Have Carried Us Up The Long, Rugged Path Towards Prosperity And Freedom.

I Do Not Accept That We Cannot Find A Common Sense Way To Preserve Our Traditions, Including Our Basic Second Amendment Freedoms And The Rights Of Law Abiding Gun Owners, While At The Same Time Reducing The Gun Violence That Unleashes So Much Mayhem On A Regular Basis.

We Are Engaging In The Diplomatic Efforts That Are Required Within Iraq Among The Shia, The Sunni And The Kurd, Among Friends, Like Egypt, And Turkey And Saudi Arabia, But Also Enemies Like Iran And Syria. They Have To Have Buy-in Into That Process.

If Condoms And Potentially Microbicides Can Prevent Millions Of Deaths [from Aids], They Should Be Made More Widely Available. I Know That There Are Those Who, Out Of Sincere Religious Conviction, Oppose Such Measures. And With These Folks, I Must Respectfully But Unequivocally Disagree.

We Have To Focus On How Do We Ensure The Economy Works For Everybody, And Not Just A Few.

It Is True, I Worry About The Hype. The Only Person More Over-hyped Than Me Is You.

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Alberto Manguel

William F. Buckley, Jr.

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