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One Of The Gratifying Things, I Think, About The End Of My Presidency Even Though Admittedly My Successor Ran Against A Lot Of What We Stood For, Is When You Look At The Individual Issues And The Progress That We've Made On A Lot Of Those Issues, We Got The Support Of A Pretty Decent Majority.

-Barack Obama

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One Of The Gratifying

Barack Obama

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One Of The Gratifying Things, I Think, About The End Of My Presidency Even Though Admittedly My Successor Ran Against A Lot Of What We Stood For, Is When You Look At The Individual Issues And The Progress That We've Made On A Lot Of Those Issues, We Got The Support Of A Pretty Decent Majority.

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Democracy Cannot Be Imposed On Any Nation From The Outside. Each Society Must Search For Its Own Path, And No Path Is Perfect.

People In Every Country Should Be Free To Choose And Live Their Faith Based Upon The Persuasion Of The Mind, And The Heart, And The Soul. This Tolerance Is Essential For Religion To Thrive.

The Biggest Threat That We Face Right Now Is Not A Nuclear Missile Coming Over The Skies. It's In A Suitcase. This Is Why The Issue Of Nuclear Proliferation Is So Important. It Is The - The Biggest Threat To The United States Is A Terrorist Getting Their Hands On Nuclear Weapons.

You Know, One Of The Things I Think You Understand As President Is You're Held Responsible For Everything, But You Don't Always Have Control Of Everything, Right?

No Matter How Long It Takes, The United States Will Find And Bring To Justice The Terrorists Who Are Responsible For Kayla's Captivity And Death, Isil Is A Hateful And Abhorrent Terrorist Group Whose Actions Stand In Stark Contrast To The Spirit Of People Like Kayla.

If A Jayvee Team Puts On Lakers Uniforms, That Doesn't Make Them Kobe Bryant.

We Stand With Israel As A Jewish Democratic State Because We Know That Israel Is Born Of Firmly Held Values That We, As Americans, Share: A Culture Committed To Justice, A Land That Welcomes The Weary, A People Devoted To Tikkun Olam. ... So America's Commitment ... And My Commitment To Israel And Israel's Security Is Unshakeable. It Is Unshakeable. ... I Am Proud To Say That No U.s. Administration Has Done More In Support Of Israel's Security Than Ours. None. Don't Let Anybody Else Tell You Otherwise. It Is A Fact.

You Didn't Elect Me To Tell You What You Wanted To Hear. You Elected Me To Tell You The Truth.

African American

Tonight, More Americans Are Out Of Work And More Are Working Harder For Less. More Of You Have Lost Your Homes And Even More Are Watching Your Home Values Plummet. More Of You Have Cars You Can't Afford To Drive, Credit Card Bills You Can't Afford To Pay, And Tuition That's Beyond Your Reach.

Look, Americans Will Go For Leadership That Makes Sense. Our Job, You Know, As Public Officials, Is Not To Put Our Finger In The Air. Our Job Is To Listen, And Then Lead.

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

Funny Graduation

I Would Put Our Legislative And Foreign Policy Accomplishments In Our First Two Years Against Any President - With The Possible Exceptions Of Johnson, Fdr, And Lincoln - Just In Terms Of What We've Gotten Done In Modern History. But, You Know, But When It Comes To The Economy, We've Got A Lot More Work To Do. And We're Gonna Keep On At It.

I Believe In Term Limits For Presidents Because I Think That There Is No Doubt I'm A Better President Now Than I Was When I Start. I Would Argue That I Am The Best President I've Ever Been Over The Last Year Or Two. My Team Is More Effective Than It's Ever Been.but What Is Also True Is That Number One, This Is Grueling.

It's The Job, I Think, Of Leaders To Try To Address Peoples' Real Legitimate Concerns And Channel Them In The Most Constructive Ways Possible.

I Think That Dealing With Guns Is One Way To Handle The Violent-crime Issues That We Have In This Country.

We Do Not Consider Ourselves A Christian Nation.

Arne Duncan Is Done More To Bring Our Educational System, Sometimes Kicking And Screaming, Into The 21st Century Than Anyone Else.

Obviously, We've All Had Disagreements And Differences In The Past. I Suspect We'll Have Them Again In The Future. But Last Night As Americans Learned That The United States Had Carried Out An Operation That Resulted In The Capture And Death Of Osama Bin Laden. I Think We Experienced The Same Sense Of Unity That Prevailed On 9/11. We Were Reminded Again That There Is A Pride In What This Nation Stands For. And What We Can Achieve That Runs Far Deeper Than Party, Far Deeper Than Politics.

We Cannot Allow Internet Service Providers To Restrict The Best Access Or To Pick Winners And Losers In The Online Marketplace For Services And Ideas.

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.

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When I've Sent Young Men And Women Into Harm's Way, I Always Understand That That Is The Last Resort, Not The First Resort.

Rather Than Pointing Fingers Or Assigning Blame, Let’s Use This Occasion To Expand Our Moral Imaginations, To Listen To Each Other More Carefully, To Sharpen Our Instincts For Empathy And Remind Ourselves Of All The Ways That Our Hopes And Dreams Are Bound Together.

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

The Kind Of Violence, Looting, Destruction That We Saw From A Handful Of Individuals In Baltimore, There's No Excuse For That. That's Not A Statement. That's Not Politics. That's Not Activism. That's Just Criminal Behavior.

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We're Up Against The Conventional Thinking That Says Your Ability To Lead As President Comes From Longevity In Washington Or Proximity To The White House. But We Know That Real Leadership Is About Candor And Judgment And The Ability To Rally Americans From All Walks Of Life Around A Common Purpose, A Higher Purpose.

My Goal Is Not To Resolve Conflicts And Tensions In The Region Through More War. My Goal Is To Make Sure That, You Know, We Are Able To Negotiate A Deal That We Can Verify.

I Don't Think That Hedge Funds Are Bad Per Se. I Think They're Just One More Financial Tool. And In That Sense, They're Useful.

The Profound Mistake Of Reverend Wright's Sermons Is Not That He Spoke About Racism In Our Society. It's That He Spoke As If Our Society Was Static; As If No Progress Has Been Made; As If This Country - A Country That Has Made It Possible For One Of His Own Members To Run For The Highest Office In The Land And Build A Coalition Of White And Black; Latino And Asian, Rich And Poor, Young And Old - Is Still Irrevocably Bound To A Tragic Past.

They Say I Need To Be Seasoned; They Say I Need To Be Stewed. They Say, 'we Need To Boil All The Hope Out Of Him -- Like Us -- And Then He'll Be Ready.'

Its [dreams From My Father] Also A Reflection About How We Might Start A Better Conversation In Our Democracy About How To Solve Problems, Because It Feels As If Our Political System - It Just Seems There Is So Much Cynicism And Negativity In Our Politics.

We Will Not Apologise For Our Way Of Life.

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You Have To Be Involved In Terms Of What's Happening In Your Local Neighborhood And What Issues Are There.

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So Don't Get Cynical. Cynicism Didn't Put A Man On The Moon. Cynicism Has Never Won A War, Or Cured A Disease, Or Built A Business, Or Fed A Young Mind. Cynicism Is A Choice. And Hope Will Always Be A Better Choice.

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[about His Marijuana Use] I Did. It's Not Something That I'm Proud Of. It Was A Mistake As A Young Man, But You Know? I Mean Not Going To -- I Never Understood That Line. The Point Was To Inhale. That Was The Point.

You Know, The Bowling Alley Doesn‘t Seem To Be Improving My Game. That‘s The One Thing I Have Noticed.

I Want To Be Very Clear: I Will Not Sign On To Any Health Plan That Adds To Our Deficits Over The Next Decade.

Well, Governor, We Also Have Fewer Horses And Bayonets.

Aircraft Carriers

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Whether We Like It Or Not, We Remain A Dominant Military Superpower.

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Sometimes When These Kinds Of Things Happen, It Can Seem A Little Bit Too Much To Bear. But What I Want The People Of Louisiana Know Is That You're Not Alone On This. Even After The Tv Cameras Leave, The Whole Country Is Going To Continue To Support You And Help You Until We Get Folks Back In Their Homes And Lives Are Rebuilt.

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[when I Ordered 30,000 More Troops Into Afghanistan] That Was The First Time In Which I Looked Out At A Crowd Of West Point Graduates And Knew That Some Of Those Might Not Come Back Because Of That Decision.

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Think About It: Iran, Cuba, Venezuela - These Countries Are Tiny Compared To The Soviet Union. They Don't Pose A Serious Threat To Us The Way The Soviet Union Posed A Threat To Us.

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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.

Yes To Trade, But Trade That Ensures That These Other Countries That Trade With Us Aren't Engaging In Child Labor.

Buy Health Insurance, Or Go To Jail.

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I Have Said Repeatedly That America Doesn't Torture And I'm Going To Make Sure That We Don't Torture. Those Are Part And Parcel An Effort To Regain America's Moral Stature In The World.

It Is My View That If Society Was Doing The Right Thing With Respect To You, [and There Were] Programs Targeted At Helping People Rise Into The Middle Class And Have A Good Income And Be Able To Save And Send Their Kids To School, And You've Got A Vigorous Enforcement Of Anti-discrimination Laws, Then I Have Confidence In The Black Community's Capabilities To Then Move Forward.

Essentially, Iran Was Sanctioned Because Of What Had Happened At Fordow, Its Unwillingness To Comply With Previous U.n. Security Resolutions About Their Nuclear Program, And As Part Of The Package Of Sanctions That Was Slapped On Them, The Issue Of Arms And Ballistic Missiles Were Included.

I'm Going To Insist On Making Sure That We've Got Decent Funding, That We've Got Enough Teachers, That We've Got Computers In The Classroom, But Unless You Turn Off The Television Set And Get Over A Certain Anti-intellectualism That I Think Pervades Some Low-income Communities, Our Children Are Not Going To Achieve.

[the Americans] Believe In The Idea That A Child Shouldn't Be Consigned To Poverty Just Because Of Circumstances Of Their Birth.

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I Think The American People, You Know, They're Going To Want That New Car Smell. They Want To Drive Something Off The Lot That Doesn't Have As Much Mileage As Me.

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I Began Feeling The Way I Imagine An Actor Or Athlete Must Feel When, After Years Of Commitment To A Particular Dream...he Realizes That He's Gone Just About As Far As Talent Or Fortune Will Take Him. The Dream Will Not Happen, And He Now Faces The Choice Of Accepting This Fact Like A Grownup And Moving On To More Sensible Pursuits, Or Refusing The Truth And Ending Up Bitter, Quarrelsome, And Slightly Pathetic.

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

Nobody's Changing What You've Got. You Get To Keep It.

Hope -- Hope In The Face Of Difficulty. Hope In The Face Of Uncertainty. The Audacity Of Hope! In The End, That Is God’s Greatest Gift To Us...a Belief In Things Not Seen. A Belief That There Are Better Days Ahead.

But You See, A Rich Country Like America Can Perhaps Afford To Be Stupid.

The Brain Is A Body Part Too; We Just Know Less About It.

Moammar Gadhafi Had More American Blood On His Hands Than Any Individual Other Than Osama Bin Laden.

Osama Bin Laden

I'm Not Somebody Who Is Always Comfortable With Language That Implies I've Got A Monopoly On The Truth, Or That My Faith Is Automatically Transferable To Others.

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.

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 Think It's Fair To Say That My Temperament Is Steady - And On The Buoyant Side.

I Have 90 Percent Or 95 Percent Support In The African American Community And It's Not Sort Of "well, He's Black, So It's Okay. We're Not Going To Say Anything Even Though We're Seething." And I Hang Out With A Lot Of Middle-aged Black Women, And They're Not Casual In Their Support Of Me. There's A Lot Of Love Forthcoming. Partly Because They Understand The Constraints Of This Society. They Know That This Is Hard.

African American

I Wish The Country Had Fewer Lawyers And More Engineers.

I Don`t Know If Donald Trump`s Ever Been To An Actual Polling Place, But, You Know, He Doesn`t Even Worry If What He Says Is True. This Is Just About Him Worried That He`s Losing.

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Terrorist Groups

I Actually Believe That We Need Missile Defense, Because Of Iran And North Korea And The Potential For Them To Obtain Or To Launch Nuclear Weapons, But I Also Believe That, When We Are Only Spending A Few Hundred Million Dollars On Nuclear Proliferation, Then We're Making A Mistake.

Those Opportunity Gaps Begin Early, Often At Birth. And They Compound Over Time, Becoming Harder And Harder To Bridge, Making Too Many Young Men And Women Feel Like, No Matter How Hard They Try, They May Never Achieve Their Dreams.

I Just Miss - I Miss Being Anonymous.

In Many Ways [those Middle-aged Black Ladies] My Touchstone, Because They Are What I Meant When I Talked About The Audacity Of Hope.

Too Many Americans Who Struggle With Mental Health Illnesses Are Suffering In Silence Rather Than Seeking Help, And We Need To See To It That Men And Women Who Would Never Hesitate To Go See A Doctor If They Had A Broken Arm Or Came Down With The Flu, That They Have That Same Attitude When It Comes To Their Mental Health.

I Can Say With Confidence That I Never Bought Into The Hype, And I Made Sure That The People Around Me Didn't Buy Into The Hype, And I Did Not Surround Myself With People Who Fed Me The Hype. And I'm Glad Of That As Well.

If Somebody Was Sending Rockets Into My House, Where My Two Daughters Sleep At Night, I’m Going To Do Everything In My Power To Stop That, And I Would Expect Israelis To Do The Same Thing.

I Think Dona;d Trump Is Sincere In Wanting To Be A Successful President And Moving This Country Forward And I Don't Think Any President Ever Comes In Saying To Himself "i Want To Figure Out How To Make People Angry Or Alienate Half The Country."

I Think That Most Americans Don't Resent People For Getting Rich. They Want To Get Rich Themselves.

As President, I'll Invest In Renewable Energies Like Wind Power, Solar Power, And The Next Generation Of Homegrown Biofuels. That's How America Is Going To Free Itself From Our Dependence On Foreign Oil Not Through Short-term Gimmicks, But Through A Real, Long-term Commitment To Transform Our Energy Sector.

For Me, Personally, The Most Difficult Moments Had To Do With Not Just Terrorist Attacks, But Also Shootings.

Angela [merkel] And I Also Agreed The Need For A Comprehensive And Humane Response To The Devastating Humanitarian Crisis In Syria And For The Influx Of Migrants And Refugees From Around The World. We Need To Build On The Progress Achieved At The U.n. Refugee Summit, Which Yielded New Commitments From Some 50 Nations And Organizations.

We Are Unique Among Advanced Countries That We Don't Have Universal Health Care. My Hope Was That I Was Able To Get A Hundred Percent Of People Health Care While I Was President. We Didn't Quite Achieve That, But We Were Able To Get 20 Million People Health Care Who Didn't Have It Before. And Obviously Some Of The Progress We Made Is Now Imperiled Because There's Still A Significant Debate Taking Place In The United States. For Those 20 Million People, Their Lives Have Been Better.

My Expectation Would Be That If We Can Begin Discussions Soon, Shortly After The Iranian Elections, We Should Have A Fairly Good Sense By The End Of The Year As To Whether They Are Moving In The Right Direction.

I Think That Leadership More Than Anything Is About Setting A Course And Describing A Vision For People.

We've Taken Bold Action At Home By Making Historic Investments In Renewable Energy, By Putting Our People To Work Increasing Efficiency In Our Homes And Buildings, And By Pursuing Comprehensive Legislation To Transform To A Clean Energy Economy.

I Can No More Disown (jeremiah Wright) Than I Can Disown The Black Community. I Can No More Disown Him Than I Can My White Grandmother - A Woman Who Helped Raise Me, A Woman Who Sacrificed Again And Again For Me, A Woman Who Loves Me As Much As She Loves Anything In This World, But A Woman Who Once Confessed Her Fear Of Black Men Who Passed By Her On The Street, And Who On More Than One Occasion Has Uttered Racial Or Ethnic Stereotypes That Made Me Cringe.

The American People And The Israeli Peoples Share A Faith In The Future And Believe That Democracies Can Shape Their Own Destinies And That Opportunities Should Be Available To All. Throughout Its Own Extraordinary History, Israel Has Given Life To That Promise.

We Are God's Partners In Matters Of Life And Death.

Let's Say Hypothetically, Knowing What We Know Now About Public Policy, That We Could Close The Education Gap So That It Was Only A Couple Percentage Points, And We Could Make Sure That Hiring Barriers And Educational Barriers Had Been Leveled Down, And Unemployment Among African Americans Right Now Instead Of Being Double Was Only 10 Percent Higher Than White Unemployment - If We Got To That Point , America As A Whole Would Be A Lot Richer.

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.

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

One Of The Challenges Over The Last Decade Is America Has Done Experiments In Nation Building In Places Like Iraq And Afghanistan And We've Neglected, For Example, Developing Our Own Economy, Our Own Energy Sectors, Our Own Education System. And It's Very Hard For Us To Project Leadership Around The World When We're Not Doing What We Need To Do.

Societies Held Together By Fear And Repression May Offer The Illusion Of Stability For A Time, But They Are Built Upon Fault Lines That Will Eventually Tear Asunder.

Not Much Happens In Russia Without Vladimir Putin.

We Are The Change We Have Been Waiting For.

My Staff Was Very Excited For Brisvegas. When I Arrived, They Advised I Needed Some Xxxx.

For Decades, Our Differences With Iran Meant That Our Governments Almost Never Spoke To Each Other. Ultimately, That Did Not Advance America's Interests.

Ultimately There Is No Dividing Line Between Main Street And Wall Street. We Will Rise Or We Will Fall Together As One Nation.

I Want To Reform The Tax Code So That It's Simple, Fair, And Asks The Wealthiest Households To Pay Higher Taxes On Incomes Over $250,000 - The Same Rate We Had When Bill Clinton Was President; The Same Rate We Had When Our Economy Created Nearly 23 Million New Jobs, The Biggest Surplus In History, And A Lot Of Millionaires To Boot.

Obviously [my Daughters] - And Michelle - Have Made A Lot Of Sacrifices On Behalf Of My Cockamamie Ideas, The Running For Office And Things.

Through Words He Gave Voice To The Voiceless. Through Deeds He Gave Courage To The Faint Of Heart.

I Think That We Are In A Position To Continue To Make Progress, But It's Gonna Require Us To Both Recognize What The Problems Are, Also Recognize The Progress We've Made. Last Point I'd Make On This, Since We're On Criminal Justice: During The Course Of My Presidency Crime Has Been The Lowest It's Been Probably Since The '60s.

You Like Pie? I Like Pie.

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.

That Is Our Generation’s Task - To Make These Words, These Rights, These Values Of Life And Liberty And The Pursuit Of Happiness Real For Every American.

Pursuit Of Happiness

We Have To Ensure Free And Open Exchange Of Information. That Starts With An Open Internet. I Will Take A Backseat To No One In My Commitment To Network Neutrality. Because Once Providers Start To Privilege Some Applications Or Websites Over Others Then The Smaller Voices Get Squeezed Out And We All Lose. The Internet Is Perhaps The Most Open Network In History, And We Have To Keep It That Way.

The Goal Of This Office Will Not Be To Favor One Religious Group Over Another - Or Even Religious Groups Over Secular Groups. It Will Simply Be To Work On Behalf Of Those Organizations That Want To Work On Behalf Of Our Communities, And To Do So Without Blurring The Line That Our Founders Wisely Drew Between Church And State.

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.

When We Were Working On Immigration Reform And There Was A Young Latino Man, Young Immigration Activist Here Who, In The Roosevelt Room, Refused To Shake My Hand.he Made A Point Of Saying, "i Can't Shake Your Hand; You're Deporting Too Many People." And I Just Said To Him, "young Man, I'm Glad That You Feel So Passionately About This Issue, But You're With The President Right Now In The White House. You've Got To Think About What's Going To Be Most Effective In Getting What You Need, What You're Trying To Accomplish. Because This May Not Be Your Best Strategy."

What We Saw Was That The Ferguson Police Department In Conjunction With The Municipality Saw Traffic Stops, Arrests, Tickets As A Revenue Generator, As Opposed To Serving The Community, And That It Systematically Was Biased Against African-americans In That City Who Were Stopped, Harassed, Mistreated, Abused, Called Names, Fined.

Don't Get Cynical. Don't Ever Think You Can't Make A Difference.

There's Just A Whole Different Attitude And Vibe When You're Not In Power As When You're In Power.

My Parents Shared Not Only An Improbable Love, They Shared An Abiding Faith In The Possibilities Of This Nation. They Would Give Me An African Name, Barack, Or Blessed, Believing That In A Tolerant America Your Name Is No Barrier To Success.

I Said To One Young Activist Who Herself Was The Daughter Of An Undocumented Worker, And So Could Speak From A Very Personal And Legitimate Perspective - I Remember Saying To Her: I Agree With You, From A Moral Perspective, That A Child From Honduras Is Worth The Same As My Daughter. God Is Not A Respecter Of Boundaries; He's Not Saying That American Kids Deserve A Better Life Than Honduran Kids. But I'm The President Of The United States, And The Nation-state By Definition Means That Boundaries Mean Something And Borders Mean Something.

Perhaps I Possess A Certain Midwestern Sensibility That I Inherited From My Mother And Her Parents, A Sensibility That Warren Buffet Seems To Share: That At A Certain Point One Has Enough, That You Can Derive As Much Pleasure From A Picasso Hanging In A Museum As From One That's Hanging In Your Den, That You Can Get An Awfully Good Meal In A Restaurant For Less Than Twenty Dollars, And That Once Your Drapes Cost More Than The Average American's Yearly Salary, Then You Can Afford To Pay A Bit More In Taxes.

Presidential Elections Always Turn On Personalities, They Turn On How Campaigns Are Run, They Turn On Natural Desires For Change.

I Like My Quiet Time. There Is A Writer's Sensibility In Me Sometimes, Where I Step Back.

The First Thing I Would Do Would Be To Move Forward With An Agenda To Make Sure That We Give D.c. The Opportunity To Elect Its Own Representatives And Have Some Political Power On Capitol Hill.

The Iranian Regime Supports Violent Extremists And Challenges Us Across The Region. It Pursues A Nuclear Capability That Could Spark A Dangerous Arms Race And Raise The Prospect Of A Transfer Of Nuclear Know-how To Terrorists. Its President Denies The Holocaust And Threatens To Wipe Israel Off The Map. The Danger From Iran Is Grave, It Is Real.

I Decided To Become A Community Organizer ... Change Won't Come From The Top, I Would Say. Change Will Come From A Mobilized Grass Roots.

I Think When You Spread The Wealth Around It's Good For Everybody.

I Delivered A Clear And Forceful Message That Although We Recognize Russia's Intelligence Gathering Will Sometimes Take Place Even If We Don't Like It, There's A Difference Between That Than Either Meddling With Elections Or Going After Private Organizations Or Commercial Entities, And That We're Monitoring It Carefully, And We Will Respond Appropriately If And When We See This Happening.

Despite All The Noise And Hullabaloo - Military Cooperation, Intelligence Cooperation, All Of That Has Continued. We Have Defended Them Consistently In Every Imaginable Way. But I Also Believe That Both For Our National Interests And Israel's National Interests That Allowing An Ongoing Conflict Between Israelis And Palestinians That Could Get Worse And Worse Over Time Is A Problem. And That Settlements Contribute.

You Might Not Be Ready For Diplomacy With Beijing If You Can't Visit The Olympics Without Insulting Our Closest Ally.

If You Want Some Additional Money For Your School, We'll Give It To You. But You've Got To Compete, Show Us That You're Going To Reform Your Education System So That Our Children Are Performing Better.

When I Came Into Office, The World Was Divided. Iran Was Resurgent. Iran Is At Its Weakest Point, Economically, Strategically, Militarily, Then Since - Then In Many Years. And We Are Going To Continue To Keep The Pressure On To Make Sure That They Do Not Get A Nuclear Weapon. That's In America's National Interest And That Will Be The Case So Long As I'm President.

I Think We All Know That World Owes An Enormous Debt To Greece And The Greek People.

For The First Time, Preventing Nuclear Proliferation And Nuclear Terrorism Is Now At The Top Of America's Nuclear Agenda.

Nuclear Terrorism

Nuclear Proliferation

The Problem With All These Tired Excuses For Inaction Is That It Suggests A Fundamental Lack Of Faith In American Business And American Ingenuity.

Race Is Still A Powerful Force In This Country. Any African American Candidate, Or Any Latino Candidate, Or Asian Candidate Or Woman Candidate Confronts A Higher Threshold In Establishing Himself To The Voters ... Are Some Voters Not Going To Vote For Me Because I'm African American? Those Are The Same Voters Who Probably Wouldn't Vote For Me Because Of My Politics.

Trayvon Martin Could Have Been Me 35 Years Ago.

Could Have Been

Rather, My Perceptions About How We Solve Problems In Health Care Or Education Span Across A Whole Range Of Areas. And I Want To Try To Capture That Complexity.

Some Of The Same Politicians And Pundits That Are So Quick To Reject The Possibility Of A Diplomatic Solution To Iran's Nuclear Program Are The Same Folks Who Were So Quick To Go To War In Iraq And Said It Would Take A Few Months.

Today, I Can Report That, As Promised, The Rest Of Our Troops In Iraq Will Come Home By The End Of The Year.

The Market Alone Can't Solve Our Health-care Woes.

I'm Told There's A Saying From Those Ancient Times, Kalos Kai Agathos, When Someone Or Something Is Good And Beautiful On The Outside, But Is Also Good And Noble On The Inside In Terms Of Character And In Terms Of Purpose. And I Think That's A Fine Description Of The Friendship That Exists Between The Greek People And The American People.

That's Why I Stand Here Tonight. Because For Two Hundred And Thirty Two Years, At Each Moment When That Promise Was In Jeopardy, Ordinary Men And Women - Students And Soldiers, Farmers And Teachers, Nurses And Janitors - Found The Courage To Keep It Alive.

The Capacity Of Iraq's Security Forces Has Improved, And Iraq's Leaders Have Made Strides Toward Political Accommodation

Being A Father Is Sometimes My Hardest But Always My Most Rewarding Job. Happy Father's Day To All The Dads Out There.

[the Democrats] Have Got To Do A Better Job Of Showing Up.

To All Those Watching Tonight From Beyond Our Shores, From Parliaments And Palaces, To Those Who Are Huddled Around Radios In The Forgotten Corners Of The World, Our Stories Are Singular, But Our Destiny Is Shared, And A New Dawn Of American Leadership Is At Hand.

It Is Our Generation's Task, Then, To Reignite The True Engine Of America's Economic Growth - A Rising, Thriving Middle Class.

I Was Pretty Realistic To People About What We Could Get Done, And The Situation We Were In, And Trying To Tamp Down Expectations. If You Listen To My Stump Speeches, If You Listen To What I Said At Grant Park, I Kept On Saying, "look, This Is Not Just About Me, This Is Not Going To Happen In One Year, Or One Term, Or Even One Presidency." And We Tried To Layer Into Everything We Were Saying A Sense Of Hope, But Also Realism.

Congress Is Hard To Deal With, Dealing With, You Know, Multiple Parliaments And Commissions And Unions And This And That And The Other, That's Very Complicated.

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.

What We Have To Do Is Make Sure That Here In America, If You Work Hard, You Can Get Ahead. If You Worked Hard, Not Only Did You Have A Good Job, But You Also Had Decent Benefits, Decent Health Care. We've Got To Make Sure That We're Doing Everything We Can To Expand The Middle Class And People Who Are Working Hard Can Get Into The Middle Class.

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.

In Terms Of My Conversations With [vladimir] Putin, These Are Conversations That Took Place Before The Election. As I Indicated, There Has Been Very Clear Proof That They Have Engaged In Cyber Attacks. This Isn't New. It's Not Unique To Russia. There Are A Number Of States Where We've Seen Low-level Cyber Attacks And Industrial Espionage And, You Know, Other Behavior That We Think Should Be Out Of Bounds.

This Victory Alone Is Not The Change We Seek; It Is Only The Chance For Us To Make That Change.

The Easiest Way To Save Money Is To Waste Less Energy.

No Party Has A Monopoly On Wisdom. No Democracy Works Without Compromise. But When Governor Romney And His Allies In Congress Tell Us We Can Somehow Lower Our Deficit By Spending Trillions More On New Tax Breaks For The Wealthy - Well, You Do The Math. I Refuse To Go Along With That. And As Long As I'm President, I Never Will.

Each Wave Of Immigrants That Have Come In Have Been Able To Assimilate, Integrate And Then Rise Up And Become Part Of This Great American Dream.

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

I Think It's Very Important To Remember That So Much Of The Work That Gets Done Between Countries Is Not Done At The Level Of Presidents, But Is Done Within Various Agencies, Whether It's Law Enforcement Or Economic Ministries. And When They Establish Relationships And Systems Of Communications And Shared Projects And Shared Visions, Those Structures Continue Even After Any Particular President Is Gone. It Builds Trust And Understanding Between Countries That Are Critically Important.

Americans Coming Home, An Iran That Has Rolled Back Its Nuclear Program And Accepted Unprecedented Monitoring Of The Program -these Things Are A Reminder Of What We Can Achieve When We Lead With Strength And With Wisdom, With Courage And Resolve And Patience. America Can Do And Has Done Big Things When We Work Together.

They [ Respublicans] Wanna Argue The Sensational Which Is About Abort Not Certain Cases Of Abortion, But The Fact Is It's A Fundamental Disrespect For Women - Women's Judgment About The Sizing And Time Of Their Families.

You Can't Rest On Your Laurels. Your Own Body Of Work Is Yet To Come.

As I Said In My State Of The Union Address Ensuring The Security Of The United States And The Safety Of Our People Demands A Smart, Patient And Disciplined Approach To The World.

If We Have The Kinds Of Confirmation That We Need, We Will Once Again Work With The International Community And The Organization Charged With Monitoring Compliance By The Syrian Government, And We Will Reach Out To Patrons Of Assad Like Russia To Put A Stop To It.

I Will Continue To Urge Creditors To Take The Steps Needed To Put Greece On A Path Towards A Durable Economic Recovery Because It's In All Of Our Interests That Greece Succeeds.

One Of The Things You Discover About Being President Is That There Are All These Rules And Norms And Laws And You Got To Pay Attention To Them.

I Thought I Could Start Over, You See. But Now I Know You Can Never Start Over. Not Really. You Think You Have Control, But You Are Like A Fly In Somebody Else's Web. Sometimes I Think That's Why I Like Accounting. All Day, You Are Only Dealing With Numbers. You Add Them, Multiply Them, And If You Are Careful, You Will Always Have A Solution. There's A Sequence There. An Order. With Numbers, You Can Have Control.

Under My Plan Of A Cap-and-trade System, Electricity Rates Would Necessarily Skyrocket.

I Kept Finding The Same Anguish, The Same Doubt; A Self-contempt That Neither Irony Nor Intellect Seemed Able To Deflect. Even Dubois’s Learning And Baldwin’s Love And Langston’s Humor Eventually Succumbed To Its Corrosive Force, Each Man Finally Forced To Doubt Art’s Redemptive Power, Each Man Finally Forced To Withdraw, One To Africa, One To Europe, One Deeper Into The Bowels Of Harlem, But All Of Them In The Same Weary Flight, All Of Them Exhausted, Bitter Men, The Devil At Their Heels.

There Are Institutional Obligations I Have To Carry Out That Are Important For A President Of The United States To Carry Out, But May Not Always Align With What I Think Would Move The Ball Down The Field On The Issues That I Care Most Deeply About.

A Political Consultant, When We First Started Thinking About Senate Race, Said, "you Can Have One Funny Name. You Can Be 'barack Smith.' Or You Can Be 'joe Obama.' But 'barack Obama' - That's Not Gonna Work."

We Have A Stake In One Another...what Binds Us Together Is Greater Than What Drives Us Apart.

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