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What Can I Do To Make Sure That Middle-class Families Are Feeling More Secure, That More Young People Are Able To Access Opportunity, That We Are Safe, That We Are Working With Our International Partners To Try To Create More Order At A Time When There's A Lot Of Chaos? How Do We Deal With Terrorism In A Way That's Consistent With Our Values? As Long As I Stay Focused On Those North Stars, Then I Tend Not To Get Too Rattled.

-Barack Obama

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What Can I Do

Barack Obama

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What Can I Do To Make Sure That Middle-class Families Are Feeling More Secure, That More Young People Are Able To Access Opportunity, That We Are Safe, That We Are Working With Our International Partners To Try To Create More Order At A Time When There's A Lot Of Chaos? How Do We Deal With Terrorism In A Way That's Consistent With Our Values? As Long As I Stay Focused On Those North Stars, Then I Tend Not To Get Too Rattled.

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While We Have Come A Long Way Since The Stonewall Riots In 1969, We Still Have A Lot Of Work To Do. Too Often, The Issue Of Lgbt Rights Is Exploited By Those Seeking To Divide Us. But At Its Core, This Issue Is About Who We Are As Americans. It's About Whether This Nation Is Going To Live Up To Its Founding Promise Of Equality By Treating All Its Citizens With Dignity And Respect.

Ironically, The Single Thing That Has Strengthened Iran Over The Last Several Years Has Been The War In Iraq. Iraq Was Iran's Mortal Enemy. That Was Cleared Away. And What We've Seen Over The Last Several Years Is Iran's Influence Grow. They Have Funded Hezbollah, They Have Funded Hamas, They Have Gone From Zero Centrifuges To 4,000 Centrifuges To Develop A Nuclear Weapon.

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

In The Midst Of This Enormous Economic Crisis, I Think Canada Has Shown Itself To Be A Pretty Good Manager Of The Financial System And The Economy In Ways That We Always - Haven't Always Been Here In The United States.

This Country Of Ours Has More Wealth Than Any Nation, But That's Not What Makes Us Rich. We Have The Most Powerful Military On Earth, But That's Not What Makes Us Strong. Our Universities And Our Culture Are The Envy Of The World, But That's Not What Keeps The World Coming To Our Shores. Instead, It Is That American Spirit - That American Promise - That Pushes Us Forward Even When The Path Is Uncertain; That Binds Us Together In Spite Of Our Differences; That Makes Us Fix Our Eye Not On What Is Seen, But What Is Unseen, That Better Place Around The Bend.

Change Has Come To America.

Isis Is Not An Organization That Can Destroy The United States. This Is Not A Huge Industrial Power That Can Pose Great Risks To Us, Institutionally Or In A Systematic Way. But They Can Hurt Us. And They Can Hurt Our People And Our Families.

Some Heinous Crimes Justify The Ultimate Punishment.

The First Thing I'd Do As President Is Sign The Freedom Of Choice Act.

The Greek People Are Entrepreneurial.

Entrepreneurial

Who You Are And Who You Love Should Never Be A Fireable Offense

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.

The United States Often Finds Itself In A Situation Where If It Goes In Militarily Then It Is Criticized For Going In Militarily, And If It Doesn't Go In Militarily, Then People Say, Why Aren't You Doing Something Militarily?

When Bp Was Not Moving Fast Enough On Claims, We Told Bp To Set Aside $20 Billion In A Fund - Managed By An Independent Third Party - To Help All Those Whose Lives Have Been Turned Upside Down By The Spill.

My Sister Is A Teacher, So I Am A Strong Support Of Teachers, But I'm Not Going To Be Bound By Just A Certain Way Of Talking About These Things, In Order For Us To Move Forward On Behalf Of Our Kids.

Not Much Happens In Russian Federation Without Vladimir Putin.

A Good Compromise, A Good Piece Of Legislation, Is Like A Good Sentence; Or A Good Piece Of Music. Everybody Can Recognize It. They Say, 'huh. It Works. It Makes Sense.'

Long Before Being Nerdy Was Cool, There Was Leonard Nimoy.

What I Value Most About Pastor Wright Is Not His Day-to-day Political Advice. He's Much More Of A Sounding Board For Me To Make Sure That I Am Speaking As Truthfully About What I Believe As Possible And That I'm Not Losing Myself In Some Of The Hype And Hoopla And Stress That's Involved In National Politics.

It’s Not That I Want To Punish Your Success. I Want To Make Sure That Everybody Who Is Behind You, That They’ve Got A Chance For Success, Too. My Attitude Is That If The Economy’s Good For Folks From The Bottom Up, It’s Gonna Be Good For Everybody. I Think When You Spread The Wealth Around, It’s Good For Everybody.

I Don't Think There's A Lot Of Dispute For This. You Can Argue That We Didn't Get Everything Done That We Wanted To Get Done, But I Can Make A Really Strong Argument, And I Think Prove, That By Almost Every Measure The Country's Better Off Now Than When I Started.

I Think We Would Have Made A Lot More Mistakes And Would Have Accomplished A Lot Less Had We Not Been Grounded In Some Basic Truths.

There Are Certain Occupations - Probably, Most Prominently, Politics - Where There Would Be A Bias Against Somebody Who's Agnostic Or Atheist In Running For Office.

We Worship An Awesome God In The Blue States, And We Don't Like Federal Agents Poking Around Our Libraries In The Red States. We Coach Little League In The Blue States And Have Gay Friends In The Red States.

My Goal Is To Maintain The International Norm On Banning Chemical Weapons. I Want That Enforcement To Be Real. I Want It To Be Serious. I Want People To Understand That Gassing Innocent People, Delivering Chemical Weapons Against Children Is Not Something We Do. It's Prohibited In Active Wars Between Countries. We Certainly Don't Do It Against Kids. And We've Got To Stand Up For That Principle.

We Too Often Let The Material Things Serve As Indicators That We're Doing Well, Even Though Something Inside Us Tells Us That Were Not Doing Our Best. That We Are Avoiding That Which Is Hard, But Also Necessary. That We Are Shrinking From Rather Than Rising To The Challenges Of The Age.

We Can Make Sure That People Who Don't Have Health Insurance Can Buy Into An Insurance Pool That Gives Them Better Bargaining Power.

In America, There's A Failure To Appreciate Europe's Leading Role In The World. Instead Of Celebrating Your Dynamic Union And Seeking To Partner With You To Meet Common Challenges, There Have Been Times Where America Has Shown Arrogance And Been Dismissive, Even Derisive.

I Think It's Perfectly Consistent To Say That I Want My Government To Be Operating For All Faiths And All Peoples, Including Atheists And Agnostics, While Also Insisting That There Are Values Tha Tinform My Politics That Are Appropriate To Talk About.

And Above All, Children Need Our Unconditional Love - Whether They Succeed Or Make Mistakes; When Life Is Easy And When Life Is Tough.

Operations In Iraq And Afghanistan And The War On Terrorism Have Reduced The Pace Of Military Transformation And Have Revealed Our Lack Of Preparation For Defensive And Stability Operations. This Administration Has Overextended Our Military.

Both Of Our Nations [america And Germany] Were Proud To Join The Paris Climate Agreement Which The World Should Work To Implement Quickly. Continued Global Leadership On Climate In Addition To Increasing Private Investment And Clean Energy Is Gonna Be Critical To Meeting This Growing Threat.

We Rise And Fall As One People, One Nation.

We Believe That Big Nations Should Not Bully Smaller Nations, And That The Sovereignty Of Nations Must Be Respected. And We Have Long Urged That Disputes Be Resolved Peacefully, Including Through Mechanisms Like International Arbitration.

There Are Certain People In Our Popular Culture That Just Capture People's Imaginations. And In Death, They Become Even Larger. Now, I Have To Admit That It's Also Fed By A 24/7 Media That Is Insatiable.

Today We Are Engaged In A Deadly Global Struggle For Those Who Would Intimidate, Torture, And Murder People For Exercising The Most Basic Freedoms. If We Are To Win This Struggle And Spread Those Freedoms, We Must Keep Our Own Moral Compass Pointed In A True Direction.

Our Nation Owes A Debt To Its Fallen Heroes That We Can Never Fully Repay, But We Can Honor Their Sacrifice.

Torture Is How You Create Enemies, Not How You Defeat Them.

I Haven't Been Sorting Through Each And Every Aspect Of This. Here's What I Know: Hillary Clinton Was An Outstanding Secretary Of State. She Would Never Intentionally Put America In Any Kind Of Jeopardy.' Mr. Wallace Pressed Further On The Jeopardy Angle, And Mr. Obama Responded Again: 'i Continue To Believe That She Has Not Jeopardized America's National Security. Now What I've Also Said Is That - And She Has Acknowledged - That There's A Carelessness, In Terms Of Managing Emails...'"

The Other Thing Is Going To Be Me Being Able To Show Not Just The American People Or The Israeli People But The World That, In Fact, We Have Mechanisms In Place That Will Prevent Iran From Having A Nuclear Weapon.

What Is Portrayed As High-minded Positions On Issues Sometimes Is Just Designed To Carve Out Some Of Their Commercial Interests.

Isil Is A Terrorist Organization, Pure And Simple. And It Has No Vision Other Than The Slaughter Of All Who Stand In Its Way.

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.

When You've Got A Economy In Which 40 Percent Of Economic Growth Is Happening In The Financial Sector, That Turns Out That Was All An Illusion, That It Wasn't Growth Based On Real Products And Services, But Just A Bunch Of Paper Shuffling And A House Of Cards, Then What's Gonna Emerge, At Some Point, Is A Sense Of Resentment, A Sense That The System's Rigged, And It's Not Working For Ordinary People. And It's Not Fulfilling The Basic American Dream.

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.

I Do Not Believe Being Gay Or Lesbian Is A Choice.

To Me The Question Right Now Is: How Do I Close That First Three-quarters Of The Achievement Gap, Education Gap, Wealth Gap? What Gives Me The Best Chance To Do That? And I'm Pretty Darn Sure That If America Is A Just Society And Treating People Well Right Now, Irrespective Of Past Wrongs, That I'm Going To Close A Big Chunk Of That Gap. I've Seen It.

And Whether I Earned Your Vote Or Not, I Have Listened To You. I Have Learned From You. And You’ve Made Me A Better President. And With Your Stories And Your Struggles, I Return To The White House More Determined And More Inspired Than Ever About The Work There Is To Do And The Future That Lies Ahead.

Of Course We [with Angela Merkel] Discussed Our Commitment To Meeting Shared Security Challenges From Countering Cyber Threats To Ensuring That Iran Continues To Live Up To The Terms Of The Iran Nuclear Deal.

Cuba Is Actually One Where I Am More Optimistic Because Of The Unique Nature Of Cuba - 90 Miles Off Our Shore With A Massive Ex-patriot Population, Now Cuban-american Population That Still Have Deep Links To The Island. There I Am More Confident That Over Time That The Winds Of Commerce And Telecommunication And Travel Start Shifting The Nature Of That Regime. But That's A Small Country Which Has Almost A Unique Relationship To Us.

With Respect To Some Of The Specific Legislation Or Initiatives That I've Made, It's True That Republicans Often Opposed These Things. Sometimes They Opposed Them Because I Proposed Them. Now That They Are Responsible For Governing, I Think They'll Find That Reversing Them Would Be Counterproductive.

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

I Don't Look At My Pension. It's Not As Big As Yours So It Doesn't Take As Long.

My Administration Is Committed To Creating An Unprecedented Level Of Openness In Government.

Broken Promises

One Of The Thing About Being President - That Can't Be Taught, You Have To Experience, Is - There Is The Sheer Weight Of Decision Making. And When I Make A Decision To Send 17,000 Young Americans To Afghanistan - You Can Understand That Intellectually. But Understanding What That Means For Those Families, For Those Young People - When You End Up Sitting At Your Desk, Signing - A Condolence Letter To One Of The Family Members Of A Fallen Hero - You're Reminded Each And Every Day, At Every Moment, That - The Decisions You Make Count.

When It Comes To The Budget, We Know That We Shouldn't Be Cutting More On Core Investments, Like Education, That Are Going To Help Us Grow In The Future. And We've Already Seen The Deficit Cut In Half. It's Going Down Faster Than Any Time In The Last 60 Years. So Why Would We Make More Cuts In Education, More Cuts In Basic Research? Nobody Thinks That's A Good Idea.

Keep Exploring. Keep Dreaming. Keep Asking Why. Don’t Settle For What You Already Know. Never Stop Believing In The Power Of Your Ideas, Your Imagination, Your Hard Work To Change The World.

Unemployment Is Low, Incomes Are Up, Poverty Is Down - And That's Going To Be A Lasting Change.

I'm Not So Optimistic As To Think That You Would Ever Be Able To Garner A Majority Of An American Congress That Would Make Those Kinds Of Investments Above And Beyond The Kinds Of Investments That Could Be Made In A Progressive Program For Lifting Up All People.

If We Choose To Keep Those Tax Breaks For Millionaires And Billionaires, If We Choose To Keep A Tax Break For Corporate Jet Owners, If We Choose To Keep Tax Breaks For Oil And Gas Companies That Are Making Hundreds Of Billions Of Dollars, Then That Means We've Got To Cut Some Kids Off From Getting A College Scholarship.

The United States Was Proud To Stand With The People Of Germany As This Nation And This Continent Reunited And Rebuilt And Reached For A Better Future.

As Tough As Things Have Been, I Am Convinced You Are Tougher. I've Seen Your Passion And I've Seen Your Service. I've Seen You Engage And I've Seen You Turn Out In Record Numbers. I've Heard Your Voices Amplified By Creativity And A Digital Fluency That Those Of Us In Older Generations Can Barely Comprehend. I've Seen A Generation Eager, Impatient Even, To Step Into The Rushing Waters Of History And Change Its Course.

I Do Believe, Separate And Apart From Any Particular Election Or Movement, That We Are Going To Have To Guard Against A Rise In A Crude Sort Of Nationalism Or Ethnic Identity Or Tribalism That Is Built Around An Us And A Them.

But At A Time When Our Discourse Has Become So Sharply Polarized - At A Time When We Are Far Too Eager To Lay The Blame For All That Ails The World At The Feet Of Those Who Think Differently Than We Do - It's Important For Us To Pause For A Moment And Make Sure That We Are Talking With Each Other In A Way That Heals, Not A Way That Wounds.

My Faith Reminds Me That We All Are Sinners.

The Boarded-up Homes, The Decaying Storefronts, The Aging Church Rolls, Kids From Unknown Families Who Swaggered Down The Streets - Loud Congregations Of Teenage Boys, Teenage Girls Feeding Potato Chips To Crying Toddlers, The Discarded Wrappers Tumbling Down The Block - All Of It Whispered Painful Truths.

The Problem Is, That We've Got A Position, Often Times By The Nra That Says Any Regulation Whatsoever Is The Camel's Nose Under The Tent. And That, I Think, Is Not Where The American People Are At.

We Don't Quit. I Don't Quit. Let's Seize This Moment.

You Have People Around The Country Who Are Benefitting From The Steps That We've Taken [with Obamacare] And As Long As They Continue To Get Helped, Then At Least I'll Know In My Own Mind That The Work We Did Here Had A Lasting Impact.

The Criminal-justice System Is, Obviously, The Sole Source Of Racial Tension In This Country [usa] Or The Key Institution To Resolving The Opportunity Gap. It Is A Part Of The Broader Set Of Challenges That We Face In Creating A More Perfect Union.

Civility Also Requires Relearning How To Disagree Without Being Disagreeable. Surely You Can Question My Policies Without Questioning My Faith Or, For That Matter, My Citizenship.

Public School System Status Quo Is Indefensible.

My Conviction Is That Those Fights Need To Be Fought Right Now And Can Be Won. And If In Fact We Have Finite Political Capital, Energy, Resources, We Need To Win Those Fights.

We Proved That We Are Still A People Capable Of Doing Big Things And Tackling Our Biggest Challenges.

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.

One Of The Great Qualities Of Chancellor Merkel Is That She Is Steady. She Analyzes A Situation. She's Honest. Sometimes We've Had Disagreements, But When We Do, It's Very Constructive. And We Are Consistently Open With Each Other About How We Should Approach These Issues.

Climate Change Constitutes A Serious Threat To Global Security, An Immediate Risk To Our National Security, And, Make No Mistake, It Will Impact How Our Military Defends Our Country.

The United States Is Not, And Never Will Be, At War With Islam.

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.

We Continue To Believe That A Two-state Solution Is The Only Way For The Long-term Security Of Israel, If It Wants To Stay Both A Jewish State And Democratic.

In Our Household, The Bible, The Koran And The Bhagavad Gita Sat On The Shelf Alongside Books Of Greek And Norse And African Mythology

True Leadership Will Not Be Measured By The Ability To Muzzle Dissent, Or To Intimidate And Harass Political Opponents At Home. The People Of The World Want Change. They Will Not Long Tolerate Those Who Are On The Wrong Side Of History.

I Attend Trinity United Church Of Christ, And My Pastor [was] Jeremiah Wright.

We Must Educate Our Children To Become Like Young Egyptian People.

Egyptian Revolution

I Have Got To Figure Out A System Because I Have Bad Filing, Sorting, And Organizing Habits.

From Obama's Book, "the Audacity Of Hope:" "i Am Not Willing To Have The State Deny American Citizens A Civil Union That Confers Equivalent Rights On Such Basic Matters As Hospital Visitation Or Health Insurance Coverage Simply Because The People They Love Are Of The Same Sex - Nor Am I Willing To Accept A Reading Of The Bible That Considers An Obscure Line In Romans To Be More Defining Of Christianity Than The Sermon On The Mount."

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.

We're Not Going To Baby Sit A Civil War.

We Need Fathers To Step Up, To Realize That Their Job Does Not End At Conception; That What Makes You A Man Is Not The Ability To Have A Child But The Courage To Raise One.

There Is Not A Liberal America And A Conservative America - There Is The United States Of America. There Is Not A Black America And A White America And Latino America And Asian America - There's The United States Of America.

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

Go Back To - My First Campaign For The United States Senate. I Got A Bunch Of People Now Talking About Inequality. But Back Then They Sure Weren't. Back Then, Folks Were Saying I Was Preaching Class Warfare. Now It's Suddenly Their Campaign Platform.

The Truth Is That America Has Been Closely Divided Politically For Quite Some Time. That Was Reflected In Some Of The Challenges I Had With The Republican Congress.

Ninety-eight Percent Of All American Companies Have Fewer Than 100 Employees. Over Half Of All Americans Work For A Small Business. Small Businesses Are The Backbone Of Our Nation’s Economy And We Must Protect This Great Resource.....helping American Small Business Is Part Of Our Movement For Change And The End Of Politics As Usual.

I Think That There Have Been A Number Of Public Figures Where You Start Hearing Commentary That Is Dangerous Because What It Starts Doing Is It Starts Dividing Us Up As Americans.

Congress Has Become So Dysfunctional That More And More Of A Burden Is Placed On The Agencies To Fill In The Gaps. And The Gaps Get Bigger And Bigger Because They're Not Constantly Refreshed And Tweaked.

In Order To Make Reforms Sustainable, The Greek Economy Needs The Space To Return To Growth And Start Creating Jobs Again.

Peace Is Far More Preferable To War. [...] I Believe That Peace Is The Only Path To True Security. [...] And There Is No Question That The Only Path To Peace Is Through Negotiations .

If You Look At The Current Mosul Campaign Against Isil, For Example The Few Thousand Troops That We Have There To Support That Effort Allows The Iraqi Military To Move Forward In An Effective Way.

I Say That Is Because Those Are The Times Where Sometimes You Feel Actually A Little Bit Hurt. Because You Feel Like Saying To These Folks, "[don't] You Think If I Could Do It, I [would] Have Just Done It. Do You Think That The Only Problem Is That I Don't Care Enough About The Plight Of Poor People, Or Gay People, Or Immigrants, Or ...?"

When You're Out Of Work And You Can't Buy A Home Or You've Lost Your Home And You're Worried About Paying Your Bills, Then You Become More Worried About What Other Folks Are Doing. And Sometimes That Organizes Itself Around Kind Of A Tribal Attitude, And Issues Of Race Become More Prominent.

There Are War-torn Countries, People Full Of Poverty, Who Still Voted, 60, 70 Percent. If Here In The United States Of America, We Voted At 60 Percent, 70 Percent, It Would Transform Our Politics.

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.

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.

For We Have A Choice In This Country. We Can Accept A Politics That Breeds Division, And Conflict, And Cynicism. We Can Tackle Race Only As Spectacle - As We Did In The Oj Trial - Or In The Wake Of Tragedy, As We Did In The Aftermath Of Katrina - Or As Fodder For The Nightly News. We Can Play Reverend Wright's Sermons On Every Channel, Every Day And Talk About Them From Now Until The Election, And Make The Only Question In This Campaign Whether Or Not The American People Think That I Somehow Believe Or Sympathize With His Most Offensive Words.

Even When Our Heart Aches, We Summon The Strength That Maybe We Didn't Even Know We Had, And We Carry On; We Finish The Race.

We Cannot Simply Look To Austerity As A Strategy And It Is Incredibly Important That The Greek People See Improvements In Their Daily Lives So That They Can Carry With Them The Hope That Their Lives Will Get Better.

To Keep Nigeria One, Is A Task That Must Be Done.

Our Enemies Are Also Seeking The Abilities To Sabotage Our Power Grid, Our Financial Institutions, Our Air Traffic Control Systems.

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.

I've Always Viewed The Paris Agreement As A Starting Point. If You Look At All The Commitments That Have Been Made By All The Countries, It's Still Not Sufficient To Deal With The Very Dangerous Situation We Face. What It Has Done Is That It Created An Architecture Whereby As Technology Improves, As We Find New Clean Sources Of Energy, As We Make Our Economies More Efficient, Then Gradually We Can Turn Up The Dial And Improve The Outcomes Of Paris.

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.

African American Boys Oftentimes Fall Behind In School Early, Start Feeling Discouraged, Check Out, Drop Out, End Up On The Streets And Then Get Into Trouble.

I Believe The United States Of America Must Remain A Standard Bearer In The Conduct Of War. That Is What Makes Us Different From Those Whom We Fight. That Is A Source Of Our Strength. That Is Why I Prohibited Torture. That Is Why I Ordered The Prison At Guantanamo Bay Closed. And That Is Why I Have Reaffirmed America's Commitment To Abide By The Geneva Conventions. We Lose Ourselves When We Compromise The Very Ideals That We Fight To Defend.

In America, We're Getting Too Comfortable With Our Ability To Take Kinetic Strikes Around The World Without Having Enough Process To Avoid Consistently The Kinds Of Civilian Casualties That Can End Up Actually Hurting Us In The War Against Radicalization.

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.

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.

There Is No Shame In Confusion Or Fear. "there Was Only Shame In The Silence Fear Had Produced. . . . It Was The Silence That Betrayed Us."

The Irony Is That We've Seen This Model Work Really Well In Massachusetts Because Gov. Romney Did A Good Thing, Working With Democrats In The State To Set Up What Is Essentially The Identical Model And, As A Consequence, People Are Covered There. It Hasn't Destroyed Jobs. And As A Consequence, We Now Have A System In Which We Have The Opportunity To Start Bringing Down Costs As Opposed To Just Leaving Millions Of People Out In The Cold." "gov. Romney Said This Has To Be Done On A Bipartisan Basis

Leadership Isn't Just Legislation, That It's A Matter Of Persuading People And Giving Them Confidence, And Bringing Them Together And Setting A Tone.

The Russians Can't Change Us Or Significantly Weaken Us. They Are A Smaller Country. They Are A Weaker Country. Their Economy Doesn't Produce Anything That Anybody Wants To Buy, Except Oil And Gas And Arms. They Don't Innovate. But They Can Impact Us If We Lose Track Of Who We Are.

You Not Only Do You Appreciate The Sacrifices People Have Made And The Hours They've Kept And The Soccer Games They Missed And The Birthday Parties, But I Also Had A Lot Of Young People Who Came In Here [to White House], And This Probably, You Know, Echoes With You, In Your Own Experience, You Were Young When You Got Here.

Nowhere Is It Ordained That History Moves In A Straight Line.

The Only People Who Don't Want To Disclose The Truth Are The People With Something To Hide.

Hillary Clinton Was An Outstanding Secretary Of State. She Would Never Intentionally Put America In Any Kind Of Jeopardy. And What I Also Know, Because I Handle A Lot Of Classified Information, Is That There's Classified And Then There's Classified. There's Stuff That Is Really Top Secret Top Secret, And There's Stuff That Is Being Presented To The President Or The Secretary Of State That You Might Not Want On The Transom Or, You Know, Going Out Over The Wire, But Is Basically Stuff That You Could Get In Open Source.

Pot Had Helped, And Booze, Maybe A Little Blow When You Could Afford It.

No Party Has A Monopoly On Wisdom. No Democracy Works Without Compromise.

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

In The End, No Amount Of American Forces Can Solve The Political Differences That Lie At The Heart Of Somebody Else's Civil War.

You Have Countries Like India That Have Tried To Help Untouchables, With Essentially Affirmative-action Programs, But It Hasn't Fundamentally Changed The Structure Of Their Societies.

American Values And Legal Traditions Do Not Permit The Indefinite Detention Of People Beyond Our Borders.

If We’re Going To Have Arguments, Let’s Have Arguments — but Let’s Make Them Debates Worthy Of This Body And Worthy Of This Country.

The Leaders We Revere And The Businesses That Last Are Generally Not The Result Of A Narrow Pursuit Of Popularity Or Personal Advancement, But Of Devotion To Some Bigger Purpose. That's The Hallmark Of Real Success. The Other Trapping Of Success Might Be The By Product Of This Larger Mission, But It Can't Be The Central Thing.

What Makes You A Man Is Not The Ability To Make A Child, It's The Courage To Raise One.

The More We Can Encourage Entrepreneurship, Particularly For Young People, The More They Have Hope. That Requires Some Reforms In These [african] Governments: Rooting Out Corruption, Increased Transparency And How Government Operates, Making Sure That Regulations Are Not Designed Just To Advantage Elites, But Are Allowing People Who Have A Good Idea To Get Out There And Get Things Done.

It’s Important To Make Sure That We’re Talking With Each Other In A Way That Heals, Not In A Way That Wounds." - Barack Obama, 44th U.s. President

Did I Recognize That There Was Anger Or Frustration In The American Population? Of Course I Did. First Of All, We Had To Fight Back From The Worst Recession Since The Great Depression, And I Can Guarantee You If Your Housing Values Have Crashed And You've Lost Most Of Your Pension And You've Lost Your Job, You're Going To Be Pretty Angry.

As I Reflect Back On What's Worked For Me In This [presidential] Office It's Been That I've Gotten People Who Maybe Didn't Believe In The Process To Get Engaged. Ironically, I've Even Gotten The Other Side That Maybe Didn't Believe In The Process To Get Engaged.

There Are Some Who Might Say That Somebody Named Barack Obama Can't Be Elected Senator In The State Of Illinois. They're Probably The Same Folks Who Said That A Guy Named Rod Blagojevich Couldn't Be Elected Governor Of The State Of Illinois.

Nothing In Life That’s Worth Anything Is Easy.

I Get Letters From [people Getting Insurance] Right Now. "you Saved My Child's Life." "i Did Not Have To Sell My Home When My Wife Got Sick." And That Is What, As A Policy Maker, I'm Trying To Achieve During The Short Period Of Time That I'm Here.

The American Story Has Never Been About Things Coming Easy. It Has Been About Rising To The Moment When The Moment Is Hard. About Rejecting Panicked Division For Purposeful Unity. About Seeing A Mountaintop From The Deepest Valley. That Is Why We Remember That Some Of The Most Famous Words Ever Spoken By An American Came From A President Who Took Office In A Time Of Turmoil: "the Only Thing We Have To Fear Is Fear Itself.

My Advice To African Leaders Is To Make Sure That If, In Fact, China Is Putting In Roads And Bridges, Number One, That They Are Hiring African Workers; Number Two, That The Roads Don't Just Lead From The Mine To The Port To Shanghai.

We Can't Afford To Stand Pat While The World Races By. The United States Of America Did Not Become The Most Prosperous Nation On Earth By Sheer Luck Or Happenstance. We Got Here Because Each Time A Generation Of Americans Has Faced A Changing World, We Have Changed With It. We Have Not Feared Our Future; We Have Shaped It.

The United States Has To Go Through Structural Reforms In Terms Of Improving Our Education System Or Revamping Our Infrastructure Or, You Know, Looking At Some Regulations That Weren't Properly Controlling Excesses On Wall Street.

I've Said Repeatedly That Where We See Terrorist Organizations Like Al-qaeda Or Isil, They Have Perverted And Distorted And Tried To Claim The Mantle Of Islam For An Excuse, For Basically Barbarism And Death. These Are People Who Kill Children, Kill Muslims, Take Sex Slaves - There's No Religious Rationale That Would Justify In Any Way Any Of The Things That They Do.

Throughout American History, There Have Been Moments That Call On Us To Meet The Challenges Of An Uncertain World, And Pay Whatever Price Is Required To Secure Our Freedom.

My Presidency Is Not Over. I've Got Another Five Years Coming Up.

Since I'm The President And Democrats Have Controlled The House And The Senate, It's Understandable That People Are Saying, You Know, 'what Have You Done?'

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.

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.

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.

I Am A Christian. So, I Have A Deep Faith. So I Draw From The Christian Faith...so, I'm Rooted In The Christian Tradition. I Believe That There Are Many Paths To The Same Place.

Politics Has Become So Bitter And Partisan, So Gummed Up By Money And Influence, That We Can't Tackle The Big Problems That Demand Solutions. And That's What We Have To Change First. We Have To Change Our Politics, And Come Together Around Our Common Interests And Concerns As Americans.

I Think Back To The Day I Drove Michelle And A Newborn Malia Home From The Hospital Nearly 11 Years Ago - Crawling Along, Miles Under The Speed Limit, Feeling The Weight Of My Daughter's Future Resting In My Hands. I Think About The Pledge I Made To Her That Day: That I Would Give Her What I Never Had - That If I Could Be Anything In Life, I Would Be A Good Father. I Knew That Day That My Own Life Wouldn't Count For Much Unless She Had Every Opportunity In Hers.

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.

Africa Doesn't Need Strongmen, It Needs Strong Institutions.

We Made America More Respected Around The World, Took On The Mantle Of Leadership In The Fight To Protect This Planet For Our Kids, And Much, Much More.

[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.

I Think The Greek People, Although It Is Difficult And Challenging And The Politics Of It I Know Are Not Good, Should Appreciate The Fact That In This Global Economy, The Greek Economy Was Going To Have To Go Through Some Structural Reforms.

I Remember When I Was In Chicago And Data Started Coming Out That When Black Folks Walk Into An Auto Dealership, And Women, Too, To Some Degree, They Are Automatically Given Higher Quotes, Worse Deals. And This Was Just Documented Extensively Across Auto Dealerships Around The Country. There Was A Tax Being Imposed On Black Folks. By Collecting That Data, You Can Construct Policies To Combat That.

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.

One Of The Things That We Have To Change In This Country Is The Idea That People Can't Disagree Without Challenging Each Other's Character And Patriotism. I Have Never Suggested That Sen. Mccain Picks His Positions On National Security Based On Politics Or Personal Ambition. I Have Not Suggested It Because I Believe That He Genuinely Wants To Serve America's National Interest. Now, It's Time For Him To Acknowledge That I Want To Do The Same. Let Me Be Clear: I Will Let No One Question My Love Of This Country.

We Want Everybody To Act Like Adults, Quit Playing Games, Realize That It's Not Just My Way Or The Highway.

So Just To Be Clear, I'm Not Going To Sign Any Package That Somehow Prevents The Top Rate From Going Up For Folks At The Top 2 Percent.

Americans... Still Believe In An America Where Anything's Possible - They Just Don't Think Their Leaders Do.

One Of The Things That You Learn, Having Been In This [president's] Office For Four Years, Is The Old Adage Of Abraham Lincoln's. That With Public Opinion There's Nothing You Can't Do And Without Public Opinion There's Very Little You Can Get Done.

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.

[a] Family With Two Kids That Earns The Minimum Wage Still Lives Below The Poverty Line. That's Wrong. That's Why, Since The Last Time This Congress Raised The Minimum Wage, 19 States Have Chosen To Bump Theirs Even Higher. Tonight, Let's Declare That In The Wealthiest Nation On Earth, No One Who Works Full-time Should Have To Live In Poverty, And Raise The Federal Minimum Wage To $9 An Hour.

What Drags Down Our Entire Economy Is When There's An Ever-widening Chasm Between The Ultra-rich And Everybody Else.

Generally Speaking, People Who Know Me Will Tell You That My Public Persona Is Not That Different From My Private Persona.

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.

California Is Our Biggest Economy. California Is Our Biggest Agricultural Producer. So What Happens Here Matters To Every Working American.

You're Not Going To Be Able To Make Good Decisions Without Building Some Relationship Of Trust Between Yourself And Community.

Nobody Gets To Threaten The Full Faith And Credit Of The United States Just To Extract Political Concessions.

That's What Building A Body Of Work Is All About. It's About The Daily Labor, The Many Individual Acts, The Choices Large And Small That Add Up Over Time, Over A Lifetime To A Lasting Legacy. It's About Not Being Satisfied With The Latest Achievement, The Latest Gold Star, Because The One Thing I Know About A Body Of Work Is That It's Never Finished. It's Cumulative. It Deepens And Expands With Each Day You Give Your Best. You May Have Setbacks And You May Have Failures, But You're Not Done.

Our Government Should Work For Us, Not Against Us. It Should Help Us, Not Hurt Us. It Should Ensure Opportunity Not Just For Those With The Most Money And Influence, But For Every American Who's Willing To Work. That's The Promise Of America - The Idea That We Are Responsible For Ourselves, But That We Also Rise Or Fall As One Nation; The Fundamental Belief That I Am My Brother's Keeper; I Am My Sister's Keeper.

And If That Child Should Ever Get The Chance To Travel The World And Someone Should Ask Her Where Is She From, We Believe That She Should Always Be Able To Hold Her Head High With Pride In Her Voice When She Answers, "i Am An American." That Is The Course We Seek. That Is The Change We Are Calling For.

Whenever I Write A Letter To A Family Who Has Lost A Loved One In Iraq, Or Read An Email From A Constituent Who Has Dropped Out Of College Because Her Student Aid Has Been Cut, I'm Reminded That The Actions Of Those In Power Have Enormous Consequences--a Price That They Themselves Almost Never Have To Pay.

We Can Be Civil To Each Other, And We Can Try To Express Ourselves Acknowledging That We're All Patriots, We're All Americans, And Not Assume The Absolute Worst In People's Motives.

I've Got Two Daughters And I Want To Make Sure That They Have The Same Opportunities That Anybody's Sons Have. That's Part Of What I'm Fighting For As President Of The United States.

These Kinds Of Tragedies [like Shooting In Fort Lauderdale] Have Happened Too Often During The Eight Years That I've Been President. The Pain, The Grief, The Shock That They Must Be Going Through Is Enormous. I've Asked Me Staff To Reach Out To The Mayor Down There And Make Sure That Coordination Between The State And Local Officials Is What It Should Be. But I Think We'll Find Out Over The Next 24 Hours Exactly How This Happened And What Motivated This Individual.

I Would Not Have The Justice Department Prosecuting And Raiding Medical Marijuana Users. It's Not A Good Use Of Our Resources.

Our Founding Fathers, Faced With Perils We Can Scarcely Imagine, Drafted A Charter To Assure The Rule Of Law And The Rights Of Man, A Charter Expanded By The Blood Of Generations. Those Ideals Still Light The World, And We Will Not Give Them Up For Expedience's Sake.

America And Islam Are Not Exclusive And Need Not Be In Competition. Instead, They Overlap, And Share Common Principles Of Justice And Progress, Tolerance And The Dignity Of All Human Beings.

Beside The Two Wars He Inherited In Iraq And Afghanistan, And Promised To End, A Financial Crisis At Home Had Pushed The United States To The Brink Of Another Great Depression. When We Spoke With The New President In March Of 2009, The Economy Was Losing 800,000 Jobs A Month, The Government Was Throwing Hundreds Of Billions Of Dollars At Failing Banks, And The Auto Industry Was On The Verge Of Collapse. Politically Pummeled From All Sides, Obama Did His Best To Keep A Sense Of Humor.

We Can't Change The Way Washington Works Unless We First Change How Congress Works.

I Found During The Course Of My Political Career On The National Scene There's A Point Where The Vanity Burns Away And You've Had Your Fill Of Your Name In The Papers, Or Big Adoring Crowds, Or The Exercise Of Power. And For Me That Happened Fairly Quickly. And Then You Are Really Focused On: What Am I Going To Get Done With This Strange Privilege That's Been Granted To Me? How Do I Make Myself Worthy Of It?

You're Going To Face A Choice In November. This Is A Choice Between The Policies That Got Us Into This Mess In The First Place And The Policies That Got Us Out Of This Mess - And What The Other Side Is Counting On Is People Not Having A Good Memory.

The Problem Is That Young People Are Less Likely To Vote Than Older People. What Results Is A Situation In Which Sometimes The Elections Don't Fully Reflect The Views Of The American Population.

There Are Gonna Be Elections Coming Up Among Our Nato Allies That We Have To Pay Attention To. I Anticipate That This Kind Of Thing Can Happen Again Here. And So In Addition To The Report Assessing What Exactly Happened, What We Have Also Done Is To Make Sure That The Department Of Homeland Security And Our Intelligence Teams Are Working With The Various Folks Who Run Our Elections.

We Are Not A Nation That Says 'don't Ask, Don't Tell.' We Are A Nation That Says 'out Of Many, We Are One.'

The Problem Is That, Over Time, Big Pieces Of Business That Have To Get Done Without Leadership From Washington, Don't Get Done.

John Mccain Has Not Spoken About My Muslim Faith.

What We Should Be Asking Is Not Whether We Need A Big Government Or Small Government, But How We Can Create A Smarter And Better Government.

Michelle, I Love You. The Other Night, I Think The Entire Country Saw Just How Lucky I Am. Malia And Sasha, You Make Me So Proud…but Don't Get Any Ideas, You're Still Going To Class Tomorrow. And Joe Biden, Thank You For Being The Best Vice President I Could Ever Hope For.

The Cuban People Must Know That They Have A Friend And Partner In The United States Of America.

The Warren Court Wasn't That Radical. It Didn't Break Free From The Essential Constraints That Were Placed By The Founding Fathers In The Constitution... I Intend To Succeed Where They Failed.

The Peaceful Transition Of Power Is One Of The Hallmarks Of Our Democracy.

I Look Forward To Hosting Prime Minister Lee [hsien Loong], Whose Friendship And Partnership I Appreciate Very Much And With Whom I've Worked Throughout My Administration. This Will Also Be An Opportunity For Me To Reciprocate The Hospitality That The Prime Minister And The People Of Singapore Showed To Me During My Visit To Singapore For The Apec Summit In 2009.

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