Magic lies in challenging what seems impossible.
I really think that's the key, part of the spiritual renewal that America needs to have, the notion that we really can have confidence in a better tomorrow.
I think if we are actually going to accept our generation's responsibility, that's going to mean that we give our children no less retirement security than we inherited from our parents.
The really important victory of the civil rights movement was that it made racism unpopular, whereas a generation ago at the turn of the last century, you had to embrace racism to get elected to anything.
I'm committed to universal health coverage and education.
I'm a results-oriented person and my Senate record shows that.
The notion that we won the war against Iraq is like saying we won a war against Arizona. I mean, the fact of the matter is it's not that big of a country. Nobody, I don't think, had any notion that we would do anything but win it.
I think the legacy of the civil rights movement is that now whites are more open to being represented by people of color or people who are women or, again, non-traditional candidates.
I'd come back after having served as ambassador to New Zealand and found that I had real concerns about the direction in which this country was headed.
We're failing our children with education, we're failing our environment.
I think Americans want to believe in this country again.
I think that we have a responsibility to make certain that we are fiscally responsible in order to assure, frankly, future generations don't have to pay our bills.
I want to rebuild America.
If we can rebuild Iraq, we can rebuild Illinois and Indiana and if we can do Baghdad, we can do Baltimore.
There are a number of steps that we can take to reinvigorate and rebuild the economic and the physical infrastructure of our country and then to rebuild us, frankly, on a spiritual level.
To me, that means getting back to the point where our Constitution means that you don't tap people's phones and poke into their e-mail and you don't arrest people and keep them hidden for a year and a half without charging them.
Well, if you pick a fight with somebody that's smaller than you and you beat them, where's the honor in that?
New Zealand, by the way, where I was ambassador, has had two women prime ministers - one from either party.
People just want to hear some common sense... and I bring to bear the experience in local government and state government and national government - I was the first woman in history on the Senate Finance Committee - not to mention the diplomatic international experience.
I think it does suggest that the American people really do want to listen to somebody who actually has some solutions, some answers, and gives them some hope.
