I saw courage both in the Vietnam War and in the struggle to stop it. I learned that patriotism includes protest, not just military service.
NAFTA recognizes the reality of today's economy - globalization and technology. Our future is not in competing at the low-level wage job; it is in creating high-wage, new technology jobs based on our skills and our productivity.
Climate change, if unchecked, is an urgent threat to health, food supplies, biodiversity, and livelihoods across the globe.
I'm fascinated by rap and by hip-hop. I think there's a lot of poetry in it. There's a lot of anger, a lot of social energy in it. And I think you'd better listen to it pretty carefully, 'cause it's important.
We have traded a dictator for a chaos that has left America less secure.
If we don't preserve the oceans from nitrate runoff and plastic and chemicals, and if we don't preserve it from acidification, and if we don't preserve it from grotesque overfishing - too much money chasing too few fish - we're going to have the most massive ecosystem on the planet in peril.
Being lectured by the president on fiscal responsibility is a little bit like Tony Soprano talking to me about law and order in this country.
In the 1950s and '60s, America's natural resources were in bad shape. Communities were so polluted that clouds of smog lingered over cities like Los Angeles. Rivers and lakes were filled with chemicals. In my hometown of Boston, the harbor was among the nation's most polluted waterways.
You just don't, in the 21st century, behave in 19th-century fashion by invading another country on completely trumped up pre-text.
When we walk away from global warming, Kyoto, when we are irresponsibly slow in moving toward AIDS in Africa, when we don't advance and live up to our own rhetoric and standards, we set a terrible message of duplicity and hypocrisy.
Young people have so much more power than they tend to think to be able to affect politics. And if people will organize and get involved and go out and knock on doors and hand out leaflets and make a change, then they can determine the future.
I think George Mitchell is a consummate professional. He is the ideal selection to handle the job of special envoy if you choose to have a special envoy.
The best way to begin genuine bipartisanship to make America stronger is to work together on the real crises facing our country, not to manufacture an artificial crisis to serve a special interest agenda out of touch with the needs of Americans.
I would rather be the candidate of the NAACP than the NRA.
The bottom line is that the impacts of climate change can exacerbate resource competition, threaten livelihoods, and increase the risk of instability and conflict, especially in places already undergoing economic, political, and social stress.
One of the most cherished photographs in my life is a picture of me with John Lennon - who I met back in 1971 at an anti-war rally.
The solution to climate change is staring us in the face. It's energy policy. If we pursue a global clean-energy economy, we can cut dramatically the amount of carbon pollution we emit into the atmosphere and prevent the worst impacts of climate change.
Republican secretaries of state from Kissinger to Baker, Powell to Rice, President Bush, 71 United States Senators all supported President Obama's new START treaty, but not Mitt Romney.
I know there are a lot of musicians and a lot of artists, and there are a lot of writers and other people who inspire young people, but I'd like to see somebody in political life be able to connect and make these choices that we need to make in Washington real in terms of people's lives.
In 1970, as a 26 year-old, I joined in the effort in my home state of Massachusetts to organize for Earth Day. But what made the event so successful was that I was only one of about 20 million Americans of all ages and backgrounds who got involved.
