David Ben-Gurion understood that the public's trust is given to a leader in order to lead, determine clear goals and make difficult decisions. The fate of the people and the good of the state guided him, not polls, media treatment or measures of prestige.
I can honestly say that my abortion was one of the least difficult decisions of my life. I'm not being flippant when I say it took me longer to decide what worktops to have in the kitchen than whether I was prepared to spend the rest of my life being responsible for a further human being.
Our long-term prosperity depends critically on the ability of world leaders to make politically difficult decisions at a time when the global economy is still vulnerable on so many fronts.
The trouble with the SNP is they want power without responsibility. They do not want to take difficult decisions.
It's a competitive business and obviously a lot of money is involved in the sport and the regulators sometimes have difficult decisions to make, but hopefully for the benefit of Formula 1 and all the fans across the world, we can move forwards into 2008 with all the focus on the race track rather than in the courtroom.
We need a younger generation that's prepared to grow a backbone, go out into the world, take risks and make difficult decisions. Otherwise the future doesn't bode well for any of us.
Playing deep-stack, no-limit hold'em is a very complex game where the most critical and difficult decisions come after the flop.
When you're taking the country through difficult times and difficult decisions you've got to take the country with you. That means permanently trying to make the argument that what you're doing is fair and seen to be fair.
At a time when we're having to take such difficult decisions about how to cut back without damaging the things that matter the most, we should strain every sinew to cut error, waste and fraud.
I do think that despite my best efforts to resist it, I am now a grown-up. It's due to lots of very difficult decisions that you make over a long period of time - about motherhood, wifehood, and work, and all the things that one has to make decisions about.
