That is what leadership is all about: staking your ground ahead of where opinion is and convincing people, not simply following the popular opinion of the moment.

Good leadership requires you to surround yourself with people of diverse perspectives who can disagree with you without fear of retaliation.

The past is not simply the past, but a prism through which the subject filters his own changing self-image.

Once a president gets to the White House, the only audience that is left that really matters is history.

As a historian, what I trust is my ability to take a mass of information and tell a story shaped around it.

Go ahead, and fear not. You will have a full library at your service.

Better to have your enemies inside your tent pissing out, then to have them outside your tent pissing in.

I still think about that one Jamiroquai video a lot.

Excitement about things became a habit, a part of my personality, and the expectation that I should enjoy new experiences often engendered the enjoyment itself.

Whatever it is that you do, if you have that passion and desire for it, that's the most important thing.

Washington was a typical American. Napoleon was a typical Frenchman, but Lincoln was a humanitarian as broad as the world. He was bigger than his country - bigger than all the Presidents together.

Not only does depression take away our spiritual and emotional health, it also undermines our physical health.

I don’t know who those other people are and what they did to you, but I’m not one of them, ” I whispered, on the verge of tears. (Molly)“You are. You just don’t know yet.” (Victor)

NEW HAIKUOne breathy vowelmists the glass warming windowpanes crystalled with snowRobin Glasser

The tree of liberty grows only when watered by the blood of tyrants.

I had a chance to choose a couple different places and, well, I grew up - I was a small-town kid from Illinois, so No. 1, just trying to win a championship for my home state.

Fear is excitement without breath.

The only proof for the existence of God is that without God you couldn't prove anything.

Money poisons you when you've got it, and starves you when you haven't.

Medicine is a jealous mistress. It demands all your time.

It's still possible to be a cockeyed optimist these days - you just have to be a little more cockeyed.