Quotes from Margaret Brennan

As a member of the often maligned fourth estate, it is so refreshing to have a conversation instead of a buttoned up interview in a stifling studio.

I do believe there's a hunger in this country to have a civil conversation and to listen to each other again and that's what we try to do. That's what I try to do.

I love D.C. - people who have such cosmopolitan background, who are doing interesting things. It's a fraction of the size of Manhattan but the knowledge that people have is amazing.

Growing up I was a competitive Irish step dancer.

A lot of the traveling that I have done is for work. I've been to spots in Afghanistan and Iraq that are lovely, too, but I wouldn't put those on travel itineraries.

As a journalist, I fundamentally believe that keeping the public informed is an essential part of democracy.

I went to an all-girls school in Connecticut, which particularly in high school is a really formative time. This one nun would eviscerate you for raising your hands and adding some disqualifying statement - 'I could be wrong but,' or 'I don't know I might be wrong but this is what I'm thinking' - as young women often do.

Every single person who tries to juggle a family and their life knows all those things that pull at you.

Traveling with my husband is great as he is a sponge for new languages and tries to learn them on our trips.

I've noticed something happens when you take the masters of the universe outside of their home turf. They breathe.

There is a place for the hot take. There is a place for the tweet.

Our country needs more people who listen, think for themselves, and treat each other with respect.

No one really speaks for the president other than the president.

In college, I was in the debating society - this total nerd.

I lived in Manhattan for 12 years and grew up outside New York City, so that was definitely how I saw the center of the world.

CNBC really did dominate. Could I have stayed there and continued doing what I was doing? Yes. I had been there for seven years and I was looking for an opportunity to help me grow in immediate terms.

When you cover someone day in and day out, you start observing their habits or how and when they respond well.

I was hired at CNBC TV by a financial news anchor named Louis Rukeyser who had spent decades as a foreign correspondent in the Middle East. He told me I could learn the craft on the job. That was my first paid gig. Before that I was an unpaid intern at CNN in Atlanta.

Face the Nation' is a brand, a mantle, and it's a responsibility to continue to uphold, and to protect. My job is to maintain the brand, grow the brand, and along with our executive producer Mary Hager, help bring the brand along without in any way devaluing the trust that people have bestowed on us over the years.

I'm vegetarian and my husband is not, so the one kind of commonality in our palate is that we both love spicy food.

I graduated with a foreign affairs/Middle East studies degree with a minor in Arabic from UVA in 2002.

There's really no substitute for being able to sit across from someone, have eye contact, see and read their body language, hear the inflection in their voice in a real way.

If you're just inflaming your electorate, are you making anything better?

Talking points aren't going to help the viewers understand something better. They're about as useful as bumper sticker slogans.