Quotes from Bill Clinton

The Wild, Wild West, this cyberterrorism. This new, scary frontier. Anyone sitting on a couch in his underwear could undermine the security of a nation.

Violin Concerto no. 1, featuring Wilhelm Friedemann Herzog

Participation in our democracy seems to be driven by the instant-gratification worlds of Twitter, Snapchat, Facebook, and the twenty-four-hour news cycle. We're using modern technology to revert to primitive kinds of human relations. The media knows what sells—conflict and division. It's also quick and easy. All too often anger works better than answers; resentment better than reason; emotion trumps evidence.

God, I sound like an ass. Worse yet, I sound like a lawyer.

And I know that there are cops who think of themselves as good cops but, even if unconsciously, see a black man in a T-shirt and jeans as more threatening than a white man dressed the same way.

Mr. President," he says, almost like a southern drawl, thick with incredulity. This man could look you in the eye and tell you that the world is flat, the sun rises in the west, and the moon is made of blue cheese, and he'd probably pass a polygraph test while doing so.

They intended to use America's absence from the world scene to overthrow the Saudi king, expropriate the wealth of his branch of the royal family and its supporters, reconcile with Iran and Syria, and establish a modern technocratic caliphate using science and technology to raise the standing of the Muslim world to heights not seen in a thousand years.

Jenny is leaning forward, wanting more, always wanting me to expound on the details of my military service. Tell them about your tour of duty. Tell them about your time as a POW. Tell them about your injuries, the torture. It was an endless struggle during the campaign, one of the things about me that tested most favorably. If my advisers had their way, it would have been just about the only thing I ever discussed. But I never gave in. Some things you just don't talk about.

I'd hate to interrupt this witch hunt with a substantive conversation." I glance over to the corner of the room, where Carolyn Brock winces, a rare break in her implacable expression.

I have a gigantic pain in my ass," I say. "Can you look and see if the Speaker of the House is up there?

My questioner is not the least bit deterred by the insults I've hurled. He is undoubtedly encouraged by the fact that his questions have now firmly found their place under my skin. He is looking at his notes again, at his flowchart of questions and follow-ups, while I try to calm myself.

Savagery in the quest for power is older than the Bible, but some of my opponents really hate my guts.

As the room slowly empties, the adrenaline drains from me, leaving me exhausted and discouraged. One thing they never tell you about this job is how much it's like your first roller-coaster ride—thrilling highs, lows lower than a snake's belly. Then it's just me, staring at the Rough Rider portrait above the fireplace and hearing footsteps as Carolyn, Danny, and Jenny gingerly approach the wounded animal in the cage.

She said swearing shows a lack of creativity. I'm not so sure. When things get really tough, I can get pretty creative with my cussing.

You're fair. Dirty blond and fair-complected.

everyone knows—that if you blow the opener, nobody remembers anything else.

I'd never known intimacy so raw and cathartic.

too often, those who rail against "them" prevail over earnest pleas to remember what "we" can be and do together. Our brains have worked this way for a long time. Maybe they always will. But we have to keep trying. That's the permanent mission our Founding Fathers left us—moving toward the "more perfect union.

There is nothing I value more in subordinates than their willingness to tell me I'm wrong, to challenge me, to sharpen my decision making. Surrounding yourself with sycophants and bootlickers is the surest route to failure.

Traffic is thick, so my urge to gun the car, to feel the freedom of this temporary independence, is stymied by the congestion at every intersection. I look up through the windshield at the bruised sky, hoping it won't rain.

Her eyes drift up and away, enlarging them, a beautiful copper color. It makes her look even younger. Less of the hardened image she's trying to project and more the scared kid she must be, underneath it all.

May God bless the United States of America and all who call it home.

At the end of the Constitutional Convention, a citizen asked Benjamin Franklin what kind of government our founders had given us. He replied, "A republic, if you can keep it." That's a job no president can do alone. It's up to all of us to keep it. And to make the most of it.

Remembering the words of Ranko, her first teacher, the toothpick jutting out from the side of his mouth, his fiery red, stalklike hair—a scarecrow whose hair caught fire, as he once described himself.