As I've said many times, the nuclear deal was never intended to resolve all of our differences with Iran. But still, engaging directly with the Iranian government on a sustained basis for the first time in decades has created a unique opportunity, a window, to try to resolve important issues.
Everybody stumbles across a golden opportunity at least once in a lifetime. Unfortunately most people just pick themselves up, dust themselves down, and walk away from it.
At eight o'clock the curtain goes up and that's it, you're out there with yourself, the audience, the other players. There's no "take two" business. You're on. The great thing is the rehearsals, too. When you're bouncing around on film sets and TV sets you don't really get the opportunity to - generally speaking - rehearse much. With theater you're kind of four-to-five weeks locked down in the room with the guys figuring stuff out. It's back to play school.
People expect those in authority to take on big problems and to solve them. We had an opportunity to reform Social Security in a way that would have protected people's benefits and created a solvent system. Younger workers would be confident that the money they were putting into the system would be available to them when they retired. It was a missed opportunity. I regret that.
I come from a great family and I was raised by wonderful parents. There is no question that I was given a lot of interesting and unique opportunities growing up...But I think people often misunderstand that I work as hard and want things just as badly as anybody else.
I think having the opportunity to get inside the skin of people that operate outside the law and normal moral and ethical restraints, and then to go home afterwards leaving them on set, is pretty cathartic. I get to play out all kinds of bad behavior without anyone actually coming to harm.
Gary Berntsen, head of the CIA in Afghanistan there, he was a field commander. And he has a book out called "Jawbreaker." And he says we missed an opportunity at Tora Bora to get him. We put resources elsewhere. That's been a critique of the administration. Did we miss opportunities?
Sometimes we let our thoughts of tomorrow take up too much of today. Daydreaming of the past and longing for the future may provide comfort but will not take the place of living in the present. This is the day of our opportunity, and we must grasp it
I think I live inside the plane! I never have time to unpack; I'm always leaving in two days again. I travel a lot, and at the beginning it was really fun. The first time I went inside a plane, I was 15 years old and I had so much fun. I like to travel all over the world and learn [about] new cultures. Not that many people have the opportunity to do that.
I meant it when I said she was the greatest first lady ever. Because she viewed the presidency and being first lady as an opportunity to improve people's lives. It wasn't a burden. She put her heart and soul into the experience, just like I did.
Entrepreneurs are simply those who understand that there is little difference between obstacle and opportunity and are able to turn both to their advantage.
I look forward to hosting Prime Minister Lee [Hsien Loong], whose friendship and partnership I appreciate very much and with whom I've worked throughout my administration. This will also be an opportunity for me to reciprocate the hospitality that the Prime Minister and the people of Singapore showed to me during my visit to Singapore for the APEC summit in 2009.
We rarely use much debt and, when we do, we attempt to structure it on a long-term fixed rate basis. We will reject interesting opportunities rather than over-leverage our balance sheet. This conservatism has penalized our results but it is the only behavior that leaves us comfortable, considering our fiduciary obligations to policyholders, depositors, lenders and the many equity holders who have committed unusually large portions of their net worth to our care.
I cannot consent to take the position that the door of hope - the door of opportunity - is to be shut upon any man, no matter how worthy, purely upon the grounds of race or color. Such an attitude would, according to my convictions, be fundamentally wrong.