A presidential debate is a job interview. And voters look for certain traits in people applying to be president.

At the start of his second term, one wonders less about Obama's fitness than his willingness: Why doesn't he do more to build and maintain the relationships required to govern in era of polarization?

It's a deft trick to turn American exceptionalism into an exceptional political tactic.

According to a Public Policy Polling survey, most Americans find lice and colonoscopies more appealing than Capitol Hill.

With gridlock the norm, Congress's approval rating is below 10 percent and the public has lost faith in its national leadership.

Blending hard-bitten realism with long-view optimism, Obama said that every 20 or 30 years brings a new cycle of pessimism in America.

Although we were never pals and occasionally butted heads, my relationship with Clinton and his wife, Hillary, made me a better journalist.

President George W. Bush won reelection in 2004 largely because he was seen as comfortable in his own skin, while rival John Kerry was viewed as a flip-flopping opportunist.

Obama might do well to remember that his fast rise from the Illinois state Senate was due in large part to an uncanny ability to make friends and find mentors.

I'm hearing echoes of Bill Clinton, circa 1996, in President Obama's reelection rhetoric.

For a man who has compared himself to Theodore Roosevelt and the nation's challenges to those of the Gilded Age, Obama put forward a tepid agenda.

There's no shame in fear, my father told me, what matters is how we face it.

I have noticed bakers with swelled hands, and painful, too; in fact the hands of all such workers become much thickened by the constant pressure of kneading the dough.

I love Don Williams records. And old Ralph Stanley and Bill Monroe.

What's [the Beatles'] I Am the Walrus all about?

Only the most acute and active animals are capable of boredom.

Shooting videos with lots of effects is like shooting a bunch of puzzle pieces.

What's great about stand-up unlike athletes and other things when you get old you get old and rusty.

I just never really gave myself any credit. And because of that, nobody else did either. You mirror what the world mirrors to you.

I'm glad I did it, partly because it was worth it, but mostly because I shall never have to do it again.

I don't really remember, but from about the age of five I told anyone who would listen that I was going to be the best golfer in the world.