We're living in an era of unprecedented change, and I want to be a part of documenting it.

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.

The more permanent the outcome of a decision seems, the more thorough and painstaking our decision process should be.

Life is a broken thing. It's what we do with the pieces that defines us.

Isn't there any heaven where old beautiful dances, old beautiful intimacies prolong themselves?

Put on the music, and listen. Zazen means to sit, to listen. You're listening to enlightenment, to the universes, to the planes of mind.

You might be a redneck if you hammer bottle caps into the frame of your front door to make it look nice.

I seem to get the best work when I'm angry and depressed and alienated.

I love living in London but I would like to buy a place in Dubai and spend a few months of the year out there.

The perfection of a thing consists in its essence; there are perfect criminals, as there are men of perfect probity.

As a writer, I will tell you that darkness is so easy to make interesting. It is so easy because you're allowed to do anything you want.

Does anyone in this land act like they're supposed to?