Mitt Romney

I looked at the race, and I said, 'Look. Hillary Clinton is going to be hard to beat.' Another bad prediction on my part, because she's turned out a lot weaker than I thought.

It's time for the party of big ideas, not the party of Big Brother!

If I were to offer advice to any president of the United States, it would be this: do whatever you can do to keep America the most prosperous and free and powerful nation on earth.

The reason I'm an American is for all the people in this country and recognizing that if business is thriving and growing, it will create more jobs, raise wages of our people, allow us to care for our seniors, get a better education for our kids, and allow us to have the kind of military that can defend American interests around the world.

I love practical jokes and humor. That there's frankly no joke that I don't think is funny. I love practical jokes, but I don't like being scared.

Dad was an outstanding leader. He'd bring in top thinkers from a wide array of fields - how to fix the Detroit schools, for example. I watched him in these meetings. He listened and probed.

No person I have ever met, not even the most righteous or pure of heart, has gone without those times when faith recedes in the busy-ness of life.

And that's how it is in America. We look to our communities, our faiths, our families for our joy, our support, in good times and bad. It is both how we live our lives and why we live our lives.

Iran with a nuclear weapon or with fissile material that can be given to Hezbollah or Hamas or others has the potential of not just destabilizing the Middle East. But it could be brought here.

I've been on Letterman a couple of times. I've been on Leno more than a couple times, and now Letterman hates me because I've been on Leno more than him. They're very jealous of one another, as you know.

There never was a democracy yet where the people didn't vote themselves into oblivion.

We believe in individual initiative, personal responsibility, opportunity, freedom, small government, the Constitution. These principles, these American principles are key to getting our economy back to being successful and leading the world.

Our economy is on the move and we are creating thousands of new jobs, but we need to keep our foot on the gas pedal.

I think Dodd-Frank has contributed to a concentration of banking assets in the hands of a small number of banks.

I am in favor of stem-cell research. I am not in favor of creating new human embryos through cloning.

Sometimes I wonder whether Washington's liberal politicians truly understand the greatness that is America.

Instead of just giving lip service to improving our schools, I will actually put the kids first and the teachers union behind in giving our kids better teachers, better options and better choices for a better future.

Three years ago, this week, a newly elected President Obama faced the American people and he said, look, if I can't turn this economy around in three years, I'll be looking at a one-term proposition, and we're here to collect! You know the results. It's been 35 months of unemployment above 8 percent.

Democrats want to use the slowdown as an excuse to do what their special interests are always begging for: higher taxes, bigger government and less trade with other nations.

That said, your values will not always be the object of public admiration. In fact, the more you live by your beliefs, the more you will endure the censure of the world.