The John F. Kennedy Institute of Politics was originally intended to bring scholars and politicians into closer contact, on the assumption that other office-holders can use academics as profitably as Kennedy did during his political career.

A reader's eyes may glaze over after they take in a couple of paragraphs about Canadian tariffs or political developments in Pakistan; a story about the reader himself or his neighbors will be read to the end.

I won't sell any Facebook shares as long as I'm on the board. When I leave, all my Facebook shares will be donated to two or three D.C. education-related charities I've supported over the years. Thus, a small portion of Facebook's success will be shared with low income students in Washington.

I was lucky to become a Facebook board member in late 2008. Restricted stock units granted me at the time have increased many times in value.

From the outside, Yahoo was extremely successful. It was making money; it was still bigger than Google. But when I got there, I learned what a disaster of a company looks like from the inside. There were a lot of vice presidents, and it was basically a turf battle between them.

If you put me in charge of the medical research budget, I would cancel all primary research, I would cancel all new trials, for just one year, and I would spend the money exclusively on making sure that we make the best possible use of the clinical evidence that we already have.

I think that what went wrong with religion is the same thing that went wrong with politics. Is that it became too money based and too controlling. It's just a weakness that we human beings have for control - we want one thing and then we want more and then we want more.

I'm Greek-American, and I come from an immigrant-type background, and Greek-American parents want you to be a doctor or a lawyer. Because that's how you make money, and it's very respectable.