My priority will continue to be that we maintain the optimal balance to be able to invest in education and infrastructure while encouraging business growth.

That's a large part of the job as governor: to create and maintain the optimal balance.

I believe that our teachers need more freedom to be creative in the classroom in order to maximize the time students spend learning, not the time they spend taking tests.

When it comes down to hardball, we have a veto pen, and I've used it in the past, and I expect we will have opportunity to use it in the future. That's the nature of the business.

My son was born somewhat late in my life and I just found myself really feeling like I didn't want to miss out on being a parent and being with him, and not wanting a situation where I was constantly pulled back and forth between being present, and having all these other pressures and considerations.

I could have ended up a casualty of a broken family, like so many of the kids around me in inner city Baltimore. But my life was forever changed the year I turned 10. That was the year my dad turned to Jesus.

I come from the slums; I come from a hard background; I come from a poor family; and I was a soldier.

The idea of kids helping other kids is such a great way to introduce children to being involved in charitable causes and volunteer work, setting them on the path to doing good for others throughout their lives.