We recognize that violence is a learned behavior. One of the best classrooms for learning violence is in the home.

What has too often happened in the past is that people have threatened punishment but have failed to carry it out. It's imperative in any initiative that is undertaken that punishment be real and that there be truth in sentencing, and that the truly dangerous offenders - the recidivists and the career criminals - be put away and kept away.

My earnest hope is that what we started in terms of building partnerships with communities across America will continue, that we will continue our efforts to reduce crime and violence.

We're building on an international network with many others for the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act. There are so many things we can do to carry forward policies.

It would be great if firefighters across the country had the guarantee that they would be making enough money to support their family right from the get-go, but that's not the case.

During my childhood and teenage years, everything I knew was at war. My mother and father were at war. My sister and I were at war. I was at war with my atypical nature, desperately trying to fit in and be normal. Even my genes were at war - the cool Swiss-German side versus the hot-headed Corsican.

I know I'm British. I haven't spent much time in the U.K., but my parents are British, my family heritage is British, so if I wasn't British, what would I be? I am British.

We were the outliers: my mother was the only Western woman (khawagayya, in Egyptian Arabic) to have married into the family, and during my childhood, we were the only members living outside of Egypt. So between my father's prestige as the eldest son and my own exotic pedigree, I basked in the spotlight.