It's too early to declare that we have achieved "Peace in our time!" Even if every aspect of this agreement will be followed to the letter, it is unclear that Iran's nuclear ambitions, and the danger that these imply, have been effectively contained.

Don't call this America a "police state," not given what that came to mean in the previous century, nor a "totalitarian" state, given what that meant back then. The truth is that we have no appropriate name, label, or descriptive term for ourselves.

I hope, as we remember a young President, that we will renew our commitment to building with urgency and persistence a just America where every child is valued and enabled to achieve their God given potential regardless of the lottery of birth.

The only real hope in any significant change for the better rests in the American people. But first we have to regain a sense of America's history and reclaim our inheritance.

In the maelstrom of the shutdown, a debt-ceiling suicide attempt and the cutting off of nutrition support for poor people by Congress, it's clear that America's political class has unbounded belief in national stability.

Did you hear the one about the people awaiting flights on a Friday morning having to flee for their lives from a deranged guy with a gun? Or how about...

Instead of containing terrorists, the illegal and immoral drone warfare has increased extremist recruiting that can destabilize Pakistan and in the long term can target the U.S.