I Taught. I Lectured At Universities. I

When You Go Into A College Of Education You've Got Aspirations Of Making A Difference In People's Lives, Of Loving Children, Of Working With Kids, But None Of That Is Affirmed In Your College Of Education. Then You Go Working In Schools, Especially In Places Like New York City And Chicago That I'm Most Familiar With, And You Find These Huge Aspirations Are Beaten Out Of You In A Very Systematic Way - And Still People Persevere.

There Are Things About Classic Liberalism That Obviously I'm Drawn To And I Bet All Of You Are As Well. Those Are Things Like Liberty, Freedom, The Bill Of Rights. But The Reason That I Reject The Label Is That I Grew Up Cutting My Teeth Against The Liberals.

Part Of The Fun Of Writing, Touring, Teaching, Is Engaging With Real People About All Of It: What To Do Now, How To Build A Movement, Of Approaches To Teaching, Of Parenting - It's Exciting To Be In That Dialogue.

[barack] Obama Doesn't Disappoint Me, Because All During The Campaign He Said, I'm A Pragmatic, Middle-of-the-road, Compromising Politician.

I'm An Optimist In My Heart - I'm A Hopeless Pollyanna Just Like My Mother - But A Pessimist In My Head. I Think That's The Dialectic We All Need To Be In.