I need you to go out and talk to your friends and talk to your neighbors. I want you to talk to them whether they are independent or whether they are Republican. I want you to argue with them and get in their face.
You should know both the universal and the personal, the realm of forms and the freedom to not cling to them. The forms of the world have their place, but in another way, there is nothing there. To be free, we need to respect both of these truths.
I have many projects in various states of development. Some are on paper and some are in my head. But as I go on, I feel the need to be guided in my choices.
But like all power, there are those who want to keep it for themselves. The world's entire scientific and cultural heritage, published over centuries in books and journals, is increasingly being digitized and locked up by a handful of private corporations. Want to read the papers featuring the most famous results of the sciences? You'll need to send enormous amounts to publishers like Reed Elsevier.
Part of American leadership is making sure that we're doing nation building here at home. That will help us maintain the kind of American leadership that we need.
The books, the authors who matter the most are those who speak to me and speak for me all those things about life I most need to hear as the confession of myself