Religious freedom doesn't mean you can force others to live by your own beliefs. - Barack Obama

And that’s why we support societies that empower women -- because no country will reach its potential unless it draws on the talents of our wives and our mothers, and our sisters and our daughters.

"We the people, in order to form a more perfect union." Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America's improbable experiment in democracy.

When I was on the brink of graduating from college, I had this crazy idea that I wanted to be a community organizer and work in low-income neighborhoods. My mother and grandparents thought I should go to law school, and my friends were all busy applying for jobs on Wall Street. But I went ahead and wrote letters to every organization in the country that I thought was working to empower low-income people. And finally, this small group of churches on the south side of Chicago wrote back and offered me a job helping them deal with the consequences of steel plants that had closed and put thousands out of work. The churches didn't have much money - so they offered me a grand sum of $12,000 a year plus $1,000 to buy a car. So I bought a beat up old car, packed up my belongings, got out a map, and started driving west to Chicago - a place I had never been and where I didn't know a living soul.