The truth is every problem can't be solved by government. Many are caused by the moral breakdown in our society. And the answers to those challenges lie primarily in our families and our faiths, not our politicians.

A tough day for me is if I lose an election or get a bad story in the paper. A tough day for my dad was they might be late on the rent. A tough day for my grandfather might have meant his daughters didn't eat.

It's one thing to consider immigration reform as a theoretical policy issue, and another to meet real people whose lives are impacted by it. As a senator, I interact with people who flat-out tell you, "Look, my kids were hungry. And I am going to do what it takes to feed them." You think, "If I had been in that position, would I have done something different?"

A politician is very good at navigating the process of politics. It involves getting a few things done for the people who sent you there, but mostly perpetuating your time in office. A leader may end up being able to accomplish that, but is more motivated by the desire to accomplish something, and usually when you try to accomplish something you're almost never judged kindly by your contemporaries. I think that's true for all great leaders. If you look back, they were almost all significantly unpopular or had tremendous opposition they faced because of what they were trying to do.

Even with all the challenges America faces, there is still no nation on earth with a brighter future. The fundamental source of our nation's greatness remains our people. And while their government and its leaders might be languishing. The American people have not diminished one bit.

If it's bad for America, it can't possibly be good for your state.

Legal immigration is good for America, if it's controlled and structured via the legal process, of course. But the problem is the system we have in place right now is broken. For example, it is completely family based which means that it's based not on what you can do or what talent you have or what merit you bring or what job you could fill, but rather on whether you know someone who already lives here.

I don't think you can nominate someone with a last name that ends in a vowel and expect that all of a sudden Hispanics will flock to them.

For more than two generations, my family had never achieved their ambitions. Their talents were unappreciated and unused. They deserved better. They hadn't done anything wrong; they just had some bad breaks. Why was I succeeding? Why was I living my dreams? I wasn't more deserving than they were. I wasn't smarter or a better person. What was the difference between us that allowed me to attain so much in a short time? America. America was the difference. I had been born a citizen of the greatest nation in all of human history.

[My parents] emigrated to America with little more than the hope of a better life. My dad was a bartender. My mom was a a maid and a stock clerk at K-Mart. They never made it big. And yet they were successful. Because just a few decades removed from hopelessness, they made possible for us all the things that had been impossible for them.

In order to work together with people that you disagree with, there has to be mutual respect. That means I respect people who disagree with me on certain things, but they have to respect me too. Just because I believe that states should have the right to define marriage in the traditional way does not make me a bigot.

I needed water, what am I going to do? God has a funny way of reminding us we’re human.

Each generation is responsible for the America we leave our children, for ensuring we are not America's last privileged generation.

Of course solar and wind energy should be a part of our energy portfolio. But God also blessed America with abundant coal, oil and natural gas. Instead of wasting more taxpayer money on so-called "clean energy" companies like Solyndra, let's open up more federal lands for safe and responsible exploration. And let's reform our energy regulations so that they're reasonable and based on common sense. If we can grow our energy industry, it will make us energy independent, it will create middle class jobs and it will help bring manufacturing back from places like China.

I had finally settled into life in Miami, and was happy we had moved back. But in October, our family's fortunes took a sudden turn for the worse. I came home from school one day and knew from the look on my mother's face that something terrible had happened. It was a look you expect to see when someone has been told they or someone they love is dying. And that's exactly how I felt when she told me that earlier that morning Orlando had been arrested on drug charges. I was stunned by the news. Like my parents, I had never suspected Orlando was involved in a criminal enterprise. His arrest and subsequent trial and imprisonment distressed the entire family, but [my sister] Barbara and my parents bore the brunt of the hardships it caused. Even decades later, my sister and mother would be forced to relive the shame of the ordeal.

I would just say it's not good for the country to have 11 million people here who we don't know who they are, where they're living. They're not paying taxes, but they're showing up in emergency rooms. They're driving up the cost of auto insurance 'cause they don't have driver's licenses and are getting into accidents. They're having children, which are US citizens. So, I mean, it's an issue that needs to be dealt with.

Because tuition costs have grown so fast, we need to change the way we pay for higher education. I believe in federal financial aid. I couldn't have gone to college without it. But it's not just about spending more money on these programs; it's also about strengthening and modernizing them.

The people who are against illegal immigration and make that the core of their argument view it only as a law and order issue. But we know it's much more than that. Yes, it is a law & order issue, but it's also a human issue. These are real people. These are human beings who have children, and hopes, and dreams. These are people that are doing what virtually any of us would do if our children were hungry, if their countries were dangerous, if they had no hope for their future. And too often in our conversation about immigration that perspective is lost. Who among us would not do whatever it took to feed our children and provide for them a better future?