Look Congress has allocated more money to finance the upcoming Iraqi elections than it has for the American elections. There's something wrong with that.

Do you know the only thing that gives me pleasure? It's to see my dividends coming in.

I think interviews can be fine. It's just there's this terrible fear of coming off wrongly or saying something that gets taken out of context.

The day in 2004 when the radiologist told me I had invasive cancer I walked down the hospital corridor looking for a phone to call my husband and I could almost see the fear coming toward me like a big black shadow.

I had a fear of becoming anything a fear of becoming a specialist. I might have become a doctor but if you become a doctor that's your specialty in life and you are defined by it. One of the attractions of being a writer is that you're never a specialist. Your field is entirely open your field is the entire human condition.

If the markets had behaved badly that would obviously add to people's sense of alarm... but there has been a lot of reassurance coming particularly in the way the Brits handled all this. There seems to be no great fear that something like that is going to happen here.

Being aware of your fear is smart. Overcoming it is the mark of a successful person.

But with the right kind of coaching and determination you can accomplish anything and the biggest accomplishment that I feel I got from the film was overcoming that fear.

I'd rather be two strokes ahead going into the last day than two strokes behind. Having said that it's probably easier to win coming from behind. There is no fear in chasing. There is fear in being chased.

Over the past few years the road to confrontation has shown its consequences: loss of innocent lives destruction and fear. Most costly however was the loss of hope. The most precious gift that you can present to your peoples over the coming weeks is renewed hope born out of tangible progress on the ground.