Obama seems to inspire a bizarre personal loyalty among his advocates, particularly among young people who should by all rights be concerned with their fading futures and collapsing prospects.

Obama's pop-cultural focus may seem demeaning to the office of the presidency. It may be mockable. But it is also tremendously effective.

Wishful thinking won't make the Palestinians an Israeli peace partner, no matter how much President Barack Obama pressures Israel to make concessions; caustically mocking Putin's worldview won't make it any less real or mitigate the Russian threat.

There are times that everyone hates his or her job. Were they freed from the economic consequences of having these jobs, they'd drop out of the workforce. There are only two problems with this strategy: First, someone has to pay for it; second, it is not the recipe for human fulfillment.

Leisure time is only leisure time when it is earned; otherwise, leisure time devolves into soul-killing lassitude. There's a reason so many new retirees, freed from the treadmill of work, promptly keel over on the golf course: Work fulfills us. It keeps us going.

The European style of living is seductive: fewer hours worked, more hours at the cafe, less concern over self-betterment. But that style of living does not produce a purposeful life.

It took capitalism half a century to come back from the Great Depression.

When people are desperate or wealthy, they turn to socialism; only when they have no other alternative do they embrace the free market. After all, lies about guaranteed security are far more seductive than lectures about personal responsibility.

Socialism states that you owe me something simply because I exist. Capitalism, by contrast, results in a sort of reality-forced altruism: I may not want to help you, I may dislike you, but if I don't give you a product or service you want, I will starve. Voluntary exchange is more moral than forced redistribution.

Socialism violates at least three of the Ten Commandments: It turns government into God, it legalizes thievery and it elevates covetousness. Discussions of income inequality, after all, aren't about prosperity but about petty spite. Why should you care how much money I make, so long as you are happy?

When the Soviet Union fell, optimistic scholars believed the world had shifted inexorably in the direction of free markets and liberal democracy. Instead, the West gradually embraced bigger government and weaker social bonds, creating a fragmented society in which the only thing we all belong to, as President Barack Obama puts it, is the state.

Conservatives are routinely pilloried on television. A&E likely greenlit 'Duck Dynasty' in the first place because executives believed Americans would laugh at the redneck antics of the self-described 'white trash' family.

Liberals in Hollywood can't stand when Americans resonate to conservatives on television.

The Left masks its distaste for the Bible's condemnation of homosexuality in a straw man argument that Bible believers are violent bigots. They are not. Citing the Bible doesn't make you a bigot against human beings - it makes you a bigot against sin, which is a good thing.

Primarily affecting low-information voters and members of the mainstream media, Obama Worship Syndrome attributes impossible capabilities to Obama's political opponents, finds excuses for every Obama failure in everyone around him and praises the president as the finest politician - nay, human being - of our time.

Obama rammed through Obamacare legislation without a single Republican vote.

President Obama is a gifted politician. He is gifted with rhetoric virtuosity. He is gifted with the ability to lie directly to camera without blinking. And he is gifted with some of the most incompetent conservative opposition in the history of the country.

Show Republicans a shiny pro-life or pro-marriage issue and they'd much rather address that controversial topic than keep pressing on the tyranny that Obamacare represents.

The story of Detroit's bankruptcy was simple enough: Allow capitalism to grow the city, campaign against income inequality, tax the job creators until they flee, increase government spending in order to boost employment, promise generous pension plans to keep people voting for failure. Rinse, wash and repeat.

Hillary Clinton is not that fascinating a person. According to those who have spent time with her, she's harsh and demanding. According to those who haven't - like her husband - she's a delight.

The argument that gay marriage doesn't affect straight marriages is a ridiculous red herring: Gay marriage affects society and law in dramatic ways. Religious groups will come under direct assault as federal and state governments move to strip them of their non-profit statuses if they refuse to perform gay marriages.

Same-sex marriage is not the final nail in the coffin for traditional marriage. It is just another road sign toward the substitution of government for God. Every moral discussion now pits the wisest moral arbiters among us - the Supreme Court, President Obama - against traditional religion.

Distrust of government isn't baseless cynicism. It's realism.

I had a chance to choose a couple different places and, well, I grew up - I was a small-town kid from Illinois, so No. 1, just trying to win a championship for my home state.

Half the time, I have trouble following our own pitcher's sequence.

It was like a heavyweight fight, man. Just blow for blow, everybody playing their heart out. The Indians never gave up either, and I can't believe we're finally standing, after 108 years, finally able to hoist the trophy.

Like anybody else that goes and does their job, there's a way to do your job with excellence.

You want to represent Christ well with doing you job, first and foremost, because that's what you're there to do.

I never even thought about playing professionally. I didn't think that was a possibility for a little kid from Illinois.

It really comes down to God opening the doors for me, and I'm trying to walk through them doing the best I can.

I didn't ever realize that my ceiling would be this high, that I would be able to play at the major-league level. But here I am. I've been doing it for a while now, so it's certainly a blast. It's something that I want to cherish and make the most of.

I didn't realize the ceiling that I had, and I don't think a lot of players understand what they're capable of. Some of them dream of what they're capable of, but you don't really understand until you get in the moment and you give it everything you got and see in the end where you can end up.

As a ballplayer, there is no Christian way to swing a bat. There is no Christian way to swing or throw.

You are either good or you're not at whatever your job is. And it is more important that you understand the grace and love and peace you have in Christ, whether you are good or bad at whatever you are doing every day.

We are just so thankful that Christ does not measure us by what we do. God is not measuring us by that, He is measuring us by our faith in Christ.

We are perfect. According to God, we are perfect, yet we know that we are sinners. We believe in the fact that we are both saints and sinners at the same time as we live in this world.

We all need grace. We all need Christ.

I was so engrossed in my sport, I wasn't thinking about the future from God's standpoint. I was thinking about just my sporting future.

I hit my knees and I went to him with that and I said God I want to do what you want. I don't want sports to be an idol in my life.

We know that as a Christian athlete, people are watching, and so we want to be the best example we can be and show that we are different - that Christ has changed our lives.

I still have a lot to learn about what the love of Christ is like - that it's not just knowledge... but it's allowing the truth to change you - allowing Christ's message of grace and hope and love through the cross, that that message is the message that changes the way we look at everything in our lives.

You just go through highs and lows as an individual payer and as a team.

You just want the highs to start once the playoffs start.

My dad was a pastor, so we were in church all the time.

I knew all the right Bible answers and the Sunday school answers.

The most important thing is that we're impacting people for the Kingdom of Jesus Christ... that's why we're here.

One-hundred years from now, nobody's going to remember that I played for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays - nobody!

The best things happen when you're not overthinking it.

We need to just stay in the moment and stay in our routine.

I grew up in Illinois.