The greatest moral failing is to condemn something as a moral failing: no vice is worse than being judgmental.

There is such a thing as fanaticism, it is always wrong, and if you disagree, you're wrong too.

As a teenager, I increasingly had questions about religion to which I found no good answers.

Anger clearly has its proper place at work, which is neither wholly absent nor ever present. The manager who is an emotional blank is just as hard to work for as the volcanic boss, and both can do great harm by setting an unhelpful example for what kind of emotional expression is expected and accepted.

Indeed, without emotion it seems unlikely we can even have morality.

When you try to cool down hot emotions, what tends to happen is that you end up either repressing them or losing them altogether. Neither is desirable. Without emotion, much social interaction loses its meaning or changes for the worse.

Science works because the phenomenon being described can be relied on to remain the same. Even in quantum physics, where phenomena are changed by observation, the way in which observation interferes is regular and falls within a limited range of possibilities. Human culture, however, has the nasty habit of never staying the same for very long.

Economics is uncertain because its fundamental subject matter is not money but human action. That's why economics is not the dismal science, it's no science at all.

If there is an art of living, it is not something that can be taught timelessly. We have lessons to learn from Aristotle et al, for sure, but not if we simply uproot them from their epoch and stamp them into 21st-century soil.

Philosophy is at its most engaged when it is impure. What is being recovered from the Ancient Greek model is not some lost idea of philosophy's pure essence, but the idea that philosophy is mixed up with everything else.

In the end, the American dream is not a sprint, or even a marathon, but a relay. Our families don't always cross the finish line in the span of one generation. But each generation passes on to the next the fruits of their labor.

Opportunity today, prosperity tomorrow.

We believe that housing is a power platform to spark great opportunities in people's lives and help them achieve the American dream.

As my family story shows, Latinos have been a blessing for USA for many generations. The future of America depends in part on the success of the Latino community, and this opportunity is just one more signifier of that.

My grandmother didn't live to see us begin our lives in public service. But she probably would have thought it extraordinary that just two generations after she arrived in San Antonio, one grandson would be the mayor and the other would be on his way - the good people of San Antonio willing- to the United States Congress.

What we see out there is an affordable housing crisis, particularly in the rental market in cities big and small, and we don't have the resources necessary to fill that gap.

Our families don't always cross the finish line in the span of one generation. But each generation passes on to the next the fruits of their labor.

Now, in Texas, we believe in the rugged individual. Texas may be the one place where people actually still have bootstraps, and we expect folks to pull themselves up by them. But we also recognize there are some things we can't do alone. We have to come together and invest in opportunity today for prosperity tomorrow.

To me, what I believe is that everybody should have the ability to enroll in Medicare. If somebody wants a supplemental plan or a private plan, then I believe they should be able to do that as well.

I consider myself a pretty progressive person, and I think I have a track record that shows that. But I'm also not just going to do a policy because it's the liberal thing to do.

The advantage that Democrats have is that they're a big-tent party.

First thing that I put up in my office here at City Hall was a poster from 1971 when my mother ran for city council.

The prosperity of the United States and the prosperity of the Hispanic community, as the fastest-growing community, are one and the same. The destinies are one and the same.

Being the keynote speaker at the convention this year is an honor I don't take lightly. I know I've got some big shoes to fill. Two conventions ago, the keynote speaker was a guy named Barack Obama.

I believe in the Green New Deal. Fundamentally, what we recognize is that we don't have to choose between protecting our planet and growing our economy and creating jobs and opportunity.

San Antonio is an ideal market for Major League Soccer. It's time that we put our best foot forward.

We have a responsibility to protect public housing residents from the harmful effects of secondhand smoke, especially the elderly and children who suffer from asthma and other respiratory diseases.

I started when I was 39 as a cabinet secretary, and so I feel like I have lived an experience in my life where I can relate to families that struggle, and are scraping by and scrounging.

You know, I'm speaking for myself. I didn't like to have to speak filtering for what I thought somebody else would or wouldn't want me to say.

I see myself as a bridge-builder who can understand both sides.

What I believe we need to do is to be the smartest, the healthiest, the fairest and the most prosperous nation on earth. So in order to become the healthiest nation on earth, we need a different health care system.

The number one way that we can address these long-term challenges of poverty, of education, is to invest in early childhood education.

Hopefully, in not a too distant future, we will see a Latino president, and who knows how's that going to happen. It's just a matter of time.

I actually believe that one of the lessons of 1993 and 1994, as well as 2009 and 2010, is that when a Democratic president has the opportunity - with a Democratic Congress - that you shouldn't wait to push significant legislation, whether it's health care, immigration reform, other measures.

Seven presidents before him - Democrats and Republicans - tried to expand health care to all Americans. President Obama got it done.

When it comes to letting people marry whomever they love, Mitt Romney says, 'No.'

And because he knows that we don't have an ounce of talent to waste, the president took action to lift the shadow of deportation from a generation of young, law-abiding immigrants called dreamers.

I can understand the value of the immigrant experience and that we have become the nation that we are because people like my grandmother were able to make a life in this country.

To me, as I see it, reparations would be something that is fairly specific to the descendants of slaves, and it would also be an official apology from the United States government for slavery.

My family's story isn't special. What's special is the America that makes our story possible. Ours is a nation like no other, a place where great journeys can be made in a single generation. No matter who you are or where you come from, the path is always forward.

I couldn't help but to think back to my classmates at Thomas Jefferson High School in San Antonio. They had the same talent, the same brains, the same dreams as the folks we sat with at Stanford and Harvard. I realized the difference wasn't one of intelligence or drive. The difference was opportunity.

If you're willing to work hard and play by the rules, you should be able to move up.

My mother dreamed dreams for Joaquin and for me long before we could dream them for ourselves.

My grandmother spent her whole life working as a maid, a cook and a babysitter, barely scraping by, but still working hard to give my mother, her only child, a chance in life, so that my mother could give my brother and me an even better one.

I have learned in life that the best thing you can do to create a great future for yourself is don't forget what's in front of you. And so I'm trying to do a great job at HUD.

My People First Education plan includes universal pre-K for 3- and 4-year-olds, because the research is very clear that if you have a dollar to spend in education, it's best spent early on with high-quality pre-K so that kids can get off to a strong start.

Growing up, when we would get dragged to these events, I didn't want to be there. Over time, as we got older, I developed a real appreciation of the importance of being involved in the democratic process.

I stand before you tonight as a young American, a proud American, of a generation born as the Cold War receded, shaped by the tragedy of 9/11, connected by the digital revolution and determined to re-elect the man who will make the 21st century another American century - President Barack Obama.

Mitt Romney, quite simply, doesn't get it.

And my mother fought hard for civil rights so that instead of a mop, I could hold this microphone.