I love being a woman and I was not one of these women who rose through professional life by wearing men's clothes or looking masculine. I loved wearing bright colors and being who I am.

I didn't want to set up a women's studies program. I thought women should learn to operate in a coeducational atmosphere, because, especially in national security and international affairs, it's male-dominated.

I did go to Wellesley, a women's college. And I am of a kind of strange generation which is transitional in terms of women who wanted to go out and get jobs.

Maybe if everybody in leadership was a woman, you might not get into the conflicts in the first place. But if you watch the women who have made it to the top, they haven't exactly been non-aggressive - including me.

We need a visionary leader with very big and bold ideas. This is a very big, very bold country.

The leaders come up from the volunteers that do the work, and it's amazing because then they do these incredible things in their community that they never thought they had the power to make that happen.

I can finally go home and tell the constituents, law enforcement, and leaders in Washington state that Congress is treating the meth problem with the same urgency and commitment that local communities have been treating it with for years.

Men display less self-doubt and lead with what seems always like a sense of force and direction. We are not as familiar with women leaders, and so we question their skills. As women, we always need to work harder to prove our competence.