Well, I've been to Iraq twice now. I was in Baghdad in June and then north of Baghdad in November.

I've worked with a lot of really fine actors, both on stage and on screen. The level of their game lifts me up and brings the level of my game up to theirs. Always. It's like a constant upgrade.

It's always been my dream to do a dance scene with Anthony Hopkins.

Well, I've been to Iraq twice now. I was in Baghdad in June and then north of Baghdad in November.

Sometimes you're in great demand. Then suddenly your career hits the breaks.

I was always fascinated with rock 'n' roll, or girls, or something like that when I was a kid.

Careers, like rockets, don't always take off on time. The trick is to always keep the engine running.

But I've got more to learn, too. I don't feel like I'm done or I know it all.

I started a theater called Steppenwolf. We've been very supportive of the veterans there.

Yeah, I volunteered to support the troops, and get out there and show them that we care about them.

I study to learn, to be an educated person.

I've directed enough in the theatre and a couple of films to know that - to feel fairly secure that if I find a story that I really like I can probably get it done somewhat.

I save money when I'm working so that I never have to take a role simply to pay the bills.

I'm not like one of those actors who's a frustrated director.

You've got to keep taking certain risks, because my priority is in acting, it's not in movie stardom.

Wherever I go for the military, they always call me Lt. Dan. They just can't help it.

Before discovering theater, I was sloughing off and didn't have any passion for school. Then I couldn't get enough. All of a sudden, I was getting good parts in all of these plays. I just loved it. I started getting A's in acting, directing and technical theater. I found something that clicked.

I do spend a lot of weekends on the road. I have to pace myself. It can be pretty busy, but I'm not out in the Afghan desert with 70 pounds on my back, away from my family for a year at a time. I keep a good perspective on it.

I go into military communities and do fundraisers and that kind of thing with the band, because I know that the music can help do a lot of things. It can bring communities together, it can raise awareness... and it entertains.

I have a band that I started with a buddy of mine, a Vietnam veteran pal named Kimo Williams from Chicago.

I have veterans in my family. But I didn't know anything about DAV, Disabled American Veterans.

I think you're lucky if you discover what you really love at a young age. College wasn't something I was going to do. I wanted to keep acting, and I didn't want to go to New York or California and pound the pavement.

I've never had to compromise myself for a job, ever.

My mission is to support our service members. They're volunteers, and if they're going to go to a hostile place like Afghanistan, I think we owe it to them to back them up and try to help them get through it.

The wonderful drama teacher at my high school, Barbara Patterson, saw me standing in the hall and told me I should audition for 'West Side Story.' I guess she thought I looked like a gang member.

There's always the ongoing actor frustration of finding the great role to do next. I don't go to work a lot. I wait as long as I can until the money runs out or a great part comes along.

You learn from things that don't go well, and you try to capitalize when they do. You build on those strengths and try to make your weaknesses stronger.

We must support initiatives that provide clear, concrete measures and milestones that our troops need for defeating the insurgency, building up Iraqi security forces, and handing over Iraq to the Iraqi people.

Before and during the first phase of the war his administration repeatedly maligned the UN but now, that Iraq has turned into a quagmire, it is asking the UN for help.

Athletes as role models and heroes is a hoax, a sick hoax. The men and women who are fighting in Iraq, they are the true heroes.

But in the first Gulf war the United Kingdom was not under any threat from Iraq, and is still less so in the second one. Then there is no justification for obstructing freedom of information, particularly as nations have a right to know what their soldiers are being used for.

As I think through the issue of funding the rebuilding of Iraq, I think about the analogy of a bankruptcy proceeding. There is no doubt that Iraq as a country is bankrupt.

Our brave soldiers and support personnel are engaged in a battle as important as any the United States has ever before waged, for the success of democracy in Iraq is a crucial test of the ideals this Nation was founded upon.

The situation in Iraq will be long, it will be expensive and it will be difficult. But in the end, Iraq will very much be worth it.

It's true that the war in Iraq opened a distance in relations between part of Europe and the U.S. government, but our basic ties are stronger than that. We share democracy, free markets and a commitment to Western security. We differ on how to guarantee that security.

It was Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda who attacked the U.S. on September 11, 2001, not Saddam Hussein and Iraq.

Further, Japan is the second largest donor in Iraq after the United States, with over $5 billion dollars for humanitarian, infrastructure and reconstruction projects.

Iraq's elite Republican Guard is doing so badly they're changing their name to the Democratic Guard.

And in Iraq we tried to implement the same policy that was so successful in Saudi Arabia, but Saddam Hussein didn't buy. When the economic hit men fail in this scenario, the next step is what we call the jackals.

Rather, it is through conciliation and compromise that we are building a fair Iraq, a just state for all its peoples.

This will be Iraq for all without discrimination among Iraqi citizens, or ethnic or sectarian discrimination.

The Bush administration also was not straightforward about the intelligence it had, releasing tenuous information that fit its goal of attacking Iraq. I feel deceived.

We ought to recognize that we have an offensive responsibility to take the war to the terrorists where they are. That responsibility has waned in the last year as military and intelligence resources were withdrawn from Afghanistan and Pakistan to be used in Iraq.

We are at war to liberate Iraq, to protect the people of the United States and other countries from the devastating impact of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction being used by terrorists or the Iraqi government to kill thousands of innocent civilians.

The poorest residents of the gulf coast were most affected by the devastating hurricanes, and the poorest Americans have shouldered a disproportionate share of the burden in Iraq.

We believe the use of force against Iraq, especially with reference to previous resolutions of the UN Security Council, has no grounds, including legal grounds.

This war of choice in Iraq is undermining the very fabric of American society.

And now when we hear that Iran and Iraq plan to cooperate more closely and that a fundamentalist is coming to power in Tehran - a man about whom we cannot be sure that he is absolutely averse to terrorism - it is very worrisome.

What is the first thing we did when we took control of Iraq? Protect the oil fields. Remember the administration quote about how the oil would pay for the war.