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For example, I was a White House intern the summer before I dropped out of law school. Everybody knew about it. I'd come home and go to church and everybody would say, 'Oh, my God. Demetri, you're working at the White House.'

I was in the White House for a year and a half. Up to that point, all my jobs had been very unglamorous.

I don't think most people understand that when I wasn't running for president, I was working. Because I have to earn income. I have three kids in college. And three in school. And I have a little girl that has a lot of special needs. So I've got to work for a living. I was working already.

I went from being a senator, a young senator, to being considered for vice president, running for president, being a vice presidential candidate, and becoming a national public figure. All of which fed a self-focus, an egotism, a narcissism that leads you to believe that you can do whatever you want.

After working for 18 years, all of a sudden I became successful on a level where other people knew it. It's not a cat you can put back in the bag.

I worked in the Clinton administration.

I was in the trade field as White House fellow in the first Bush administration.

There's nothing in my background that would have said I was destined to be a senior politician.

There was a brief period of time when I was very young where I thought I wanted to be a veterinarian - largely because I liked cats - but then somebody told me I would have to cut animals open, and that was the end of that.

I have an ability to work collegially across a wide range of interests in the caucus and in the Congress, and an ability to work on a bipartisan basis. Appropriators pride themselves on that.