Forget the consultants, the pundits and the pollsters; good policy is good politics.

Heritage will remain, first and foremost, a research institute dedicated to impeccable research and data-driven policy analysis.

We have been blessed with a healthy, growing economy, with more Americans going back to work, and with our Nation acting as a positive force for good in the world.

The message is pretty clear: Americans are sick and tired of the doubletalk coming out of Washington, of us going home and saying we're conservative and then coming up here and voting for 10,000 earmarks. We can't fool America anymore; the media is too good. They're reporting what we're really doing.

Good policy makes good politics and what I've done has been good politics.

I know I was a businessman for years, and I stayed up countless nights worrying about having to let one person go. It's a terrible thing to do.