Everything that I learned in the Navy, I took it with me into the next phase of my life.
I was a policy office in my final tour in the Navy, a Russian policy officer, and we were always thinking about our interactions and how they would affect the country 10, 20 years from now.
In the Navy, I slept mere feet from a nuclear reactor, so I have no knee-jerk opposition to traditional reactors.
And then, when I went into the Navy, there was no choice. You took about half of the hours during your naval training as naval courses and the other half were engineering.
I served in the Navy in Europe and know firsthand the importance of our NATO partners.
I wouldn't trade those 10 years for anything. The Navy taught me a lot of things. It molded me as a man, and I made a lot of wonderful friends.
During my years in the Navy and in the White House, I was involved in assessing how a war with Iran would go. In summary: It would be ugly.
I'm glad I was in the Navy.
I've been thinking, in an age of Trump where you don't know the direction of the country, the person you need most is a steady conservative hand like Mark Kirk in the Senate to be advising the president, especially on national security topics ... which is my particular expertise after 23 years in the Navy.
I had spent years in the United States military. Specifically in the U.S. Navy.
When I was in the navy, I wanted to go to Paris and the Academie Julian. I never did. Mexico City took me instead.
Being in the Navy, when I came home, it changed your whole life. You're 18, you go away for two and a half years, you come home - boy, you're a different person.
I was a mechanic in the Navy. And mechanics in the Navy are like mechanics in airlines. You may have more stripes than I do, but you don't know how to fix the airplane.
When I started at Baruch in January 2002, I was almost 23 years old. I'd previously spent five years as an officer the Israeli Navy. I did what I thought you were supposed to do at that age - a little studying and a lot of trying to have fun.
I was a radioman when I first went into the Navy, so I learned to type by taking Morse code. So I was using the typewriter from day one. My handwriting wasn't any good anyway.
