The only way change happens is when people become more significantly involved in the political process. We have to increase voter turnout and citizen participation so that people know what's going on and demand a government that works for everybody and not just the one percent.

In Germany, many other countries, college tuition is free. Why isn`t free in America? Why do we have the highest rate of childhood poverty when other countries have rates much lower than we have? Why don`t we have pay equity for women workers? Why aren`t we leading the world in transforming our energy system in terms of climate change? We can do that. Are we dumb? Are we lazy? Not the case.

In my view, one of the major reasons that we have so many people in jail is that we have turned our backs on a lot young people.

One of the ongoing crises in America is institutional racism. We have a very broken criminal justice system. We live in a country where there are more people in jail than any other country on Earth. There are some 2.2 million people currently incarcerated and they are disproportionally African American and Hispanic. Unarmed African Americans have been abused and sometimes killed while in police custody. Clearly these are issues that must be dealt with and changed.

I have a long history in fighting for civil rights. I understand that many people in the African-American community may not understand that.

We know the legislation that passed the House. It was the worst piece of legislation frankly against working class people that I can remember in my political life in the Congress.

I think the war in the Mideast, how we got into it and how we're going to address the current problems, are issues that every American should be concerned about.