The first thing I did [in Michigan] was join a picket line of a pizzeria in Ann Harbor in 1963 that didn't allow African Americans to eat there.

I would say for the young: Don't be straight jacketed by ideology. Don't be driven by a structure of ideas.

Every politician - FDR, Lyndon Johnson, Abraham Lincoln, Barack Obama - they're all conservative by nature. They are part of the big thing and they're moving in a very constrained world.

One question is: Who is the working class today, and how has it changed? Where are we in that? I don't have a knee-jerk kind of 1930s thing about we must build the unions and that's the way to the future. I'm writing this book right now called Pallin' Around, and the subtitle is: "Talking to the Tea Party." And frankly I find talking to the Tea Party exhilarating, I love it.

I wanted a racially just society. I wanted to end wars. I wanted to end white supremacy. I wanted to create a world that was based on egalitarianism, sharing, racial justice.

The nice thing about being detained in Canada is it's like being in a Days Inn; it's very clean and very nice.

I more or less shared the view that life should be lived.