To be great in our times too often means to have great prosperity and no moral magnanimity at all.

I am excited to have a black president because white supremacy is real and it needs to be shattered.

confining life to an eternal present is an insidious form of soul murder

Once you begin to talk about wealth inequality, especially as it relates to corporations and big banks, or engage in an indictment of U.S. foreign policy, you are really getting at the center of a society that is very fearful of that kind of critique.

There is something about boldness and fearlessness and being free enough to speak what is on one's mind that warrants freedom.

Martin Luther King's legacy is never to be measured by bricks and mortar, but rather by the kind of lives that we live, and the kind of love and service that we render.

I want to be a jazzman until the day I die. To help keep that motion, momentum and movement going, for myself, for my students, for the people who hear me. Oh sure, some days you look around at this country and look at the evidence and think, Oh Lord, don't look good. But you keep moving. You gotta keep moving.