The death penalty is inhumane... whether that person is in a [jail] or it's bin Laden.

The world is dealing with issues of immigration, deindustrialization, and poverty.

Since 1957, black people have experienced double-digit unemployment - in good times and bad times. Look at the population of African Americans in prison. They represent more than half the population of prisoners in the country, 55 percent of those on death row

The black power movement was not a separation from the civil rights movement, but a continuation of this whole process of democratization.

President [Barack] Obama is a man who had certain advantages because of the civil rights movement.

But rarely have I made choices that made me feel I was really compromising what I believe.

The exceptionalism of a black U.S. President is not important to me. It's what he does - and who he has at the table.