The whole idea of a democracy is that we ourselves, the people, are supposed to make a path of our politics, and it is we who with our feet and our vote and our labors and our vigilance are supposed to shape our country.

If we went back to the imprisonment rate we had in the early '70s, something like four out of five people employed in the prison industry would lose their jobs. That's what you're up against.

Reagan has very significant things to teach us - positive lessons and quite negative lessons.

I have criticisms of Ronald Reagan, but he lives in another universe from the kind of political theater that is represented by people, like Sarah Palin, who aren't really public servants.

Elites are once again invoking Reagan, dropping their Gs and saying things in a folksy sort of way thats meant to capture the hearts of people. And its all fraud; its all stagecraft. And people are falling for a great deal of elite behavior in this country packaged as if its proletariat behavior.

What was happening was the war on drugs. That was the primary culprit I could see that was getting in the way of black progress.

It is only education and understanding of the past that teaches us not to repeat history.