We must neither behave as children by resisting honesty, nor allow ourselves to be treated as children by having honesty withheld.

People think of black English as ungrammatical, but it bears the same relationship to standard English as contemporary Hebrew does to ancient Hebrew.

A person you excuse from any genuine challenge is a person you do not truly respect.

Barack Obama's said some very nice things and he says them well. But if you ask me, the reason that we're looking at somebody who is such an inexperienced senator, who has said some very pleasant but not especially sterling or innovative things, the reason that he's considered such a big deal is simply because he's black.

English, however, is kinky. It has a predilection for dressing up like Welsh on lonely nights.

The only way that residual racist feelings could affect legislation, in my opinion, is through a lack of priorities, from not doing things.

No longer can we measure compassion by how much we spend on poverty but how many people we help to lift out of poverty.