The economy is better than the one President [Barack] Obama inherited, and unemployment is lower, but the unemployment rate gap remains large.

One of the challenges, I think, is that Americans are not sufficiently vested in foreign policy.

Sometimes, I repeat myself, and that was a second elimination [of Barack Obama]. I worked with a team, including a great editor who, as the project came together, suggested other additions and eliminations. It was a process.

I always want to read something about our people's enslavement near the 4th. To keep it light, I also read Rolanda Watts' "Destiny Lingers" She is a sisterfriend and I ran into her at Essence. Then, I finished Paul Taylor's "The Next America." Taylor is the Executive VP at the Pew Research Center, and he uses their excellent data base to talk about the coming "generational showdown" which we are experiencing, at some level, in Black America.

[Barack Obama] intended, I think, to say that he took Trayvon's [ Martin] death somewhat personally.

Trayvon Martin could have been any of our sons, so I was not especially moved by that remark of President [Barack] Obama's.

Ronald Reagan's attack on people who receive public assistance was partially an attack on people of color.