True patriots measure themselves not by personal wealth or power but by the degree to which they contribute to the community.

The next time someone uses denial of citizenship as a weapon or brandishes the special status conferred upon him by the accident of birth, ask him this: What have you done lately to earn it?

Today's multiracial Americans are at greater liberty to choose how they'd like to be seen, and under less pressure to pass for white.

We're all better off...when we're all better off.

The Boomers have modeled a set of bad habits, and one grand gesture is not going to unwind all those bad habits.

Identity in America is complicated but it's also simple: it's about whom you identify with and who identifies with you.

As it stands now, those of us who are lucky enough to be citizens by birth don't have to do much. Very little is asked of us.

Throughout this country's history there have of course been systematic efforts to create an official underclass.

To be sure, the United States has profound problems, not least our faltering educational and physical infrastructure.

Society becomes how you behave.

The nativism behind the push to repeal or amend the Fourteenth is ugly and obvious.

I plan to live my own way. Hopefully, it is as per God's Way.

One of the most effective ways to learn about oneself is by taking seriously the cultures of others. It forces you to pay attention to those details of life which differentiate them from you.

She had not remembered then what she remembers now, a memory like something buried in river silt that finally works free and rises to the surface...

People will pay me to feel the passion and energy I breathe into my career and creations.

Most Oscar parties are pretty silly. They're really for people who like to schmooze.

Through imagination, thanks to the subtleties of the irreality function, we re-enter the world of confidence, the world of the confident being, which is the proper world for reverie.

My wife and I battle over home decor. My style goes from Gothic to Baroque. Hers is minimalist.

We’re not Indians and we’re not Native Americans. We’re older than both concepts. We’re the people, we’re the human beings.

I really do hate to sing.

You can be right or you can have empathy. You can't do both.