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Remember, you can always stoop and pick up nothing.

I was a stoopball fan. I played stoopball all the time.

I'm 5-foot-5, and I'll wear a big parka and put the hood up, and nobody gives me a second glance.

It's good that I managed to hoodwink so many people. I am actually not that nice a person.

I am not a hoodlum. I'm a community organizer.

You seen my shows; I bring the 'hood out.

I believe that young people wearing hoods, unless they are very young, can be frightening. What are they hiding? Why don't they want to come out into the light with the rest of us? They may be perfectly nice, but the hoods send an uncertain statement.

I came back to the hood and got in those streets and started doing whatever it took for me to provide.

If I grew up in 'da hood,' it would make my story so much more interesting - if I had something to escape from. I had a pretty good life. My parents weren't rich; they weren't poor. I wasn't trying to escape from anything. It was always just the pursuit of something cooler.