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There are conservative people in all colours in America.

At least there's a political input, but when you put on the robe, at that point the politics is over.

First of all, do I think there's some racists in the Tea Party? Yeah. I'm an ordained United Methodist pastor; there's some racists in the Methodist church. I don't know if there's a body that does not have some racists in it.

From the right, you get demagogues shouting about brown-skinned anchor babies and clamoring to deport the undocumented. From the left, you get advocacy for the oppressed but otherwise, when it comes to national civic identity, mainly silence.

Our constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens.

Many militants of the secular cause look astonishingly like clergy. Worse: like caricatures of clergy.

There's a very big gulf between the black civil rights leadership in America and the black middle class in America. The black middle class are conservative. Many of those minorities can be persuaded to be members of the Republican Party.

If I'm president, there are going to be government vans that drive around and pick up people who shouldn't be wearing certain clothing. Talk about lack of civil rights - I'm sorry, I'm pulling you right off the street, and we're giving you clothes that you're going to be O.K. in.

Black people can be the most conservative, the most discriminating. Especially among ourselves. It wasn't white people who said all black men have to wear baggy jeans.