evidence: I have never forgotten those words, which prompt me to write to you today—not to admonish, cajole or moralize, certainly not to pick a partisan fight, but to open up a conversation. There is something we need to talk about, my friends. Even more, there is something we need to do. [...] You might think that I have lived a life free from personal complicity in prejudice and racism. That is not true. [...] African-Americans are incarcerated at more than five times the rate of white people.