Maybe she took it a little too far, but even the African-Americans in attendance didn't seem to mind. I don't think it was racism. Maybe it was ignorance. They just didn't know. They didn't intend to offend anybody.

It was a surprise, ... We knew we were going to Washington, D.C., to take part in the First Americans Festival at the opening of the National Museum for the American Indian, with the Smithsonian, but we did not know that we had been invited to sing at the White House until we were already in Washington. So that was pretty exciting.

serve as the steward of the rights, liberties and freedoms of all Americans for generations to come.

The recurrent theme in my mind, by Wednesday, was that no cavalry was coming, so we had to hold things together ourselves,

The first thing that comes to mind is that these are African Americans and how will they be treated. Will there be graciousness?

Hallowed ground, where more than 600,000 Americans gave their lives, is being paved over in favor of shopping malls, housing tracts and even gambling casinos.