Hey, everybody. Today I got not only a great one, you know, for a change, but I'm going to say

this is easily one of the best, if not the best podcast I've ever done. You're going to be

blown away by Heather McGee. I met Heather 12 years ago.

She was then head of Demos, a very effective organization that fights racial and financial injustice.

And we work together on legislation to fight predatory lending.

Heather's been fighting the good fight for 20 years now.

You're going to be very inspired by her intellect, her eloquence, and by her very real but hopeful book, The Sum of Us.

The Sum of Us is a very important book, and it is of the moment.

It's called The Some of Us because it addresses the central economic and political issue that has been plaguing this country from its very

beginning. But it's especially of this moment, and that is that the powerful and the wealthy,

and at this moment, we're talking about the Republican Party,

Republican leadership. They've sold whites the idea that our economy, our society, is a zero-sum game,

that anything that helps blacks and people of color takes away from them.

This is profoundly important because they've sold this.

This idea goes as far back as slave owners telling poor whites,

hey, at least you're better off than black folks,

better off than slaves. You know, I held the Senate seat that was held

by Paul Wellstone, who said, we all do better when we all do better. We all do better when we all

do better. And that's what the sum of us is all about. We all do better when we all do better. Again, this book is very real, but it's also incredibly uplifting. You are going to love this conversation with Heather, because you will be inspired and hopeful.

And there's lots of reason to be hopeful right now, right at this moment,

because this $1.9 trillion package is such a big deal.

As President Biden would say, look, this is a big deal, folks.

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