. - there's, one of your colleagues at "the new york times," nikole hannah-jones, developed an initiative entitled the 1619 project. and the name referred to the year in which slaves came to colonies in america. and it insisted that 1619 ought to be the birth year of the united states. elements of the project have been criticized by historians. your colleague, bret stephens, has also criticized aspects of the project, but in your opinion, are aspects of the project related to the themes of grience or something else? - i don't know, i mean, that project, i think, has made an enormous contribution. i really do. but i often wonder if the 1619 project had appeared under the banner of the opinion pages at the "times," right? it was an argument. it was an essay that said, "let's look at the world in this way, and what do we see?" it was playing with ideas in a way- - well, let's talk about its contribution. - that i thought was very, very meaningful - well, tell me what you think the contribution was. - i think the 1619 project asked us in a very appropria and meaningful way to consider how muc