Lester Brown

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Lester Brown

International analyst, author

Lester Brown started his career as a farmer, growing tomatoes in southern New Jersey with his younger brother during high school and college. Shortly after earning a degree in agricultural science from Rutgers University in 1955, he spent six months living in rural India where he became intimately familiar with the food/population issue. In 1959, Brown joined the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service as an international analyst. In 1964, he became an adviser to Secretary of Agriculture Orville Freeman on foreign agricultural policy. In 1966, the Secretary appointed him Administrator of the department’s International Agricultural Development Service. In early 1969, he left government to help establish the Overseas Development Council.

In 1974, with the support of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Lester Brown founded the Worldwatch Institute, the first research institute devoted to the analysis of global environmental issues. In May 2001, he founded the Earth Policy Institute to provide a vision and a road map for achieving an environmentally sustainable economy.

Brown has authored or co-authored over 50 books. One of the world’s most widely published authors, his books have appeared in 40 languages.

The Common Good hosted Mr. Brown in October of 2013: Climate change and the food crisis with environmentalist Lester Brown.

Ambassador Frank Wisner

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Frank Wisner

Retired American diplomat

Ambassador Frank Wisner’s diplomatic career spans four decades and eight American presidents. He served as ambassador to Zambia, Egypt, the Philippines, and India during his years in the State Department.

After graduating from Princeton University in 1961, Frank Wisner joined the State Department as a Foreign Service officer. Ambassador Wisner worked as a senior diplomat in Tunisia and Bangladesh before returning to Washington as Director of Plans and Management in the Bureau of Public Affairs. He then joined the President’s Interagency Task Force on Indochina, the entity responsible for evacuating and settling nearly one million refugees and served as its Deputy Director. Later, as Director of the Office of Southern African Affairs, Frank Wisner worked closely with Secretary of State Henry Kissinger to launch negotiations with Zimbabwe and Namibia. Ambassador Wisner played a crucial role in negotiating Kosovo’s independence as the nation’s special representative to the Kosovo Status Talks in 2005. He is currently a foreign affairs adviser for Patton Boggs.

Ambassador Wisner spoke at The Common Good in 2013: Foreign Affairs Series: Egypt in Crisis with Ambassador Frank Wisner.

David Rohde

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David Rohde

Journalist, author

David Rohde is the online news director for The New Yorker. He is a global-affairs analyst for CNN and a former reporter for Reuters, The New York Times, and the Christian Science Monitor. He was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for international reporting in 1996 for stories that helped expose the Srebrenica massacre during the war in Bosnia. In 2009, he shared a Pulitzer Prize with a team of Times reporters for coverage of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

His other books include Beyond War: Reimagining America’s Role and Ambitions in a New Middle East, A Rope and a Prayer: The Story of a Kidnapping (co-authored with his wife, Kristen Mulvihill), and Endgame: The Betrayal and Fall of Srebrenica, Europe’s Worst Massacre Since World War II.

Rohde spoke at The Common Good in 2013: Foreign Affairs Series: Rethinking US Approaches to the Middle East with David Rohde.

Twitter: @RohdeD

Joseph Lhota

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Joseph Lhota

American public servant, former politician

Joe Lhota is an American politician and businessman, former chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and former deputy mayor of New York City. He was the Republican nominee in his unsuccessful bid for the 2013 election for Mayor of New York City. As of 2015, he is senior vice president, vice dean, and chief of staff at NYU Langone Medical Center. In 2017, he returned to the chairmanship of the MTA and later resigned from the position in 2018.

Lhota spoke at The Common Good in 2013: NYC Mayoral Candidate Series: Joe Lhota - August 13, 2013.

Twitter: @JoeLhota

Eric Schneiderman

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Eric Schneiderman

Lawyer

Eric T. Schneiderman was elected the 65th Attorney General of New York State on November 2, 2010. He served until his resignation in 2018 amid accusations of sexual misconduct.

Schneiderman previously spent 15 years in private practice as an attorney, and later as a partner, at the firm of Kirkpatrick & Lockhart. He was also a public interest lawyer for many years, and his clients included taxpayers in historic lawsuits against the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, tenants trying to evict drug dealers from their buildings, and women seeking access to health clinics. Before becoming an Attorney General, he served ten years as a democrat in the New York State Senate.

He was hosted by The Common Good in 2013: Leadership Series: New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman - July 23, 2013.

Twitter: @EricSchneiderNY

John Catsimatidis

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John Catsimatidis

Owner and CEO of the Red Apple Group

John Catsimatidis was born on the Greek Island of Nisyros in 1948. Six months later his parents emigrated to New York City. Catsimatidis enrolled in New York University to study electrical engineering, going to school during the day and working in a small grocery store on nights and weekends to help his parents pay the bills. He eventually dropped out of school to work full time. By his 25th birthday he already had 10 Red Apple Supermarkets. Four decades later, the Red Apple Group ranked 156th by Forbes in 2015 in“America’s largest private companies” and has evolved into a diversified corporation that has holdings in the energy, aviation, retail and real estate sectors and over 8,000 employees.

He and his wife are actively involved in political contributions and campaigns on both sides of the aisle.

Catsimatidis was hosted by The Common Good in 2013: NYC Candidate Series: John Catsimatidis - July 16, 2013.

Twitter: @JCats2013

Anthony Weiner

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Anthony Weiner

American politician and Former U.S. Representative

Anthony David Weiner is an American politician and former U.S. Representative who served New York’s 9th congressional district from January 1999 until June 2011. A member of the Democratic Party, he won seven terms, never receiving less than 59% of the vote. Weiner resigned from Congress in June 2011, due to a sexting scandal.

He was a member of the New York City Council from 1992 to 1998, and a congressional aide to then–U.S. Representative Chuck Schumer from 1985 to 1991. A New York City native, he attended public schools and graduated from the SUNY Plattsburgh in 1985 with a B.A. in political science. He was an unsuccessful candidate for Mayor of New York City in the 2005 and 2013 New York City mayoral elections.

Weiner was incarcerated in 2017 for sending explicit photos to a minor. He was released from prison in February, 2019. After two months in a halfway house, Weiner was released as a registered sex offender.

Weiner spoke at The Common Good in 2013: NYC Mayoral Candidate Series: Anthony Weiner on health care policy.

James Goodale

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James Goodale

Leading First Amendment lawyer with Debevoise & Plimpton

James C. Goodale is a leading First Amendment lawyer with Debevoise & Plimpton. He has represented The New York Times in every one of its cases to go to the Supreme Court. These cases include the Pentagon Papers case (The New York Times Co. v. The U.S.), The New York Times Co. v. Sullivan (libel), and The New York Times Co. v. Tasini (digital rights).

Goodale spoke at The Common Good alongside Brian Knappenberger at a Special Screening and Conversation on “Nobody Speak: Trials of the Free Press” in 2017 and at the Democracy Series: ‘Fighting for the Press’ with James Goodale event in 2013.

Ribal al-Assad

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Ribal al-Assad

Syrian businessman, political activist

Ribal al-Assad is the founder and director of the Organization for Democracy and Freedom in Syria, which promotes democracy, freedom and human rights in Syria and the Middle East. He is also the Chairman and Founder of the Iman Foundation, a non-partisan and not for profit organization which aims to promote dialogue to strengthen international understanding and co-existence through the exchange of ideas, people, culture and religion. He was born in Syria and has lived in the West since being exiled from his country as a child.

Ribal al-Assad spoke at The Common Good in 2013: Foreign Affairs Series: Syria update with Ribal al-Assad - June 25, 2013.

Twitter: @RibalAlAssad

Krystal Ball

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Krystal Ball

Journalist, politician, news talk anchor

Krystal Marie Ball is a co-host on MSNBC’s ensemble show “The Cycle”.  She’s also a political writer, former congressional candidate and CPA. Her writing has appeared in publications such as US News and World Report, The Atlantic, The Huffington Post, and Politico; she has been a featured speaker at Columbia, Princeton, and George Washington University; and a guest lecturer at the New School in New York City. (1)

Following her congressional campaign, Ball was number 21 on Forbes Magazine’s “Most Powerful Women in the Mid Term Elections” list. She has been profiled all over the United States for her innovative use of social media in politics. (1)

Ball attended Women in the Military: US Senator Jeanne Shaheen and others – March 15, 2013 as the moderator at The Common Good. This panel included Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Anu Bhagwati, Molly O’Toole, and Brenda S. Fulton.

Twitter: @krystalball

(1) Material from the MSNBC website.

Sec. Thomas Pickering

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secretary Thomas Pickering

Former U.S. ambassador, diplomat

Ambassador Pickering served as U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs from May of 1997 until late 2000. Prior to that, he served briefly as the president of the Eurasia Foundation, a Washington-based organization that makes small grants and loans in the states of the former Soviet Union. Pickering holds the personal rank of Career Ambassador, the highest in the U.S. Foreign Service. From 1989 to 1992, he served as Ambassador and Representative to the United Nations in New York. He also served as Executive Secretary of the Department of State and Special Assistant to Secretaries William P. Rogers and Henry A. Kissinger from 1973 to 1974. (1)

Pickering currently serves as Senior Advisor at Hills and Company. From 2001 to 2006, Ambassador Pickering served as Senior Vice President for International Relations and as a member of the Executive Council of The Boeing Company. (1)

In 1983 and in 1986, Pickering won the Distinguished Presidential Award and, in 1996, the Department of State’s highest award – the Distinguished Service Award. He is a member of the International Institute of Strategic Studies and the Council on Foreign Relations. (1)

Pickering spoke at The Common Good in 2013: National Security Briefing with Thomas Pickering – May 8, 2013.

(1) Material from the National Committee on American Foreign Policy website.

Elliott Abrams

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Elliott Abrams

American diplomat, lawyer

Elliott Abrams is the Special Representative for Venezuela at the Department of State. He was senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) in Washington, DC, from which he is now on a leave of absence. He served as deputy assistant to the president and deputy national security advisor in the administration of President George W. Bush, where he supervised U.S. policy in the Middle East for the White House. (1)

Mr. Abrams was president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, DC, from 1996 until joining the White House staff. He was a member of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom from 1999 to 2001 and chairman of the commission in the latter year, and served a second term as a member of the Commission in 2012-2014. From 2009 to 2016, Mr. Abrams was a member of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council, which directs the activities of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. He is a member of the board of the National Endowment for Democracy, and teaches U.S. foreign policy at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. (1)

Abrams spoke at The Common Good in 2013: Middle East Update with Elliott Abrams – April 17, 2013.

(1) Material from the U.S. Department of State website.

Jonathan Alter

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Jonathan Alter

American journalist, best-selling author, documentary filmmaker, television producer

Jonathan Alter is an award-winning author, reporter, columnist and television analyst from Chicago.

For a decade in the 1980s, Alter was Newsweek’s media critic, where he was among the first in the mainstream media to break tradition and hold other news organizations accountable for their coverage, a precursor to the role later played by blogs. In total, he spent 28 years at Newsweek, where he was a longtime senior editor and wrote hundreds of columns and features on a wide variety of subjects. He is also an analyst and contributing correspondent for NBC News and MSNBC. His 2010 book, The Promise: President Obama, Year One, was #4 on the New York Times Nonfiction Bestseller List and was one of the Times’ “Notable Books” of the year. The Defining Moment: FDR’s Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope,”published in 2006, was also a bestseller.

Alter was hosted by The Common Good in 2013: Assessing the Presidency with Lesley Stahl, Douglas Brinkley, Jonathan Alter and Ed Rollins – April 11th, 2013.

Twitter: @jonathanalter

Molly O’Toole

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Molly O’Toole

Reporter

Molly O'Toole is an immigration reporter based in the Los Angeles Times' Washington, D.C. bureau. She was previously a senior reporter at Foreign Policy covering the 2016 election and Trump administration, and a politics reporter at The Atlantic's Defense One. She has covered migration and security from Mexico, Central America, West Africa, the Middle East, the Gulf, and South Asia.

The Common Good hosted O’Toole in 2013: Women in the Military: US Senator Jeanne Shaheen and others – March 15, 2013. She spoke alongside Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Anu Bhagwati, and Brenda S. Fulton, moderated by MSNBC contributor Krystal Ball.

Twitter: @mollymotoole

Brenda Fulton

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Brenda s. Fulton

Board member of OutServe-SLDN, Co-founder of Knights Out

Brenda S. “Sue” Fulton is a Board member of OutServe-SLDN, the national organization supporting LGBT members of the Armed Forces. A Florida native, Fulton graduated West Point in 1980, part of the first class to include women, and was commissioned in the Army. She served as a platoon leader, staff officer, and company commander in Germany, and was honorably discharged as a Captain.

In 2009, she co-founded Knights Out, an organization of LGBT West Point graduates and allies, and later helped Josh Seefried and Ty Walrod launch OutServe, the association of actively-serving LGBT military personnel. She served both organizations as Communications Director and later became Executive Director of Knights Out. A key player in the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” Fulton was appointed by President Obama to the U.S. Military Academy Board of Visitors in 2011 – the first openly gay member of the Board.

Governor Murphy appointed Chief Fulton as one of three State government appointees to the State Ethics Commission, which administers and enforces State conflicts of interest law in July of 2018.

Fulton spoke as part of the panel Women in the Military: US Senator Jeanne Shaheen and others – March 15, 2013 alongside Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Anu Bhagwati, and Molly O’Toole, moderated by MSNBC contributor Krystal Ball at The Common Good.

Twitter: @suefulton

Anuradha Bhagwati

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Anuradha Bhagwati

Service Women’s Action Network’s First Executive Director

Anuradha Bhagwati is the Service Women’s Action Network’s (SWAN) first Executive Director. A former Captain and Company Commander, Anu served as a Marine officer from 1999-2004. Under Anu’s leadership, SWAN has spearheaded legislative reform and litigation to end military rape, sexual assault, sexual harassment, and domestic violence, and to eliminate all barriers to equal opportunity for service women.

Anu has testified before Congress, advised the White House and the United Nations, and has spoken to countless audiences on challenges faced by military women, including the Combat Exclusion policy, Military Sexual Trauma, the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, and the VA health care and benefits system. A regular contributor to the media, Anu has been featured on Piers Morgan Tonight, the CNN Situation Room, MSNBC, NBC Nightly News, NPR, the BBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Newsweek. Anu is the author of “UNBECOMING: A Memoir of Disobedience”, published in March 2019.

Bhagwati spoke as part of the panel Women in the Military: US Senator Jeanne Shaheen and others – March 15, 2013 alongside Molly O’Toole, Senator Jeanne Shaheen, and Brenda S. Fulton, moderated by MSNBC contributor Krystal Ball at The Common Good.

Twitter: @AnuBhagwati

Senator Jeanne Shaheen

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Jeanne Shaheen

American Politician

The first woman in history to be elected a Governor and a United States Senator, Jeanne Shaheen has been involved in all levels of New Hampshire life. She became the first woman elected Governor of New Hampshire, serving three terms from 1997-2003. In 2008 Shaheen became the first woman elected to the United States Senate from New Hampshire. She chairs the Committee on Foreign Relations’ Subcommittee on European Affairs, and the Energy and Natural Resources Committee’s Subcommittee on Water and Power. Shaheen is also a member of the Armed Services Committee and the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship.

Shaheen spoke as part of the panel Women in the Military: US Senator Jeanne Shaheen and others – March 15, 2013 alongside Molly O’Toole, Anu Bhagwati, and Brenda S. Fulton, moderated by MSNBC contributor Krystal Ball at The Common Good.

Twitter: @SenatorShaheen

Mark Kelly

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Mark Kelly

American astronaut, engineer, and U.S. Navy Captain

Mark Kelly, husband of former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, is a retired astronaut and US Navy Captain with 6,000 flight hours in more than 50 different aircraft, 375 aircraft carrier landings, 39 combat missions and more than 50 days in space.

As a Naval Aviator, Kelly flew combat missions during the Gulf War. He received initial training on the A-6E Intruder attack aircraft. He was then assigned to Attack Squadron 115 (VA-115) in Atsugi, Japan, and made two deployments to the Persian Gulf on the aircraft carrier USS Midway, flying 39 combat missions in Operation Desert Storm. Kelly has won many awards, including the Defense Superior Service Medal, Legion of Merit and Distinguished Flying Cross. He was selected as an astronaut in 1996 and flew his first of four missions in 2001 aboard Space Shuttle Endeavour, the same space shuttle that he commanded on its final flight in May 2011. He is one of only two individuals who has visited the International Space Station on four different occasions.

Kelly was thrust into the national spotlight in January 2011 after his wife, U.S. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, was shot in an assassination attempt in Arizona.

He spoke at The Common Good in 2013: Astronaut Mark Kelly “Reducing Gun Violence Responsibly”.

Twitter: @ShuttleCDRKelly

Alan Blinder

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Alan Blinder

American economist, journalist

Alan S. Blinder has been on the Princeton faculty since 1971, taking time off from January 1993 through January 1996 for service in the U.S. government—first as a member of President Clinton’s original Council of Economic Advisers, and then as Vice Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. In addition to his academic writings (books, academic articles) and his best-selling introductory textbook, he has written many op-eds and columns, and, in recent years, has been a regular columnist for The Wall Street Journal.

He also appears frequently on television on PBS, CNBC, CNN, Bloomberg, and others. Dr. Blinder is a Distinguished Fellow and past vice president of the American Economic Association, a past president of the Eastern Economic Association, and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, and the American Academy of Political and Social Science.

Alan Blinder spoke at The Common Good in 2013: Alan Blinder: The Economic Crisis and Response - January 24, 2013.

Representative Joaquin Castro

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Representative Joaquin Castro

Democratic Member of the U.S. House representing Texas’ 20th Congressional District

Joaquin Castro is a Democratic member of the U.S. House, representing Texas’ 20th Congressional District. Castro began his political career in the Texas House of Representatives, where he represented district 125 from 2003 to 2013. Castro won re-election to the U.S. House in 2014. He ran unopposed in the Democratic primary on March 4, 2014, and defeated Jeffrey Blunt (L) in the general election on November 4, 2014.

He created the Trailblazers College Tour, personally raising money to send underprivileged students on college visits. He also created SA READS, San Antonio’s largest literacy campaign and book drive. Over 200,000 books have been distributed to more than 150 schools and shelters across the city. He has also taught as a visiting professor of law at St. Mary’s University and as an adjunct professor at Trinity University.

Joaquin is active on several boards of education-related, non-profit organizations, including the National College Advising Corps, and the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials’ (NALEO) Taskforce on Education.

Twitter: @JoaquinCastrotx