Westminster Town Hall Forum

As a follow-up to our Fall Season: "Ethics, Conscience, and the New Public Square," listen in to the conversation between AMPERS CEO Joel Glaser and our Executive Director Sara Wilhelm Garbers as they discuss community radio and public media in our time.

In this special episode of the Forum podcast, we talk with Paul Neimann, one of the originators of the Forum. He and his wife Diane moved to Minneapolis in the 1970s and believed their new home deserved a great speaker series. That idea became the nationally renowned Westminster Town Hall Forum. Diane passed away in 2019. But Forum director Tane Danger sat down with Paul to learn more about the origins of the Forum. Where did the idea originally come from? Who was it intended for? Was the Forum always free? How did they find the first speakers? The Forum has now hosted hundreds of speakers and touched hundreds of thousands of hearts and minds. That's in no small part thanks to Paul and Diane Neimann's efforts more than four decades ago. Please, enjoy this short history of the Forum's earliest days. And join us in thanking Paul and Diane Neimann for helping get this treasured program started.

Dr. Keyu Jin speaking at the Westminster Town Hall Forum in Minneapolis. Born in China and educated in the U.S., she is a world-renowned economist at the London School of Economics. Her most recent book is "The New China Playbook: Beyond Socialism and Capitalism." In it and in this talk, she explains how China became the most successful economic story of our time as it has shifted from primarily state-owned enterprise to an economy that is thriving in entrepreneurship, and participation in the global economy. She also discusses how the U.S. and China might improve relations by better understanding one another's economic systems. This program was recorded in front a live audience at Westminster Presbyterian Church in downtown Minneapolis on April 18, 2024. It was moderated by Tane Danger. Learn more about the Westminster Town Hall Forum at our website: www.WestminsterForum.org Keyu Jin is a tenured professor of eco­nomics at the London School of Economics and Political Science who has worked with the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund. She is currently a global board member for Richemont. Born and raised in Beijing, she holds a BA, an MA, and a PhD in eco­nomics from Harvard University, and resides with her family in London and Beijing.

Legendary tech journalist Kara Swisher in conversation with Tane Danger at the Westminster Town Hall Forum in Minneapolis. Swisher's newest work is "Burn Book; a Tech Love Story." It’s part memoir, part history and, most of all, a necessary recounting of tech’s power players and influence. In it she shares how tech came to be at the center of global commerce and power, and the risks that poses to democracy and humanity. She'll be in conversation with Forum director Tane Danger and then take questions from the audience. This program was recorded in front a live audience at Westminster Presbyterian Church in downtown Minneapolis on March 19, 2024. Learn more about the Westminster Town Hall Forum at our website: www.WestminsterForum.org Kara Swisher is the host of the podcast On with Kara Swisher and the cohost of the Pivot podcast with Scott Galloway, both distributed by New York magazine. She was also the cofounder and editor-at-large of Recode, host of the Recode Decode podcast, and coexecutive producer of the Code conference. She is a former contributing opinion writer for The New York Times and host of its Sway podcast and has also worked for The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post.

Award-winning journalist Michele Norris speaking at the Westminster Town Hall Forum in Minneapolis. She spoke about her best-selling book, "Our Hidden Conversation; What Americans Really Think About Race and Identity." For more than a decade, Norris asked people around the world to send in their stories. The prompt was simple: "Race. Your Story. Six Words. Please Send." She and the Race Card Team collected more than 500,000 stories, many of which are complied in and expanded in "Our Hidden Conversations." The results are shocking in their depth and candor, spanning the full spectrum of race, ethnicity, identity, and class. The program opened with a dramatic reading of some of those stories by a diverse cast of community leaders: The Honorable Lt. Governor Peggy Flanagan, Heidi Adelsman, Roxane Battle, Sheletta Brundidge, Bill Kiffmeyer, Patricia Lopez, Kerri Miller, R.T. Rybak, Jasmine Brett Stringer, Laysha Ward, Tom Weber, Lizz Winstead, Jai Winston and Boua Xiong. Afterwards, Norris sat down for an in-depth conversation with Forum director Tane Danger. She also answered audience questions. This program was recorded in front a live audience at Westminster Presbyterian Church in downtown Minneapolis on February 1, 2024. Learn more about the Westminster Town Hall Forum at our website: www.WestminsterForum.org Minneapolis native Michele Norris is one of America’s most trusted voices in journalism, earning several honors over a long career, including Peabody, Emmy, Dupont, and Goldsmith awards. She is a columnist for The Washington Post Opinion Section, the host of the Audible Original Podcast, Your Mama’s Kitchen, and from and from 2002 to 2012 she was a cohost of NPR’s All Things Considered. Norris is also the founding director of The Race Card Project, a Peabody Award–winning narrative archive where people around the world share their reflections on identity—in just six words. Her first book, The Grace of Silence, was named one of the best books of the year by the San Francisco Chronicle, The Christian Science Monitor, and The Kansas City Star. Before joining NPR, Norris spent almost ten years as a reporter for ABC News covering politics, policy, and the dynamics of social change. Early in her career, she also worked as a staff writer for The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, and the Los Angeles Times.

Transgender rights activist and author Raquel Willis speaking at the Westminster Town Hall Forum. Raquel Willis is an award-winning activist, author, and media strategist dedicated to Black transgender liberation. She is the co-founder of The Transgender Week of Visibility and Action. She spoke at the Forum about her work and her memoir, "The Risk it Takes to Bloom; On Life and Liberation." This talk was recorded in front of a live audience at Westminster Presbyterian in downtown Minneapolis, Minnesota on December 8, 2023. Learn more at the Westminster Town Hall Forum website, www.WestminsterForum.org

Nancy Giles speaking at the Westminster Town Hall Forum in Minneapolis on November 9, 2023. Giles is a comedian, actress, and social commentator. Since 2002 she has been a regular contributor to the Peabody Award-winning program CBS News Sunday Morning. In that time, she has earned five Emmy Awards for her unique blend of common-sense wisdom, laugh-out-loud humor, commentary, and interviews. She’s a veteran of Chicago’s esteemed Second City improv troupe. She has appeared Off-Broadway in Nora & Delia Ephron’s Love Loss, and What I Wore, and won the Theatre World Award for the musical satire Mayor. She was one of the stars of the acclaimed series China Beach and the sitcom Delta. Her solo shows include Black Comedy: The Wacky Side of Racism, Notes of a Negro Neurotic, Things My Afro Taught Me, and The Further Adventures of the Accidental Pundette, which The New Yorker called “the surprise of (this) annual festival… a rocking standup comedy.”

Author and NPR host Steve Inskeep speaking at the Westminster Town Hall Forum. Inskeep's latest book is "Differ We Must: How Lincoln Succeeded in a Divided America." It shares Lincoln’s lessons for bridging intense political divisions. He spoke at the Forum about what we can learn from Lincoln to help navigate our own divisive politics. Steve Inskeep is a cohost of NPR’s Morning Edition, the most widely heard radio program in the United States, and of NPR’s Up First, one of the nation’s most popular podcasts. His reporting has taken him across the United States, the Middle East, Latin America, Africa, Pakistan, and China. His search for the full story behind the news has led him to history; he is the author of multiple books including "Instant City," "Jacksonland," and "Imperfect Union." This program was recorded in front a live audience at Westminster Presbyterian Church in downtown Minneapolis on October 7, 2023. Learn more about the Westminster Town Hall Forum at our website: www.WestminsterForum.org

Senior correspondent for APM Reports Emily Hanford speaking at the Westminster Town Hall Forum. For more than a generation, schools across the U.S. embraced a specific methodology of teaching kids to read. The problem? Cognitive scientists had proven decades before it didn’t actually work. In her award-winning podcast "Sold a Story," Emily Hanford investigated the influential authors who promoted this idea and the company that sold it to schools across the country. She spoke at the Forum about what that has meant for millions of kids and what it says about education in the United States. Emily Hanford is a senior correspondent and producer for APM Reports, the documentary and investigative reporting group at American Public Media. Her work has appeared on NPR, in The New York Times and other publications. For the past several years, she has been reporting on reading instruction. Her 2018 podcast episode “Hard Words: Why aren’t kids being taught to read?” won the inaugural public service award from EWA. This program was recorded in front a live audience at Westminster Presbyterian Church in downtown Minneapolis on September 12, 2023. Learn more about the Westminster Town Hall Forum at our website: www.WestminsterForum.org

Samuel G. Freedman, author of "Into the Bright Sunshine: A Young Hubert Humphrey and the Fight for Civil Rights." He spoke with Forum director Tane Danger at a special Westminster Town Hall Forum recorded at the Minnesota State Fair. They discussed the former Vice President's upbringing in South Dakota, what Minneapolis was like in the early 1900s, and why Humphrey's speech at the 1948 Democratic National Convention on civil rights still matters today. The program was recorded in front of a live audience at the Minnesota State Fair on August 30, 2023. Learn more about the Westminster Town Hall Forum at our website: www.WestminsterForum.org

Former US Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch speaking on life as a diplomat, the Russian war in Ukraine, and the political smear campaign against her by then-President Trump and his allies. She is the author of the best-selling memoir, "Lessons from the Edge." Yovanovitch served for more than 30 years in the US State Department under both Republican and Democratic presidents. She did tours in Somalia, Russia, and the U.K. She served as US Ambassador to Kyrgyzstan, Armenia, and eventually Ukraine from 2016–2019. Her service there was cut short by a politically-motivated campaign against her pushed by allies of then President Donald Trump and ultimately the President himself. These events contributed to President Trump's first impeachment, at which Ambassador Yavonovitch testified. This is a special podcast-only edition of the Westminster Town Hall Forum moderated by Forum Director Tane Danger. Ambassador Yavonovitch's visit to Minnesota was coordinated by Global Minnesota, who arranged for her conversation with the Forum. Learn more about Global Minnesota at www.GlobalMinnesota.org Learn more about the Westminster Town Hall Forum and see more of our programs at www.WestminsterForum.org

Dr. Cornel West and Ms. Ifeoma Ike Esq. speaking at the Westminster Town Hall Forum's 2023 Arc Toward Justice program. Moderated by Angela Davis of Minnesota Public Radio News. The Arc Toward Justice series invites national racial justice leaders to reflect on a another year George Floyd's murder in Minneapolis and the international uprising that followed. We ask them to discuss where we have come on racial justice since then, and where they believe we still need to go. Dr. Cornel West, affectionately known to many as Brother West, is the Dietrich Bonhoeffer Chair at Union Theological Seminary. He is the former Professor of the Practice of Public Philosophy at Harvard University and Professor Emeritus at Princeton University. He has written 20 books and has edited 13. He is best known for his classics, Race Matters and Democracy Matters, and for his memoir, Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud. Ifeoma Ike, Esq. is an award-winning advocate, writer and policy advisor focused on designing solutions to address disparities. She co-engineered Just Leadership USA and Mass Bail Out NYC. She also helped form three congressional caucuses: the Caucus on Black Men and Boys; the Caucus on Black Women and Girls; and the recently-launched Caucus on Black Innovation. Ike holds a LL.M. with highest honors from The George Washington School of Law and J.D. from CUNY School of Law, where she specialized in mediation and conflict resolution. The Forum was moderated by Angela Davis of Minnesota Public Radio News. It was recorded in front of a live audience of more than 1000 at Westminster Presbyterian in Downtown Minneapolis on May 20, 2023.

Dr. Pooja Lakshmin, M.D. speaking at the Westminster Town Hall Forum on May 2, 2023. She is a women's mental health specialist, a board-certified physician psychiatrist, and a Clinical Assistant Professor at George Washington University. She is the author of "Real Self-Care: Crystals, Cleanses and Bubble Baths Not Included." In it, she argues women are largely targeted by a wellness industry designed to sell get-well-quick schemes. In their place, she focuses on tangible psychological tools to manage difficult emotions, set boundaries, make choices aligned with one’s values, and develop mental health literacy. You can listen for free to more than 40 years of Westminster Town Hall Forum programs on our website. They are all archived on our website: www.WestminsterForum.org

Veteran and author Elliot Ackerman speaking at the Westminster Town Hall Forum in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He spoke on his most recent book, "The Fifth Act: America's End in Afghanistan." Elliot Ackerman is a writer, journalist, former White House Fellow, and decorated veteran. He served five tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan, where he received the Silver Star, the Bronze Star for Valor, and the Purple Heart. He is the New York Times bestselling author of multiple novels. His books have been nominated for the National Book Award, the Andrew Carnegie Medal in both fiction and nonfiction, and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize among others. He spoke in front of a live audience at the Westminster Town Hall Forum in Downtown Minneapolis on April 18, 2023. You can listen for free to more than 40 years of Westminster Town Hall Forum programs on our website. They are all archived on our website: www.WestminsterForum.org

Ari Shapiro's talk at the Westminster Town Hall Forum, March 28 2023. He is the award-winning co-host of National Public Radio's All Things Considered, and the author of the new memoir "The Best Strangers in the World; Stories from a Life Spent Listening." Learn more at the Westminster Town Hall Forum website, www.WestminsterForum.org

Parker Palmer is a writer, teacher, activist, and founder of the Center for Courage & Renewal, a nonprofit organization committed to creating a more just and compassionate world by nurturing personal and professional integrity. His bestselling books include, among others, A Hidden Wholeness, Let Your Life Speak, The Courage to Teach, Healing the Heart of Democracy, and On the Brink of Everything. A graduate of Carleton College, he holds a PhD in sociology from the University of California at Berkeley, and he is the recipient of 13 honorary doctorates and numerous awards for achievement and excellence. At the Forum, he will be in conversation with Sondra Samuels, president of the Northside Achievement Zone in North Minneapolis.

André Thomas is Professor of Choral Music Education, Director of Choral Activities, and the Owen F. Sellers Professor of Music at Florida State University. He is the conductor of a variety of choral organizations throughout the country and served as the artistic director for the Tallahassee Community Chorus. He is in demand as a choral adjudicator and clinician and has conducted 48 Honor and All-State Choirs, as well as the World Youth Choir. As a composer, his works have been published by seven publishing companies, and he is the author of the book "Way Over in Beulah Lan’: Understanding and Performing the Negro Spiritual." He earned a B.A. from Friends University, an M.M. from Northwestern University, and a D.M.A. from the University of Illinois.

Jim Sciutto is CNN’s chief national security correspondent and co-anchor of the weekday program CNN Newsroom. He reports and provides analysis on all aspects of U.S. national security, including the military, foreign policy, the intelligence community, and the ongoing Russia investigation. An award-winning journalist, he has received the Headliner Award for the documentary Targeting Terror: Inside the Intelligence War, a Citation for Excellence from the Overseas Press Club, and the Edward R. Murrow Award for his reporting from Iran. Prior to joining CNN, he served as ABC News’ senior foreign correspondent. His new book, The Shadow War, explores Russia and China’s clandestine efforts to undermine the U.S.

Kathleen Belew is Assistant Professor of History at the University of Chicago where her teaching and research focus on militarization, violence, racism, and identity in 20th-century America. Her recent book, Bring the War Home, explores white power activism from its roots in the Vietnam War to its collaboration with neo-Naxi, Ku Klux Klan, skinhead, and militia movements. She has been featured on Fresh Air, Weekend Edition, CBS, and the Frontline program Documenting Hate. A graduate of the University of Washington with a degree in the history of ideas, she earned an MPhil and PhD in American studies from Yale University. She is currently a research fellow at the Center for the Advanced Study of the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University.

Barbara Brown Taylor is an Episcopal priest, teacher, and bestselling author of fourteen books on religion and spirituality, including Leaving Church, An Altar in the World and Learning to Walk in the Dark, named one of the best religion books of 2014 by Publisher’s Weekly. She has served on the faculties of Piedmont College, Columbia Theological Seminary, Candler School of Theology at Emory University, McAfee School of Theology at Mercer University, and on the Certificate in Theological Studies program at Arrendale State Prison for Women in Alto, Georgia. She has been recognized by Baylor University as one of the top twelve preachers in America, and in 2015, she was named Georgia Woman of the Year. Her latest book, Holy Envy: Finding God in the Faith of Others, was published in April 2019.

Jonathan Capehart is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and member of The Washington Post editorial board, focusing on politics, social issues, and cultural shifts nationally and globally. He is a regular contributor to the blog PostPartisan and hosts the podcast Cape Up. He is a periodic commentator on MSNBC and a moderator at the Aspen Ideas Festival, the Center for American Progress, the Atlantic Dialogues conference, and the Brussels Forum. Earlier in his career, he was an editorial page editor and editorial board member for the New York Daily News, and he served as a national affairs columnist for Bloomberg News. He is a recipient of the Esteem Award, which honors individuals for their ongoing efforts to support the African American and LGBT communities in entertainment, media, civil rights, business, and art. He grew up in Newark, New Jersey, attended St. Benedict’s Preparatory School, and is a graduate of Carleton College.

David Hogg is a survivor of the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. He is among twenty Parkland students who founded Never Again MSD, a gun control advocacy group, and he is a founding member of March for Our Lives, one of the largest youth-led movements in the world. An advocate for ending gun violence in America, he has traveled the country calling for voter participation, civic engagement, and social activism. He and his younger sister, Lauren, are co-authors of the bestselling book "#NeverAgain: A New Generation Draws the Line" and contributors to the book "Glimmer of Hope: How Tragedy Sparked a Movement," a compilation of writings from the founders of March for Our Lives. A recent graduate of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, he has received letters of acceptance from several universities but has chosen to take a year off to work on the 2018 midterm elections and to continue his activism on gun policy reform.

Art Cullen is editor and co-owner of The Storm Lake Times, a flourishing, family-owned, twice-weekly newspaper founded in 1990 in Northwest Iowa. In 2017, he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing for a series of columns indicting corporate agri-business for polluting the rivers and lakes in the most-intensively farmed land in the world. His recently published book, Storm Lake, chronicles his 40-year career in journalism and describes changes in politics, agriculture, climate, and immigration in his rural community. A graduate of the University of St. Thomas, he has been a reporter and editor with newspapers in Algona, Ames, Mason City, and Storm Lake, Iowa. His commentaries have been published in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, and the StarTribune. His brother John is publisher of The Storm Lake Times, his son, Tom, is a reporter, and his wife, Dolores, is a feature writer and photographer.

Michael Beschloss is an award-winning author of nine books on presidential history. He is the presidential historian for NBC News and a contributor to PBS NewsHour. A graduate of Williams College and Harvard Business School, he has served as a historian for the Smithsonian Institution, as a Senior Associate Member at St. Antony’s College, Oxford, and as a Senior Fellow of the Annenberg Foundation. His books on the presidency include, among others, "The Crisis Years: Kennedy and Khrushchev, 1960-1963;" "The Conquerors: Roosevelt, Truman and the Destruction of Hitler’s Germany;" and "Presidential Courage: Brave Leaders and How They Changed America, 1789-1989." His most recent book is "Presidents of War." He is the recipient of the Harry S. Truman Public Service Award, the New York State Archives Award, and the Rutgers University Living History Award. He is a trustee of the White House Historical Association and the National Archives Foundation and a former trustee of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation.

Mona Hanna-Attisha is an associate professor of pediatrics at Michigan State University College of Human Medicine and a pediatrician at Hurley Children’s Hospital in Flint, Michigan. She has been acclaimed internationally for her research that exposed elevated levels of lead in the blood of the children of Flint. She directs the Michigan State University and Hurley Children’s Hospital Pediatric Public Health Initiative, a public health program committed to researching, monitoring, and mitigating the impact of the Flint water crisis. The daughter of Iraqi immigrants, she is the author of What the Eyes Don’t See: A Story of Crisis, Resistance, and Hope in an American City. She received her BS and Master of Public Health degrees from the University of Michigan and her medical degree from Michigan State University College of Human Medicine.

Clint Watts is a former FBI agent with expertise in electronic espionage operations, misinformation campaigns, fake news, and the manipulation of social media. In 2017 and 2018, he testified before four Senate committees on Russia’s information warfare campaign in advance of the 2016 presidential election. Currently, he is a Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute and the Center for Cyber and Homeland Security at George Washington University. His research and writings focus on terrorism, counterterrorism, the influence of social media, and Russian disinformation. He has served as an Army infantry officer, an FBI special agent on a joint terrorism task force, an executive officer for the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, and a counterterrorism analyst for the U.S. Intelligence Community and the U.S. Special Operations Command.

Richard Stengel is a journalist, author, and former managing editor of Time. He has written for numerous publications, including The New Yorker, New Republic, Spy, and The New York Times, and he appears regularly on television as a political commentator. In 2013, he accepted the position of Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs in the Obama administration. He served as the president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, which was established by Congress to increase awareness and understanding of the Constitution. He collaborated with Nelson Mandela on Mandela’s autobiography, The Long Walk to Freedom, and he was a producer of the documentary film Mandela. He is the author of the book Mandela’s Way.

Honey Thaljieh is known internationally for promoting the role of sports in empowering women and girls in the Arab world and beyond. She is a co-founder of women’s football (soccer) in Palestine, and she served as the first captain of the Palestinian national football team. Following her career in football, she joined FIFA, the International Federation of Association Football, where she leads its efforts to promote diversity, gender equality, integration, and peace-making in sports. She has been recognized as a Champion for Peace by the organization Peace and Sport, and she serves as an ambassador for the sports organizations Save the Dream, Homeless World Cup, and Football for Peace. This forum was the kick-off event for the weekend-long festival, Windows into Palestine: https://www.windowsintopalestine.org/

Steve Schmidt is a political strategist, public relations executive, and a political analyst on MSNBC. He was an advisor in the George W. Bush administration and served as the top strategist for the president’s re-election campaign. In 2008, he was the senior advisor to the John McCain presidential campaign. He is a vice president at Edelman, a global communications marketing firm, where he advises politicians and business executives on technology, financial services, energy, healthcare, and more. He serves on the board of the nonprofit research organization JUST Capital, which ranks companies on their commitment to fair pay, equal treatment of all workers, community-building, and sustainability. With David Plouffe, he founded the Center for Political Communication at the University of Delaware.

Nadine Burke Harris is a pediatrician and advocate for children’s health. She is the founder of the Center for Youth Wellness, which researches the impact of adverse childhood experiences on long-term health, behavior, and learning. She has shared her findings at the Mayo Clinic, American Academy of Pediatrics, Google Zeitgeist, and Dreamforce. An advisor to the Too Small to Fail initiative, which promotes the importance of early brain and language development in children, she is the author of the new book The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity. She is the recipient of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation’s Humanism in Medicine Award and the Heinz Award for the Human Condition.

Suzy Hansen is an American journalist and editor. A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, she moved to Istanbul in 2007 after receiving a journalism fellowship from the Institute of Current World Affairs to write on Turkish politics and foreign affairs. Since then, she has traveled to Libya, Greece, Egypt, Afghanistan, Kuwait, India, Kenya, and beyond to study and reflect on socio-political issues. She is a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine, London Review of Books, Vogue, Bloomberg, and Businessweek. Her first book, Notes on a Foreign Country: An American Abroad in a Post-American World, is a memoir exploring her assumptions about American beneficence abroad, America’s role in the Middle East. and its standing in the world.

Crime and Punishment in Black America. James Forman Jr. is a professor of law at Yale Law School, teaching and writing on criminal procedure, constitutional law, juvenile justice, and education law and policy. He is the author of the book "Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America." A graduate of Brown University and Yale Law School, he served as a law clerk for Judge William Norris of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and for Justice Sandra Day O’Connor of the United States Supreme Court. After clerking, he worked for six years as a public defender in Washington, D.C., where he founded the Maya Angelou Public Charter School, an alternative school serving at-risk youth who have been incarcerated or have dropped out of school. The school now provides education for young people inside the District of Columbia’s juvenile prison.

Ari Melber is Chief Legal Correspondent for MSNBC, covering the U. S. Supreme Court, Justice Department, and FBI, and the host of the political news program The Beat. He has written on law and politics for The Nation, The Atlantic, Reuters, Salon, and Politico. Raised in Seattle, he earned a BA in political science from the University of Michigan and a JD from Cornell Law School where he was an editor of the Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy. From 2009 to 2013, he practiced law at a major New York law firm, specializing in First Amendment, reporter’s privilege, and copyright litigation. During the 2008 presidential campaign, he traveled with the Obama campaign on special assignment for The Washington Independent. He was a national staff member for the 2004 John Kerry Campaign, and he worked as a legislative aide to Senator Maria Cantwell.

Carl Pope is the former executive director and chairman of the Sierra Club and a veteran leader in the environmental movement. He is now a senior climate advisor to former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg and the principal advisor at Inside Straight Strategies, where he focuses on the links between sustainability and economic development. A graduate of Harvard College, he is the author of three books, including Climate of Hope: How Cities, Businesses, and Citizens Can Save the Planet, which he co-authored with Michael Bloomberg. He was a founder of the BlueGreen Alliance and America Votes, and he served on the boards of the California League of Conservation Voters, Public Voice, the National Clean Air Coalition, California Common Cause, and Zero Population Growth. He is currently serving on the advisory board of America India Foundation and on the board of directors of Ceres and As You Sow. He writes regularly for Bloomberg View and Huffington Post.

Richard Haass is president of the Council on Foreign Relations, an independent, nonpartisan think-tank and an educational institution seeking better understanding of global issues facing the U. S. and other countries. He was chair of the multiparty negotiations in Northern Ireland in 2013, and he served as a principal advisor and director of policy planning under Secretary of State Colin Powell. He was a special assistant to George H. W. Bush and the senior director for Near East and South Asian Affairs on the staff of the National Security Council. A Rhodes Scholar, he holds master and doctoral degrees from Oxford University. He is the author or editor of twelve books on American foreign policy, including A World in Disarray: American Foreign Policy and the Crisis of the Old Order.

Otis Moss III is the senior pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, former church-home for then-Senator Barack Obama. Since coming to Trinity in 2008, Moss has focused his ministerial work on community advancement, civil rights advocacy, and social justice activism, calling attention to the problems of mass incarceration, environmental justice, and economic inequality. Committed to preaching a message of love and justice, he developed a curriculum for young people entitled My Life Matters in the aftermath of the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, MO. A graduate of Morehouse College, he holds a Master of Divinity from Yale Divinity School and a Doctor of Ministry from Chicago Theological Seminary. His books include, among others, Blue Note Preaching in a Post-Soul World: Finding Hope in an Age of Despair.

Frank Bruni is an op-ed columnist for The New York Times. Since joining the paper in 1995, he has covered a broad range of topics, including American politics, higher education, travel, the arts, gay rights, and more. As a political columnist, he has focused on the nation’s divisiveness and what each citizen can do to seek common ground. He is the author of three bestselling books, including Ambling into History, a chronicle of George W. Bush’s first presidential campaign; his memoir Born Round; and his most recent book, Where You Go Is Not Who You’ll Be: An Antidote to the College Admissions Mania. He is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and holds a master’s degree from Columbia University’s School of Journalism.

Irshad Manji is the founder of the Moral Courage Project, headquartered at the University of Southern California and committed to helping people identify, express, and act according to their values. In 2013, MCP launched its award-winning You-Tube channel, which features stories of people taking action in pursuit of the common good. MCP’s founder first came to prominence for her work as an Islamic reformer, and her book The Trouble with Islam was an international bestseller. A graduate of the University of British Columbia with a degree in the history of ideas, she describes herself as African by birth, Canadian by citizenship, and American by immersion. She is an advocate for human rights, social justice, diversity, and inclusion.

Thomas Friedman is a Pulitzer Prize-winning weekly columnist for The New York Times, focusing on foreign affairs, the Middle East, globalization, and environmental issues. He is the author of seven bestselling books, including The Lexus and the Olive Tree: Understanding Globalization; The World Is Flat: A Brief History of theTwenty-first Century; and the winner of the National Book Award, From Beirut to Jerusalem. His latest book is Thank You for Being Late: An Optimist’s Guide to Thriving in the Age of Accelerations. Born and raised in St. Louis Park, MN, he graduated from Brandeis University with a degree in Mediterranean studies and earned an M.Phil degree in Middle Eastern Studies at Oxford University.

Timothy Naftali is associate clinical professor of history and public service at NYU. He was the founding director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum where he curated its nationally acclaimed exhibit on Watergate, and founding director of the Presidential Recording Project at the Miller Center of Public Affairs. An award-winning author, his writings focus on national security, intelligence policy, international history, and presidential history. His published works include, among others, One Hell of a Gamble: Krushchev, Castro, and Kennedy, 1958 – 1964 and Blind Spot: The Secret History of American Counterterrorism. He holds degrees from Yale University and Johns Hopkins University and a doctoral degree in history from Harvard University.

Gene Robinson is a retired bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of New Hampshire. In 2003, he received national attention as the first priest in an openly gay relationship to be consecrated a bishop in a major Christian denomination. Since his retirement in 2013, he has served as a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress, speaking and writing on the issues of race, poverty, immigration reform, LGBT rights, and the full inclusion of transgender people in the life of the Church and in American society. Recently, he has been speaking on behalf of the nonprofit organization Compassion & Choices, which advocates state-of-the-art care and a full range of options for people who are dying to ensure their comfort, dignity, and control at the end of life.

Glennon Doyle Melton is the founder of the online community Momastery, which draws hundreds of thousands of readers daily to her writings on marriage, motherhood, faith, addiction, and recovery. She is the author of The New York Times bestselling book Carry On, Warrior, and the newly released memoir, Love Warrior. In her books and blog posts, she shares poignant and candid observations about life’s challenges and the need to live authentically and without shame. A speaker in high demand, she has shared her insights with businesses, universities, faith communities, nonprofits, women’s groups, and parents’ organizations. She is a graduate of James Madison University in Virginia and currently lives in Naples, Florida, with her family.

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Faith Daniels - 07/11/92 by westminsterforum

Eddie Glaude Jr. is the William S. Tod Professor of Religion and African American Studies at Princeton University and Chair of the Department of African American Studies. He is the author of the award-winning book In a Shade of Blue: Pragmatism and the Politics of Black America and co-editor with Cornel West of African American Religious Thought: An Anthology. His latest book is Democracy in Black: How Race Still Governs the Soul of America. He holds a bachelor’s degree in political science from Morehouse College, a master’s degree in African American studies from Temple University, and a PhD in religion from Princeton University. His scholarly pursuits and public service have been informed by his years growing up in the coastal town of Moss Point, Mississippi.

Kathleen Hall Jamieson is the Elizabeth Ware Packard Professor of Communication at the Annenberg School for Communication and Director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania. The Annenberg Center runs FactCheck, which is committed to examining the accuracy of U. S. political campaign advertisements. She is the author or co-author of fifteen books, including Presidents Creating the Presidency and unSpun: Finding Facts in a World of Disinformation. Her areas of research include political communication, rhetorical theory and criticism, campaign communication, and the discourse of the presidency. She is a native of Minneapolis and a graduate of Marquette University and the University of Wisconsin at Madison, where she earned her PhD in Communication Arts.

Jacob Hacker is a professor of political science at Yale University and Director of the Institution for Social and Policy Studies. He is co-author of the bestselling book Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer and Turned Its Back on the Middle Class. He is a developer of the Economic Security Index (ESI), which measures the share of Americans who experience at least a 25 percent decline in their income from one year to the next, and his 2007 plan "Health Care for America" became a template for several presidential candidates' health care reform proposals. In his latest book, American Amnesia, written with Paul Pierson, he argues that the vital link between business and government has frayed, and along with it, the American record of social advancement and prosperity.