PAST EVENTS
Meet & Greet: Jenny McCarthy
The Common Good was honored to have hosted Jenny McCarthy for a breakfast discussion for a meet and greet. She spoke about how raising her son who is autistic and her new books.
The Common Good was honored to have hosted Jenny McCarthy for a breakfast discussion for a meet and greet. She spoke about how raising her son who is autistic and her new books.
Much more than just a pretty face, the quick-witted and often outrageous Jenny McCarthy takes the belief that anyone can be famous to a whole new level. The former Catholic schoolgirl from Chicago simultaneously exploited and spoofed her good looks to launch a diverse career as a model, TV host, actress, screenwriter, and author. When her son Evan was diagnosed with autism, Jenny took on another role again, as an advocate in the fight against autism. Determined to help him and other families living with autism, Jenny’s dynamic life has taken on new meaning.
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Special Screening of 'Budrus'
The Common Good hosted a special screening and discussion of the documentary ‘Budrus’ with director Julia Bacha and producer Ronit Avni, which showed the nonviolent Palestinian movement to save the village of Budrus from destruction by Israel’s Separation Barrier.
The Common Good hosted a special screening and discussion of the documentary ‘Budrus’ with director Julia Bacha and producer Ronit Avni, which showed the nonviolent Palestinian movement to save the village of Budrus from destruction by Israel’s Separation Barrier.
This documentary by Julia Bacha that examines one West Bank town’s reaction to Israel’s construction of the security barrier. The town, with a population of 1,500, was set to be divided and encircled by the barrier, losing 300 acres of land and 3,000 olive trees. These trees were not only critical for economic survival but also sacred to the town’s intergenerational history. The film tells the story of Ayed Morrar, a Palestinian whose work for Fatah had led to five detentions in Israeli jails, but whose momentous strategic decision that the barrier would be best opposed by nonviolent resistance had far-reaching ramifications.
Julia Bacha is a media strategist and award-winning filmmaker whose work has been exhibited at Sundance, Tribeca, Berlin, Jerusalem, and Dubai International Film Festivals, and broadcasted on the BBC, HBO, Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya television channels. Julia started her filmmaking career in Cairo, where she co-wrote and edited Jehane Noujaim’s critically acclaimed documentary, Control Room (2004), for which she was nominated to the Writer’s Guild of America Award. Control Room marked the first time most Americans were exposed to an inside view of Al Jazeera and generated wide public debate about US media coverage during the war in Iraq.
Ronit Avni is an award-winning filmmaker and human rights advocate. She is the Founder and Executive Director of Just Vision, a nonprofit organization dedicated to increasing media coverage and support for Palestinian and Israeli efforts to end the conflict without arms. Her work has been featured in major news outlets, including Newsweek, The Washington Post, The BBC, NPR, and The Economist. Avni produced the documentary film, Budrus, which was hailed in The New York Times as “this year’s must-see documentary” and has won twelve international awards. Avni directed and produced the documentary film, Encounter Point, which received several awards including the San Francisco International Film Festival Audience Award for Best Documentary. Encounter Point has screened in more than 200 cities worldwide and continues to be widely used in classrooms and community centers in America and the Middle East.
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Leadership Series: David Paterson on New York Past and Present
· We enjoyed candid discussions from elected officials in our “Leadership Series.”New York Governor, Honorable David Paterson on his tenure as Governor and what lies ahead for New York with moderator David Pollak.
· We enjoyed candid discussions from elected officials in our “Leadership Series.”New York Governor, Honorable David Paterson on his tenure as Governor and what lies ahead for New York with moderator David Pollak.
David Paterson served as New York’s 55th Governor from 2008 to 2010 following the resignation of former Governor Eliot Spitzer. During his tenure as Governor, Paterson is credited for drawing attention to New York’s fiscal woes, stretching the budget-drafting powers of his office, and enacting sweeping reforms on a wide range of issues facing New Yorkers.
The former Governor led the movement to create permanent reforms to health care in New York State, successfully negotiated an MTA bailout plan, and introduced landmark legislation to end legal discrimination against same-sex couples in New York.
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Screening of Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer
The Common Good held a special screening and Q&A forum of the documentary Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer with director Alex Gibney.
The Common Good held a special screening of the documentary Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer followed by a Q&A forum with director Alex Gibney.
This documentary feature takes an in-depth look at the rapid rise and dramatic fall of New York Governor Eliot Spitzer. Nicknamed "The Sheriff of Wall Street," when he was NY's Attorney General, Eliot Spitzer prosecuted crimes by America’s largest financial institutions and some of the most powerful executives in the country. After his election as Governor, with the largest margin in the state's history, many believed Spitzer was on his way to becoming the nation's first Jewish President. Then, shockingly, Spitzer’s meteoric rise turned into a precipitous fall when the New York Times revealed that Spitzer--the paragon of rectitude--had been caught seeing prostitutes. As his powerful enemies gloated, his supporters questioned the timing of it all: as the Sheriff fell, so did the financial markets, in a cataclysm that threatened to unravel the global economy. With unique access to the escort world as well as friends, colleagues and enemies of the ex-Governor (many of whom have come forward for the first time) the film explores the hidden contours of this tale of hubris, sex, and power.
An Emmy Award-winning writer, producer and director, Alex Gibney recently produced Lighting in a Bottle a film directed by Antoine Fuqua, which premiered in 2004 at the Berlin Film Festival and which was released by Sony Classics last October. Gibney is executive producing “Exiles on Main Street,” a series of short films directed by Wayne Wang, Mira Nair, Sherman Alexie, among others.
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Special Screening of Restrepo
The Common Good presented an exclusive screening of the Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury award-winning documentary, Restrepo. This powerful documentary chronicles the one-year deployment of a platoon of American soldiers at one of the most dangerous outposts in Afghanistan. Featuring a Q&A session with directors, Sebastian Junger and Tim Hetherington, and moderated by ABC news host, Cynthia McFadden, the evening was a rousing success.
From June 2007 to July 2008, Hetherington and Junger followed the soldiers of Second Platoon, Battle Company in the remote Korengal Valley in eastern Afghanistan, as they fought to build and maintain a remote 15-man outpost named “Restrepo,” after a platoon medic who was killed in action. The filmmakers avoid all outside commentary and political context in order to present us with war as it is actually lived by soldiers, through their own eyes and in their own words—the backbreaking labor, the deadly firefights, the boredom, and the camaraderie.
Sebastian Junger is an Emmy Award-winning and Academy Award-nominated director, war journalist and best-selling author. He has written The Perfect Storm, A Death in Belmont, and Fire. Junger is acclaimed for his coverage of major international news stories across the world, including in Sierra Leone and Liberia. He has contributed as an editor to Vanity Fair and ABC News with his captivating reporting, and has received many awards for his endeavors, including the National Magazine Award and the SAIS Novartis Prize for Journalism. His debut as an author proved to be successful—The Perfect Storm remained on The New York Times best-seller list for more than three years, set sales records, and was picked up by Warner Bros. for a major motion picture.
Tim Hetherington, a photographer and filmmaker, spoke to the Common Good in 2010. Sadly, he was killed while covering the escalating violence in Misrata, Libya at age 40 on April 20th, 2011. At the time of his death, he was working along side three other photographers on the city’s front lines when they came under fire.
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Meet & Greet: William Bradley
The Common Good hosted Senator William Bradley with a lunch and discussion where he talked about America’s higher education crisis.
The Common Good hosted Senator William Bradley with a lunch and discussion where he talked about America’s higher education crisis.
Senator Bill Bradley served in the U.S. Senate from 1979 to 1997 representing the state of New Jersey. In 2000, he was a candidate for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States. He has authored seven books on American politics, culture and economy. Prior to serving in the Senate, Senator Bradley was an Olympic gold medalist in 1964 and a professional basketball player with the New York Knicks from 1967 to 1977 during which time they won 2 NBA championships. In 1982 he was elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame. (1)
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(1) Material from Bill Bradley’s website.
Election Insurrection: The Mid-Term Elections 2010
The Common Good and the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College joined forces to present “Election Insurrection: The Mid-Term Elections 2010.” This timely forum brought together America’s top political journalists with an authoritative range of strategists from across the political spectrum to discuss the importance—and likely impact—of the November Congressional…
The Common Good and the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College joined forces to present “Election Insurrection: The Mid-Term Elections 2010.” This timely forum brought together America’s top political journalists with a range of strategists from across the political spectrum to discuss the importance—and likely impact—of the November Congressional and gubernatorial elections. Through civil dialog and civic initiatives, The Common Good seeks to inspire broader participation in our democracy and bridge the growing divisions that threaten our nation. Our members joined us for this vital and enlightening evening of discussion and debate.
MODERATOR
Dan Abrams, NBC Legal Correspondent
PANELISTS:
Carl Bernstein, Pulitzer prize-winning investigative reporter
Jonathan Capehart, editorial writer for the Washington Post
Matthew Dowd, former strategist for President George W. Bush
Jane Hamsher, founder of one of the leading political blogs, Firedoglake
Steve Hildebrand, former campaign advisor for President Obama
Ed Rollins, former lead campaign advisor for Ronald Reagan and Ross Perot
Doug Schoen, former strategist for Clinton-Gore and Michael Bloomberg
Katrina Vanden Heuvel, editor and publisher of The Nation
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Ed Koch on the Reform of New York's Government
The Common Good held a conversation with Former Mayor of New York City, Honorable Ed Koch on reform of New York’s state government in Albany.
The Common Good held a conversation with Former Mayor of New York City, Honorable Ed Koch on reform of New York’s state government in Albany.
Mayor Ed Koch saved the City of New York from bankruptcy and in doing so restored the pride of New Yorkers. During his three terms as Mayor from 1978-1989, he restored fiscal stability to the City of New York, and he was responsible for placing the City on a GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Practices) balanced budget basis. He created a housing program which, over a ten-year period, provided more than 150,000 units of affordable housing financed by City funds in the amount of $5.1 billion. He created for the first time in New York City a merit judicial selection system and selected some of the most outstanding public servants to serve in his administration.
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Googled
The Common Good was proud to host Ken Auletta, author of Googled. He is known for his thorough research and fascinating profiles of leading figures and companies. These efforts have earned him five national bestsellers on subjects including Bill Gates, The New York Times, and now the multinational computing and internet search corporation, Google. In this latest best-seller, Auletta delves into the company and its success, and unmasks how the digital revolution may disrupt the world.
In his book, Googled, Auletta takes readers inside Google’s closed-door meetings and discusses Google’s notoriously private founders, Larry Page and Sergei Brin. In his narrative, Auletta provides the fullest account to date of Google’s meteoric rise.
Ken Auletta is an American journalist and media critic at The New Yorker. He has worked in government and on several political campaigns along with having taught and trained Peace Corps volunteers. In 1974, Auletta became the chief political correspondent for the New York Post. Following that, he was a staff writer and weekly columnist for The Village Voice, and then a contributing editor at New York Magazine. He started contributing to The New Yorker in 1977. Between 1977 and 1993, he wrote a weekly political column for the New York Daily News.
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The Changing of the Political Landscape
The Common good hosted a discussion with Governor John Lynch on “The Changing Political Landscape” and the ramifications of the toxic political environment in his race and around the nation.
The Common good hosted a discussion with Governor John Lynch on “The Changing Political Landscape” and the ramifications of the toxic political environment in his race and around the nation.
During his time serving as the 80th Governor of New Hampshire in 2005, Governor John Lynch focused on working across party lines to make New Hampshire a place of opportunity for all of its citizens. Lynch has worked with Democrats and Republicans to make kindergarten available to every child, to cut New Hampshire’s high school dropout rate in half, pass the toughest laws in the nation to protect children from sexual predators, to reduce spending by making government more efficient and build the economy by making it easier for companies to retain and hire new workers, increasing job training and providing tax credits for research and development.
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Meet & Greet: Bobby Sager
The Common Good hosted a lunch and discussion with Bobby Sager on his life as a international businessman and his travels around the world.
The Common Good hosted a lunch and discussion with Bobby Sager on his life as a international businessman and his travels around the world.
A tough-minded businessman who made a fortune by following his passion, Bobby Sager has spent the last decade of his life traveling around the globe giving away his money and using his entrepreneurial and street smarts to make whatever difference he can – in some of the worst areas on the planet. His is a life of extremes. On any given day you might find Bobby living in a tent in Karachi, sharing a toilet with 40 monks in the Himalayas, working alongside President Kagame in Rwanda, or discussing science education with the Dalai Lama in India.
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Screening and Discussion of 'The Most Dangerous Man in America' and the Panama Papers with Daniel Ellsberg
Daniel Ellsberg, the man who altered the history of Vietnam War with the release of the Pentagon Papers was on hand for a screening of the condensed version if the award-winning documentary, The Most Dangerous Man in America, and for the a lively Q&A. Also with us for our discussion, the film producers, Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith.
Daniel Ellsberg, the man who altered the history of the Vietnam War with the release of the Pentagon Papers, was on hand for a screening of the condensed version of the award-winning documentary, The Most Dangerous Man in America, accompanied with a lively Q&A. Also with us for our discussion were the film producers Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith.
The film is a riveting look at a defining moment in American history when, Daniel Ellsberg, then a RAND Corporation employee and a Pentagon Analyst, made the decision at the great risk to his own life and liberty to release the classified report exposing details of the U.S. involvement in Vietnam to The New York Times and other newspapers. The Pentagon Papers revealed that our government had knowledge early on that the war would be an unlikely win, and that continuing the war would lead to many more casualties.
Daniel Ellsberg worked on the top secret McNamara study of U.S. Decision-making in Vietnam, 1945-1968, which later came to be known as the Pentagon Papers. In 1969, he photocopied the 7,000 page study and gave it to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; in 1971 he gave it to The New York Times, The Washington Post and 17 other newspapers. His trial, on twelve felony counts posing a possible sentence of 115 years, was dismissed in 1973 on grounds of governmental misconduct against him, which led to the convictions of several White House aides and contributed to the impeachment proceedings against President Nixon.
Judith Ehrlich is a producer and director, known for The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers (2009), The Good War and Those Who Refused to Fight It (2000) and P.O.V. (1988). (2)
Rick Goldsmith is a producer and writer, known for The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers (2009), Mind/Game: The Unquiet Journey of Chamique Holdsclaw (2015) and Tell the Truth and Run: George Seldes and the American Press (1996). (3)
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The Common Good has been hosting events since 2006 that cover important issues of today, highlighting speakers who have worked to bolster our democracy and can provide great insight on the issues that matter.