George Mitchell
The Honorable George Mitchell
Former Senator for Maine, politician, businessman
George Mitchell is an American politician and businessman. Mitchell was appointed to the United States Senate in 1980 to complete the unexpired term of Senator Edmund S. Muskie who had resigned to become Secretary of State. Mitchell was elected to a full term in the Senate in 1982. In 1986, he chaired the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee, and was instrumental in his party regaining a majority in the Senate. Mitchell himself was reelected in 1988 with 81 percent of the vote, the largest margin in the history of the state of Maine. At the opening of the next session, he was elected Senate Majority Leader, the second most powerful elected official in the United States, a position he held for the next six years. For six consecutive years he was voted “the most respected member” of the Senate by a bipartisan group of senior congressional aides. In 1994, George Mitchell declined an appointment to the Supreme Court of the United States in order to remain in the Senate and pursue the struggle for universal national health care.
Since retiring from the Senate, Mitchell has taken up a variety of positions in politics and business. He has taken a leading role in negotiations for peace in Northern Ireland and the Middle East, being specifically appointed United States Special Envoy for Northern Ireland (1995-2001) by President Clinton and as United States Special Envoy for Middle East Peace (2009-2011) by President Obama. He was a primary architect of the 1996 Mitchell Principles and the 1998 Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland, and was the main investigator in two “Mitchell Reports”, one on the Arab–Israeli conflict (2001) and one on the use of performance enhancing drugs in baseball (2007).
Mitchell served as chairman of The Walt Disney Company from March 2004 until January 2007, and later as chairman of the international law firm DLA Piper. Mitchell currently serves as a co-chair of the Housing Commission at the Bipartisan Policy Center. In addition to the Presidential Medal of Freedom, Senator Mitchell has received awards and honors including the Philadelphia Liberty Medal, the Truman Institute Peace Prize, the German Peace Prize and the United Nations (UNESCO) Peace Prize.
Mitchel was hosted by The Common Good in 2015 for a Meet & Greet.
Philipp Mißfelder ✝
philipp Missfelder ✝
German politician
Philipp Mißfelder was a member of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), and had been called an up-and-comer in European and international politics. He served as the leader of the largest German youth organization, the Junge Union (JU), of which he had been a member since 1993.
Mißfelder was elected to the Bundestag in 2005 and re-elected in 2009. He served as a center-right member of the Executive Board of the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP) and the foreign policy representative for the largest group of Ministers. Mißfelder focused on policy issues including health care, social security and fiscal responsibility, the economy and the environment, the Middle East, European security and the expansion of the German military as well as its foreign affairs.
Mißfelder died unexpectedly on 13 July 2015 of a pulmonary embolism. The Philipp-Mißfelder Forest in the Negev desert, Israel, was named in his honor.
Mißfelder was hosted by The Common Good in 2011 for a Meet & Greet.
Dick Cavett
Dick Cavett
Author and Host of “The Dick Cavett Show”
The host of The Dick Cavett Show (which aired on ABC from 1968 to 1975 and on public television from 1977 to 1982), Dick Cavett is the author of Brief Encounters: Conversations, Magic Moments and Assorted Hijinks (2014). He is also the co-author of Cavett (1974) and Eye on Cavett (1983) and author of Talk Show: Confrontations, Pointed Commentary, and Off-Screen Secrets (2011).
Dick Cavett was born in Gibbon, Nebraska in 1936. Growing up in Lincoln, Nebraska, Cavett won local fame as a teenage magician. In 1954, he earned a scholarship to Yale University where he majored in English and drama. At Yale he appeared in numerous radio and stage productions- while spending his summers working at the Oregon and Stratford, (Connecticut), Shakespeare Festivals.
In 1968 ABC signed Cavett as the host of a morning talk show, which eventually lead ABC to give Cavett his own late night program opposite The Tonight Show. The Dick Cavett Show ran on ABC until 1975. From 1977 until 1982, The Dick Cavett Show appeared five times a week on Public Television. In 1986, he hosted the first two seasons of Faces of Japan, a thirteen part series for PBS. The Dick Cavett Show was aired for six seasons on CNBC.
He made his Broadway debut in 1977 playing the leading role in Otherwise Engaged, a British comedy by Simon Gray. During the summer of 1988, Dick Cavett returned to Broadway in the role of the narrator in Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods. From October 2000 through January of 2002 Cavett appeared as the narrator in the Broadway production of The Rocky Horror Show. He has made guest appearances on television programs as Cheers, The Edge of Night, and The Simpsons, as well as in Beetlejuice and Forest Gump.
Cavett spoke at The Common Good alongside Robert Gordon and Morgan Neville, with moderator Alex Witt, in 2015: Screening and Discussion on "Best of Enemies" - July 13, 2015.
Twitter: @TheDickCavett
Robert Gordon
Robert Gordon
Author, producer, director
Robert Gordon is the author of Can’t Be Satisfied: The Life and Times of Muddy Waters. He produced and directed “Best of Enemies” with filmmaker Morgan Neville, a documentary based on the televised debates of William F. Buckley Jr. and Gore Vidal.
Gordon is the writer and Associate Producer of “The Road To Memphis”, an episode in Martin Scorsese’s 7-part series The Blues. His other filmmaking credits include the 1990 documentary “All Day and All Night”, featuring B. B. King and Rufus Thomas, and music videos that have aired on MTV, BET, and CMT. Gordon is also the author of It Came From Memphis, a book about Memphis music and culture. He produced the book’s two companion CD’s. His other two books are Elvis: The King on the Road (St. Martin’s), and The Elvis Treasures (Random House). Among his awards is a Grammy nomination for his liner notes to the Al Green box set, Anthology, which he produced.
Gordon spoke at a Screening and Discussion on "Best of Enemies" alongside Morgan Neville and Dick Cavett, moderated by Alex Witt, at The Common Good in 2015.
Morgan Neville
Morgan Neville
Academy Award-winning documentary filmmaker
Morgan Neville is an American film producer, director and writer. Neville’s directorial debut was the documentary “Shotgun Freeway: Drives thru Lost L.A.” (1995), and he went on to produce documentaries on various musicians. He has been nominated for three Grammys, for his films “Muddy Waters: Can’t Be Satisfied”, “Respect Yourself: The Stax Records Story”, and “Johnny Cash’s America”. He also directed the award-winning film, “The Cool School”, and his acclaimed film “Twenty Feet from Stardom” won him the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 2014 as well as a Grammy Award for Best Music Film. Neville is also know for his film “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?”
He runs the Academy-Award winning documentary company Tremolo Productions, which focuses on culture, including music, art and politics.
Neville spoke at a Screening and Discussion on "Best of Enemies" alongside Robert Gordon and Dick Cavett, moderated by Alex Witt, at The Common Good in 2015.
Twitter: @TremoloDocs
Robert Zimmerman
Robert Zimmerman
Zimmerman/Edelson Inc.
Co-founder and partner of Zimmerman/Edelson, Inc., Robert Zimmerman has extensive experience in national and international media relations, branding communications and crisis management. Robert oversees all of the agency’s public relations, crisis management and branding communications activities, while personally leading account teams servicing some of the agency’s largest clients.
Most recently, Robert was appointed by Governor Andrew Cuomo to the New York State SAGE Commission, charged with the most extensive restructuring of state government since the 1920’s. He served as member of the Board of the American Museum of Natural History representing Speaker of the New York City Council Christine Quinn, and was recently appointed to the Board of Directors of the Center for an Urban Future located in New York City. In 1995, Robert was appointed by President Clinton to serve on the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Presidential Commission on the Arts. He held that position through June of 2001. A Democratic National Committeeman from New York, Robert appears regularly on CNN, Fox News Channel, Fox Business News, and MSNBC discussing a wide range of public policy issues. In 2013, he was the recipient of the lifetime achievement award by the Public Relations Professionals of Long Island.
Zimmerman participated in The Common Good Forum 2015 on May 14th, 2015, on the “Lead Up to 2016 and Beyond: US Politics Now” panel alongside Jim McLaughlin and Margaret Hoover, moderated by Dana Bash.
Richard E. Farley
Richard E. Farley
Writer
Richard E. Farley is a partner in the leveraged finance group of the law firm of Paul Hastings. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, The Daily Beast, The Wall Street Journal, New York Post, and many other publications. He is the 2012 recipient of Bloomberg BNA’s Burton Award for Legal Achievement for best law firm writers. (1)
Farley co-hosted Rethinking the Afghanistan War with Erik Prince - October 3, 2017, Citizen Action Sweeping the Country: INDIVISIBLE, and a discussion on Hurricanes, Climate, and Responsible Energy Policies for the Future in 2017 at The Common Good. He also presented the American Spirit Award for Public Service to Judge Jed Rakoff at The Common Good’s American Spirit Awards 2015.
Twitter: @REFarley
(1) Material from Amazon’s author description.
Jim McLaughlin
Jim McLaughlin
Public opinion expert, strategic consultant, political strategist.
Jim McLaughlin is a nationally recognized public opinion expert, strategic consultant and political strategist. He has worked for over 60 members of Congress, 12 U.S. Senators, 10 Governors, numerous Mayors and scores of other elected officials. He also serves as a consultant and research strategist to Fortune 500 companies and has worked on several presidential campaigns.
McLaughlin was one of only two Republican pollsters named as a part of Roll Callnewspapers’ Fabulous Fifty for his work and was also profiled as a “Mover and Shaker” by Campaigns and Elections Magazine. He is sought after as a commentator on national television and radio programs and has appeared on CBS News, NBC News, Fox News Channel, Fox Morning News, CNN and C-SPAN. He also is frequently quoted in publications such as The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Times, The New York Post, The Weekly Standard, Politico, and National Review.
McLaughlin participated at The Common Good Forum 2015 on May 14th, 2015 and spoke on the Midterm Elections Panel alongside Patrick Caddell, Carol E. Lee, Steve Kornacki, Jim McLaughlin, and Jefrey Pollock, moderated by John Harwood, at The Common Good in 2014.
Twitter: @JMcLaughlinSTK
J.R. Martinez
J.R. Martinez
Actor
J.R. Martinez is a burn survivor Army veteran, a New York Times best-selling author, and a keynote speaker at events all over the world. He stars in the television series All My Children. (1)
Martinez joined the U.S. Army in 2002. On April 5, 2003, the Humvee that he was driving hit a roadside bomb. In the years following the accident, Martinez had over 34 different surgeries including multiple skin grafts and cosmetic surgeries. During his recovery, he found solace in helping other wounded survivors. Since then, he has traveled the world as a motivational speaker. His book, Full of Heart: My Story of Survival, Strength and Spirit, was released in 2012 and quickly reached the New York Times Bestsellers list. (1)
Martinez awarded Bob Woodruff the American Spirit Award for Citizen Activism at The Common Good’s American Spirit Awards 2015.
Twitter: @iamjrmartinez
Read more:
(1) Material from J.R. Martinez’s website.
Dr. Naomi Wolf
dr. Naomi Wolf
Author
Naomi R. Wolf is an American liberal progressive feminist author, journalist, and former political advisor to Al Gore and Bill Clinton. (1)
Dr. Wolf first came to prominence in 1991 as the author of The Beauty Myth. She has since written other books, including the bestseller The End of America and Vagina: A New Biography. Her journalism career began in 1995 and has included topics such as abortion, the Occupy Wall Street movement, Edward Snowden and ISIS. She has written for media outlets such as The Nation, The New Republic, The Guardian and The Huffington Post. (1)
Dr. Wolf presented the American Spirit Award for Citizen Activism to Andrea Pino and Annie Clark at The Common Good’s American Spirit Awards 2015.
Twitter: @naomirwolf
(1) Material from Wikipedia.
Kenneth Rogoff
Kenneth Rogoff
Economist, academic
Kenneth Rogoff is an economist at the International Monetary Fund. His widely-cited 2009 book with Carmen Reinhart, This Time is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly, shows the remarkable quantitative similarities across time and countries in the run-up and aftermath of severe financial crises. Rogoff is also known for his seminal work on exchange rates and central bank independence. Together with Maurice Obstfeld, he is co-author of Foundations of International Macroeconomics, a treatise that has also become a widely-used graduate text in the field worldwide. Rogoff’s 2016 book The Curse of Cash looks at the past, present and future of currency from standardized coinage to crypto-currencies. His monthly syndicated column on global economic issues is published in over 50 countries.
Rogoff is an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Group of Thirty. He is also a Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. Rogoff is among the top ten on RePEc’s ranking of economists by scholarly citations. He is also an international Grandmaster of chess.
The Common Good hosted Rogoff in May of 2015: The Common Good Forum 2015.
Twitter: @krogoff
Omeed Malik
Omeed Malik
Executive, founder &CEO of Farvahar Partners
Omeed Malik is the Founder and CEO of Farvahar Partners, a boutique merchant bank which invests partner capital into growth businesses and acts as a liquidity provider of private placements on behalf of companies and institutional investors.
Prior to starting his own firm, Omeed was a Managing Director and the Global Head of the Hedge Fund Advisory Business at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Omeed was also the founder and head of the Emerging Manager Program within the Global Equities business. In this capacity, Omeed was charged with selecting both established and new hedge funds for the firm to partner with and oversaw the allocation of financing/prime brokerage, capital strategy, business consulting and talent introduction resources. Omeed has also worked in the United States Senate and House of Representatives, and he has appeared on Showtime's TV series Billions in a cameo role.
Omeed moderated Anthony Scaramucci’s conversation on “Growing the Economy and Jobs – Comments on the Trump Agenda” at The Common Good Forum & American Spirit Awards 2017 and hosted a Summer Cocktail Party with Manhattan Magazine at The Common Good in 2011. He also moderated a panel discussion on “Investing the People’s Money” at The Common Good Forum 2015.
J.M. Berger
J.M. Berger
Author, Non-resident Fellow with the Brookings Institution Project
With roots in newspaper journalism, J.M. Berger is an author and analyst studying online extremism, homegrown terrorism, advanced social media analysis, and countering violent extremism. His book Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go to War in the Name of Islam (Potomac Books, 2011), is the only definitive history of American involvement in jihadist movements. He is also co-author of ISIS: The State of Terror (Ecco, 2015) with Jessica Stern, a book that “should be required reading for every politician and policymaker,” according to The Washington Post.
Berger has written extensively on the evolution of al-Qaeda and the rise of the so-called Islamic State (ISIS). He interviewed American al-Shabab member Omar Hammami at length and published a widely read account of their interactions after the jihadist was killed by his former allies in 2013. Berger is especially known for his research into the tactics of extremists on social media. In addition to important articles on the subject for The Atlantic and Foreign Policy, he co-authored the 2013 study “Who Matters Online: Measuring influence, evaluating content and countering violent extremism in online social networks,” which introduced new analytical techniques for understanding extremist social networks. He expanded on these techniques in 2015 with “The ISIS Twitter Census”, published by the Brookings Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World. In 2004, Berger founded Intelwire.com, a website publishing investigative journalism, analysis, and primary source documents on terrorism and international security, including exclusive declassified documents on the September 11 attacks and the Oklahoma City bombing.
Berger has written for Politico, Foreign Policy, The New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Daily Beast Nature, and the CTC Sentinel, and previously worked as a producer for National Public Radio and Public Radio International. He also trains and consults for law enforcement and government agencies on issues related to countering violent extremism and advanced social media analysis.
Twitter: @intelwire
Read more:
J.M. Berger, ‘The New Strategy of Violent White Supremcy is Evolving’, NPR, 7 August 2019.
J.M. Berger, ‘The Dangerous Spread of Extremist Manifestos’, NPR, 26 February 2019
Sheera Frenkel, ‘Facebook Will Use Artificial Intelligence to Find Extremist Posts’, The New York Times, 15 June 2017
Jessica Stern & J.M. Berger, 'State Of Terror: Where ISIS Came From And How To Fight It’, NPR, 15 March 2015
Diandra Luker
Diandra luker
Film producer
Diandra Luker is a producer, known for Broken Lines (2008), Off the Menu: The Last Days of Chasen's (1997) and American Masters (1985). (1)
Luker awarded William Pope.L the American Spirit Award for Activism in the Arts at The American Spirit Awards 2015.
(1) Material from IMDb.
Thomas DiNapoli
Thomas DiNapoli
54th Comptroller of the State of New York
Thomas P. DiNapoli is the 54th Comptroller of the State of New York. He is known for his integrity, independence and steadfast leadership. Since taking office in 2007, Tom DiNapoli has aggressively fought misuse of public resources, strengthened one of the nation’s top public pension funds, and consistently spoken out against fiscal gimmicks and government inefficiency.
Comptroller DiNapoli has changed the way the $176.8 billion state pension fund operates to increase transparency and establish strong internal controls, ensuring the strongest investment performance and ethical operations. He barred investment firms contributing to his campaign from doing business with the state pension fund. He was also a leading voice in getting the Securities and Exchange Commission to impose tough new rules on “pay to play” to prevent improper influence on investment decisions.
Protecting public funds from waste, fraud and abuse is part of Comptroller DiNapoli’s core responsiblities. His audits and efforts have identified billions in misuse, waste and savings. He has also been relied on to examine public finances and provide an independent, credible analysis of government finances. In January 2013, his office launched a Fiscal Monitoring System to score localities on their fiscal condition, sending an early warning to those in trouble.
DiNapoli spoke at The Common Good Forum 2015 on the panel “Investing the People’s Money” alongside Jane Buchan, Janet Cowell, moderated by Omeed Malik.
Twitter: @NYSComptroller
Dana Bash
Dana Bash
CNN’s Chief Political Correspondent in Washington D.C.
Dana Bash is CNN’s chief political correspondent based in Washington, D.C. and serves as the network’s lead reporter covering both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate. She was the primary reporter covering the 2016 Republican field of presidential candidates and also continues to regularly serve as a moderator for CNN’s political town hall specials.
Additionally, as the network’s chief political correspondent, Bash played a key role in CNN’s 2016 presidential primary debates, serving as a questioner in six of the network’s seven primetime primary debates on both sides of the aisle. Bash also serves as a co-anchor on set in the CNN Election Center for all election night specials and is the primary fill-in anchor for Jake Tapper on CNN’s premier political show, State of the Union.
Bash attended The Common Good Forum - May 14, 2015 as a moderator for the panel Lead Up to 2016 and Beyond: US Politics Now, with Margaret Hoover, Jim McLaughlin, and Robert Zimmerman.
Twitter: @DanaBashCNN
Janet Cowell
Janet Cowell
Former Treasurer of North Carolina
Janet Cowell is currently the Chief Executive Officer of Girls Who Invest, and is the former Treasurer of North Carolina, the first woman to hold the office. She was first elected to the post in 2008 and re-elected in 2012. Cowell oversees more than $90 billion in pension investments for the more than 900,000 teachers, firefighters, and public employees in North Carolina. As Treasurer, she manages the 32nd largest public pension in the world and the third most solid in the nation.
Under Cowell’s executive leadership, North Carolina is one of only ten states in the country to earn a AAA bond rating by all three rating agencies. Treasurer Cowell was recently named one of the top 25 public pension executives in the world by Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute.
Cowell spoke at The Common Good Forum 2015 on the panel “Investing the People’s Money” alongside Jane Buchan, Thomas DiNapoli, moderated by Omeed Malik.
Twitter: @JanetCowell
Everett Cook
Everett Cook
Pouschine Cook Co-founder
Prior to co-founding Pouschine Cook, Everett was a managing director of Ampton Investments, Inc., where he focused on private middle market recapitalizations and acquisitions and was Chairman and CEO of Bake Rite Foods, Inc. Prior to Ampton, Everett served as an operating executive and director at several companies owned and controlled by his family. He was a vice president and director of Cook International, Inc., a vice president and director of Terminix International, Inc., a director of PBCM, Inc., and chairman of Cook Flexner & Co., Inc. Previously, he was a mortgage securities and corporate finance professional with First Pennco Securities, Inc.
Annie E. Clark
Annie Clark
Co-founder of EROC
Annie E. Clark is a co-founder of EROC, and a lead complainant in the Title IX and Clery complaints against the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. in Political Science. She has a certificate in business, and is a former administrator at the University of Oregon. She is a contributing writer to The Huffington Post, MSNBC, and The Chronicle Vitae. After directly working with New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, she helped write the Bi-Partisan Campus Safety and Accountability Act. In 2013, she was listed alongside President Barack Obama as one of the most influential forces in higher education, and she is featured in the campus sexual assault documentary The Hunting Ground.
Clark was honored with the American Spirit Award for Citizen Activism alongside Andrea Pino at The American Spirit Awards - May 14, 2015.
Twitter: @aelizabethclark
Secretary Michael Chertoff
secretary Michael Chertoff
Former Secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security
Michael Chertoff was Secretary of the U.S. Departement of Homeland Security from 2005 to 2009. He co-authored the USA Patriot Act and also transformed FEMA into an effective organization following Hurricane Katrina.
Before his role as Secretary, Mr. Chertoff served as a federal judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. Earlier, during more than a decade as a federal prosecutor, he dealt with cases of political corruption, organized crime, corporate fraud and terrorism – including the investigation of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Mr. Chertoff currently works at the Chertoff Group and provides high-level strategic counsel to corporate and government leaders on a broad range of security issues, from risk identification and prevention to preparedness, response and recovery.
He is a magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College (1975) and Harvard Law School (1978). From 1979-1980 he served as a clerk to Supreme Court Justice William Brennan, Jr.
Mr. Chertoff spoke at The Common Good Forum - May 14, 2015.
Mr. Chertoff returned to speak at the National Security Threats event alongside Jane Harman.