To be sure, Kennedy did not discount the importance of words in rallying the nation to meet its foreign and domestic challenges. Winston Churchill's powerful exhortations during World War II set a standard he had long admired. Kennedy was hardly unmi...
Too many politicians are shifting the critical themes of our national conversations from a 'big ideas' American Brand Platform to narrowly focused, polarizing sound bites that put party philosophy before what used to be heralded as the common good. T...
Most coaches would consider leading a team to an Olympic gold medal a capper for a pretty good year. The same goes for winning an NCAA national championship. Or a FIBA world championship. Mike Krzyzewski, head coach of the Duke Blue Devils and Team U...
Everything good takes a great amount of effort. Like, things went wrong with 'Prozac Nation' so much, and it went through so many rejections and incarnations, but I felt so much that it needed to exist. But if I hadn't been so persistent and insisten...
I was a very good tennis player in Ottawa, Canada - nationally ranked when I was, like, 13. Then I moved to Los Angeles when I was 15, and everyone in L.A. just killed me. I was pretty great in Canada. Not so much in Los Angeles.
For many people, and particularly in communities of color, the basic bargain of America - that if you work hard and play by the rules, you can share in the nation's prosperity - has become a raw deal. That's what President Obama's opportunity agenda ...
Before Barack Obama took office, it looked like that pride could have vanished forever, but today, from the staggering depths of the Great Recession, the nation has had 29 straight months of job growth. Workers across my state and across the country ...
Many of the benefits from keeping terrorism fear levels high are obvious. Private corporations suck up massive amounts of Homeland Security cash as long as that fear persists, while government officials in the National Security and Surveillance State...
There are nations, where people live in captivity, fear and silence. I believe, one day from prison camps and torture cells and from exile the leaders of freedom will emerge. The world should stand with those oppressed people until the day of their f...
I know I had my equivalents in Adrian Lester and Lenny James when I was at drama school. I remember David Harewood doing 'Othello' at the National, and Adrian Lester having done Cheek by Jowl's famous 'As You Like It and Company' at the Donmar. Not n...
Was Sen. Barack Obama a Muslim? Did he ever practice Islam? The presidential candidate officially rejects the claims, but the issue of Obama's personal faith has re-emerged amid conflicting accounts of his enrollment as a Muslim during elementary sch...
A lot has happened since Dr. King left us. He probably wouldn't recognize the landscape if he saw it, but I still believe he would still have the same spiritual faith and also faith in us as people - not only people in our nation, but people in the w...
Smart and savvy, the fearless female member of George Washington's Secret Six is a testament to the strong women who have helped to alter the course of history in this great nation, both in terms of large-scale battles and in the new opportunities th...
The Clinton White House today said they would start to give national security and intelligence briefings to George Bush. I don't know how well this is working out. Today after the first one Bush said, 'I've got one question: What color is the red pho...
I can remember when I was National Security Adviser, the intelligence community told us... they put out an intelligence report saying that Iran would never back off from attacks on shipping in the Gulf if we use force.
Someday we'll learn the whole story of why George W. Bush brushed off that intelligence briefing of Aug. 6, 2001, 'Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.' But surely a big distraction was the major speech he was readying for delivery on Aug. 9, his f...
Mr. Speaker, we are a blessed Nation. We have not suffered another attack on our soil since September 11, and we are grateful. We have killed or captured dozens of members of al Qaeda and the Taliban. Our military and intelligence forces are working ...
I mean, we must act with intelligence. We must work on this framework, so that immigration becomes an asset to both nations. Believe me, what - just the Mayor Bloomberg said here in New York, that this city would be stopped, totally stopped if it wer...
President Clinton not only benefits by gay and lesbian votes, but he benefits by showing the nation that he is a strong leader who implements his beliefs, who stands firm by those who he believes are being treated unfairly, and I think people respect...
President Obama is determined that our foreign and national security policies not play into al-Qa'ida's strategy or its warped ideology. Al-Qa'ida seeks to terrorize us into retreating from the world stage. But President Obama has made it a priority ...
The person who takes the oath of office in the next four months will shape not just the next four years, but the next forty years of our nation. In these next four years, we need proven leadership, proven judgment and proven values. America needs fou...
