Be part of the solution

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The recent suicide of Rutgers University student Tyler Clementi is a reminder that by working to increase access to freedom for everyone and taking care of each other, we can become a part of the solution. Continue Reading

Is compromise a virtue?

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If we are committed to progress and to solving our problems, we will need to show courage in the face of extremists. We need to come together as well-meaning adults and see where we agree and disagree and what can be done to improve things for the most people. Continue Reading

Messaging from the master

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I’m sitting in Austin, Texas today with a conference full of very smart Democrats, and I don’t say this lightly. I was feeling slightly like a fish-out-of-water, until my very balanced and politically acute mentor and friend, Mark McKinnon, walked in to address the conference. Continue Reading

Rebuilding our economy around the middle class

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Stimulus spending will spur economic growth in the short-term. Restructuring the tax code and optimizing government will resolve our long-term deficit issues. Whether by bailing out overextended banks, propping up bad businesses, or spending blood and treasure at war, most of us have been asked to sacrifice. It would be unseemly in the face of so much shared suffering for the wealthiest among us to refuse to shoulder their share of the burden. Continue Reading

Deference

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I rushed home from the gym last evening (and probably, no surely, cut a few cars off along the way) to catch what I have loved since the Berlin Wall came down. What is that? A good Presidential address – yep, I’m a sucker. A few comments. Continue Reading

Heterosexual mockery

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The warming within the GOP ranks – and, moreover, across the American heartland – to gay marriage is just as much commonsensical as it is generational. Seeing that marriages come and go so whimsically here in America– why should the male-female scenario have a lock on what is defined as marriage? Continue Reading

The war on terror is not a war on Islam

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I cannot begin to express the kindness and compassion I was shown for the week I spent trying to make my way out of the flood zone in Pakistan. Those I encountered understood the difference between disliking a government policy and disliking an American citizen. This nuance of distinction is lacking in the “Mosque at Ground Zero” debate in America. Continue Reading