A panel of political experts, including Carli Fiorina and Scott Rigell, and James Fallows, discuss how to solve the American Crisis.
Out of Time: An American Crisis will consider whether Americans can still come together to do great things. The program will consist of a role-play scenario that mirrors real world events and captures the dilemmas and tradeoffs as America struggles to get its fiscal house in order, wrestles with calamities in Europe, decides what it can afford, what it must cut and who will get priority. The debate and dilemmas highlighted will be chosen to have discernable local economic impact so that every American - Beltway officials, local mayors and business leaders, individual families - can relate to the stakes, tradeoffs and consequences.
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Bio
Robert F. Bennett
Robert Bennett served as a United States Senator from the state of Utah from 1993 until 2011. He was a senior member of the Senate Banking Committee and a member of the distinguished Joint Economic Committee, where he was at the center of national economic policy discussions. He also served as the ranking Republican on the Senate Rules Committee and as a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, where he worked to balance fiscal discipline in government with the needs of maintaining a vital national economy.
Bennett is a highly successful entrepreneur. Prior to his senate career, he served as the CEO of Franklin Quest, Inc. (NYSE), where he grew the business from four employees to more than 1,000, and got it listed on the New York Stock Exchange. In addition to his success at Franklin Quest, Inc. he has been a key participant in multiple private and publicly held companies. His success has been based on his ability to see clearly the inter-dependence of private enterprise and an expanding national economy.
Bennett is married to the former Joyce McKay and is the father of six children.
Farai Chideya
Farai Chideya is an award-winning journalist and professor who has worked in print, television, radio, and digital media. Over the years, Chideya was a producer for MTV News; an on-air political analyst for CNN; a reporter and guest host at ABC News; a host at Oxygen Media; and the host of the NPR program News and Notes. She is the author of four books: Don't Believe the Hype: Fighting Cultural Misinformation About African Americans; The Color of Our Future; Trust: Reaching the 100 Million Missing Voters; and the novel Kiss the Sky. She blogs at Farai.com; is a contributor to New York Public Radio; and appears on cable television programs and radio programs regarding politics. Awards include a National Education Reporting Award; an award for best radio documentary from the National Association of Black Journalists; and a special awards for coverage of AIDS in communities of color from the National Gay and Lesbian Journalists' Association.
Donna Edwards
Congresswoman Donna F. Edwards represents Maryland’s 4th Congressional District comprising portions of Prince George’s and Montgomery Counties. She was sworn in as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives in June 2008, and began her first full-term in the 111th Congress in 2009.
Edwards is a member of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and the Science and Technology Committee. She also serves on the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission. Prior to serving in Congress, Rep. Edwards was the executive director of the Arca Foundation in Washington, D.C., where she worked on issues such as securing a “living wage” for working people, protecting social security, and promoting labor and human rights both nationally and internationally.
She was also the co-founder and executive director of the National Network to End Domestic Violence, where she led the effort to pass The Violence Against Women Act of 1994 that was signed into law by President Bill Clinton.
James Fallows
James Fallows is a national correspondent for The Atlantic and has worked for the magazine for more than 30 years. In that time he has been based in various sites within the United States and in Tokyo, Kuala Lumpur, Shanghai, and Beijing. He has written ten books, of which the latest, China Airborne, was published in May. He won the American Book Award for his book National Defense, the National Magazine Award for his writings about the Iraq war, and a New York Emmy for his role as host of a documentary series on China. During the Carter administration, he worked in the White House as the president’s chief speechwriter.
Carly Fiorina
Carly Fiorina was president and CEO of Hewlett-Packard from 1999 to 2005 and chairman from 2000 to 2005. Before joining HP, she spent nearly twenty years at AT&T and Lucent Technologies, where she held a number of senior leadership positions.
She has a B.A. in medieval history and philosophy from Stanford University, an M.B.A. from the University of Maryland, and an M.S. from MIT's Sloan School of Management. Fiorina currently serves on several boards of directors, including those of revolution Healthcare Group and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing. She and her husband, Frank, divide their time between Silicon Valley and Washington, D.C.
Pam Iorio
Pam Iorio is a leadership speaker, author of Straightforward: Ways to Live and Lead, and former two-term Mayor of Tampa, Florida.
First elected to public office at age 26, Iorio was the youngest person ever to win a seat on the Board of County Commissioners for Hillsborough County, Florida. At age 27 she was selected as Chairman of the Board. In 1992 she was elected for the first of three terms as the county's Supervisor of Elections. In 1999 she served as the president of the State Association of Supervisors of Elections, where she served as spokesperson for the organization during the highly - publicized 2000 presidential election in Florida. In 2003 Iorio was elected as mayor of the City of Tampa and re-elected in 2007 with a margin of 79 percent.
Throughout Iorio's career she has served as a director and chairperson on numerous government, economic development, and transportation, education, and community sector boards. Iorio graduated from The American University in Washington, D.C. with a BS degree in Political Science. She holds a Master's degree in history from the University of South Florida.
Iorio has published articles on civil rights and political history and is regularly sourced on national media stories concerning government, leadership and economic issues. She has been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and USA Today, as well as on national broadcast venues including CNN, FOX News, and MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews and The Today Show.
Governor Bill Richardson
Governor Bill Richardson was elected governor of New Mexico in 2002 by the largest margin of any candidate since 1964.
Governor Richardson just completed his third legislative session, cutting taxes for more than 500,000 working New Mexicans, creating a statewide pre-kindergarten program, revamping the state's higher education system, and increasing access to quality health care. He was a candidate for the 2008 presidential election.
The Honorable Scott Rigell
Representative Scott Rigell is serving his second term in the United States House of Representatives, where he sits on the House Armed Services Committee and the House Committee on the Budget. Rep. Rigell has declined federal health care and pension benefits and will return more than $100,000 of his consecutive two-year salaries back to the U.S. Treasury. Additionally, he introduced the Lead by Example Act that would prevent members of Congress from receiving taxpayer-funded matches to their retirement plans unless Congress passes a budget and reduces the deficit. He has also committed to serve no more than six terms in the United States House of Representatives. Prior to his election to Congress, Rep. Rigell was an entrepreneur, business owner, and community leader.
Frank Sesno
Frank Sesno is a CNN Special Correspondent who covers education issues and policy.
Neera Tanden
Neera Tanden is the president of the Center for American Progress and counselor to the Center for American Progress Action Fund. Most recently, Ms. Tanden served as the chief operating officer for the Center, leading strategic planning of the organization and managing all operations.
Ms. Tanden previously served as senior advisor for health reform at the Department of Health and Human Services, advising Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and working on President Obama’s health
reform team to develop and pass the Affordable Care Act.
Prior to that, she was the director of domestic policy for the 2008 Obama campaign, where she managed all domestic policy proposals. Ms. Tanden also served as policy director for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, having previously served as associate director for domestic policy and senior advisor to the first lady during the Clinton administration. She received her B.S. from the University of California Los Angeles and her law degree from Yale Law School.
Fred Thompson
Fred Dalton Thompson (born Freddie Dalton Thompson;[1] August 19, 1942) is an American politician, actor, attorney, and lobbyist. He represented Tennessee as a Republican in the U.S. Senate from 1994 through 2002.
Thompson served as chairman of the International Security Advisory Board at the United States Department of State, is a member of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and is a Visiting Fellow with the American Enterprise Institute, specializing in national security and intelligence.[2][3][4]
As an actor, Thompson has appeared in a large number of movies and television shows. He has frequently portrayed governmental figures.[5] In the final months of his U.S. Senate term in 2002, Thompson joined the cast of the long-running NBC television series Law & Order, playing New York City District Attorney Arthur Branch, until the network granted his request to be released from his contract in May 2007.[6]
He was a candidate for the 2008 Republican nomination for President of the United States until he exited the race after finishing third in the South Carolina Primary on January 22. He resides in McLean, Virginia, near Washington, D.C.[7]
Former Utah Senator Bob Bennett discusses the crippling impact of entitlement spending in America. Bennett argues that President Obama has the unique opportunity to set whatever agenda he chooses if he can implement policy to curb entitlements.
