Category: government

adventure, choices, determination, government, journey, politics, risk

Step 256: What We Can Learn from Rahm Emanuel

Christa Avampato

“If you run before the wind, you can’t take off. You’ve got to turn into it. Face it. The thing you push against is the thing that lifts you up.” ~ Delta commercial

Rahm Emanuel has a reputation for being a tough administrator who gets the job done. He runs a tight ship as an ambitious First Mate. I’m sure somewhere in the history books, long after the Obama administration has left the White House, there will be some chapter somewhere that recalls Emanuel’s role as the White House Chief of Staff. More than likely, the average American will not remember him nor his critical role in making the Obama administration run. Even now, do we know how much policy he has influenced with a heavy hand? At best, we know that he is a trusted adviser to our President, though we don’t know his advice.

Last week Mayor Daley announced that he will not seek re-election, and rumors begin to circulate that Emanuel may exit the White House to return to his beloved city of Chicago to become the star of his own life and career, as opposed to someone’s manager who looks on from the shadows of the wings. I thought about that image when I met with Brian last week. Brian has been a supportive and unrelenting advocate for me and my career. He thinks I have spent enough time in a supporting role and that it’s time for me to step out on my own in some way. He voices that message on a regular basis.

I tell him I need some more time to save money, to grow my experience base. Brian’s all for pragmatism, though he’s more in favor of setting the stage for how we’d like our creativity to organize itself. In other words, if we tell our creativity we’re just not ready and we need a plan B then our creativity will believe us and get going on a brilliant plan B. Our creativity, in large part, does what we tell it to do.

The trouble is that I’m an excellent supporting character. I’m really good at juggling priorities and managing around challenging personalities. I’ve made a successful career out of improving situations that very much-needed improving, and until I decide to work from a clean slate, I will continue to be part of the clean-up crew. We get the circumstances we ask for, or at least the ones that we’re willing to tolerate.

We all deserve the opportunity to be the stars of our own lives, to test our own ideas, and to make our own independent contributions to the world. As much as Rahm Emanuel may respect his boss and believe in the Obama agenda, he doesn’t call the shots. At the end of the day, they’re called for him to execute against. That’s the gig that comes with being a Chief of Staff and not the Chief. Of course he’s considering the possibility of becoming the mayor of his hometown. And with that inspiration, we should all think about what stage it is that we’d like to star on – we all deserve a little piece of the spotlight in our own lives. Turn into the wind, and see what lifts you up. For Emanuel, it’s the city of Chicago. What is it for you?

books, change, community, government, politics

Step 250: An Answered Prayer for the City of Philadelphia

Christa Avampato

On vacation I started reading A Prayer for the City by Buzz Bissinger. The book recounts the history of Philadelphia from 1992-1997 while then-Mayor Ed Rendell (now Governor Rendell of Pennsylvania) held office. The book was published in 1997, one year before my graduation from Penn. Though I was largely unaware of Philadelphia politics aside from the fact that Mayor Rendell presided over a city run largely by corruption, I certainly experienced Philadelphia’s rough exterior as described by Bissinger while I was a student.

I distinctly remember the metal bars on my freshman dorm room windows that made it look more like a prison than the start of a bright college career. And of course I will never forget the homeless man just beyond those bars screaming vulgar obscenities as I rolled my suitcases through the doorway. My mother was horrified. The next day a graduate math student was shot and killed right in the middle of campus, just outside The Castle, which ironically served as Penn’s Community Service House where I was part of a pre-matriculation service program. Freshman women took a self-defense class as part of on-campus programming in the dorms. Locust Walk, the main campus thoroughfare, was lit up by an abundance of blue light phones and Penn Escort Service was heavily encouraged and fully utilized when students needed to walk around the perimeters of campus after midnight. Welcome to Philadelphia circa 1994.

My sophomore year I was mugged in the subway station at Walnut and 37th at knife point by a guy who wanted the cash in my wallet and politely handed it back to me completely intact otherwise. Looking back I think he was more frightened than I was. I remember scrambling up the stairs and running smack into a naval officer who helped me to get to a blue light phone to call for help. The Philadelphia police arrived in moments, storming down into the station, and I never rode the subway again until the very end of my senior year, and only then because my boyfriend at the time was with me. I was sadly not a unique case – I knew countless students who had incidents far worse than mine.

Once I moved into the high-rises at the north end of campus, it was routine to hear gunfire and watch the violence unfold out my window at Billy Bob’s Cheesesteaks as I studied in my apartment very late into the night. A solo walk past 40th Street was unheard of and a trip to the only grocery store, a Safeway dubbed “Scaryway”, had to be a group outing to increase our chances of actually making it back to campus with our groceries. Even that grocery store looked like a fortress – they had built a gate around it so the shopping carts could not be taken from the immediate perimeter of the store, forcing us to grab our groceries from the cart and then squeeze between the bars to get out.

So it was especially heartening to get back to Philly last weekend and see the change that has swept the city. Its rebound is nothing short of miraculous. The Saint Albans area, where Dan and I stayed a few weeks ago, would never have been a destination for me as a Penn student. Nearly every house on that block used to be boarded up, full of loitering by people I’d hope to never run into in any alley, whether at night or in broad daylight. Dan’s friend, Jeremy, drove us through neighborhoods that didn’t even exist 10 years ago. I was overwhelmed by the change, and Dan could scarcely believe the stories I told of vacant lots, littered with broken glass and drug dealers, now made over into Barnes & Noble, Sephora, and restaurants of every variety. It’s as if someone took a bulldozer to Philadelphia and started over.

After I left Penn, I moved to D.C. for 6 months and then headed for New York City, which became the center of my world, leaving Philadelphia as a distant memory. I don’t know much about what happened between 1992 and 1997 that laid the groundwork for all of the change that I could see taking shape when I graduated from Penn in 1998 that has now come to fruition over a decade later. I’m looking forward to finding out what Philadelphia did to turn itself around and I’m grateful to Mr. Bissinger for setting it down in print with such elegant description. What I know for certain is that Rendell fulfilled the promise he made during his 1992 inaugural speech, “Change must surely come…this city cannot only survive; it can come alive again…I cannot and will not falter. We cannot and will not fail.” From my vantage point, the people of Philadelphia have passed with flying colors.

community, government, legal

Step 228: Reflections on Jury Duty Service

Christa Avampato

I thought jury duty would strengthen my belief in a legal system that requires proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, a trial before 12 unbiased peers, and a set of due processes to equally protect all people. Instead, it made me question whether this system delivers justice more often than it inflicts wrongful pain and suffering. A week after serving, my mind still can’t rest.

The facts remain:
Mr. Bond lived in West Harlem at 60 Saint Nicholas Avenue, a building at the cross-section of Saint Nicholas Avenue and West 113th Street (a one-stop, five-minute subway ride or an easy twenty-minute walk from my own apartment);

On or about March 5, 2009, Mr. Bond was moving a couch, wrapped in twine to keep the cushions in place, upstairs with the help of some friends. They were taking a break from the move and standing around in a loose circle in the lobby;

There were open containers of beer in the lobby;

Two police officers in plain clothes entered the building, brandishing their badges, under the pretense that they were following two suspect black teenagers into the building (according to the officers, the teenagers “looked lost”);

Rather than continuing to follow those teenagers, the police officers told the group of men moving the couch to freeze and put their hands up against the wall;

Mr. Bond ran around the corner, was pursued by one of the police officers, and brought back to the lobby. Upon search in the lobby, a folding knife was found in Mr. Bond’s pocket. The police officer tested the knife and declared it a gravity knife, an illegal type of knife in New York City. Mr. Bond was placed under arrest. Eventually, it was discovered that Mr. Bond had a small amount of marijuana on him as well;

As a jury, our task was to determine if the knife Mr. Bond had in his pocket could fall into the broad and fuzzy classification of a gravity knife. Not if the law was ridiculous (and for the record, I believe it is). Not if Mr. Bond knew the knife was illegal. Not if the knife was indeed Mr. Bond’s and was found in his pocket. Not if he had any intent to use it to do anything other than cut the twine around the couch. Just the classification of the knife, please.

By definition a gravity knife has the capability to open by the use of gravity or centrifugal force, and then the blade must lock into an open position. After hearing both sides, under this definition, we determined the knife was a gravity knife. Verdict delivered, case closed. And off went Mr. Bond to serve 3.5 to 7 years in prison. His friends and family members hung their heads and cried. Mr. Bond, tragically, didn’t even appear surprised. He had no expression at all on his face. If I was a black man living in a section of Harlem infamous for drugs and violent crime, with a white judge, white district attorney, white police officers, white defense attorney who barely presented a case at all, and a mostly white jury, I guess would feel the same way. In the courtroom, I wanted to shove aside the defense attorney and do the job myself. At least then Mr. Bond would have had some defense presented on his behalf. I went home and cried, too.

Now Mr. Bond will spend at least 3.5 years in a prison system that will deprive him of dignity and freedom, returning him to a society that deprives him of those things as well. With a felony on his record, finding a job or attaining public assistance will be next to impossible. What will become of Mr. Bond and his family? How will they ever be able to have the opportunities to improve their lot in life? What has this done to their spirit and their belief that our system here protects its citizens and delivers justice? I went to bed the night of the verdict with a heavy heart, knowing that Mr. Bond was spending his first night of many within a cell that I didn’t believe he should be in. Circumstances may not always matter to the law, but they matter to me.

As we left the jury room on our last day, the judge thanked us for our service and she sincerely meant it. Now that the case had a verdict, she told us we were free to discuss the case with anyone, though she added the caveat that she didn’t think anyone would be interested in any of the details. I disagree. After the urging of my co-workers, I wrote to my Representatives in Congress and the Senate, to Mayor Bloomberg and a number of media outlets. I have no idea if they will do anything, but I certainly couldn’t let this moment pass in silence.

I kept rolling over in my mind how a system can hold its citizens to laws they don’t even know or understand. I’m a well-educated person and I wouldn’t know that kind of knife was illegal. If I was moving a couch in my lobby with my friends and a friend gave me that knife to cut twine, could I be searched at random by a police officer and arrested for a felony? I could, but the truth is I wouldn’t be. And even if I was searched and the knife was found in my pocket, I’m confident that the police would just confiscate it and send me on my way. I’m a white professional who lives on the Upper West Side in a full-service building. While Mr. Bond and I live only a few blocks apart, we might as well live in different countries – the laws that govern his life may, on paper, be the same as the laws that govern mine. In reality, it doesn’t play out that way.

I know my jury performed its civic duty and delivered a correct verdict in good faith as outlined by the law. It’s the law itself, and the legal and societal systems that caused Mr. Bond to be arrest at all, that leave me with a reasonable doubt that everyone in the U.S. is protected equally and fairly.

government

Guest post on 92Y blog: Mario Cuomo

Christa Avampato

I had the opportunity to see Mario Cuomo at 92Y last night and write a blog post about it for 92Y’s blog. I’m absolutely thrilled to join the talented team as a guest blogger and promote their incredible programming. To read my review of Governor Mario Cuomo’s talk at 92Y, click here.

books, Examiner, government, politics

Examiner.com: Interview with Sasha Abramsky, author of Inside Obama’s Brain

Christa Avampato

Over the Christmas holiday I read the book Inside Obama’s Brain by Sasha Abramsky, journalist and Senior Fellow at Demos. The book is a beautifully crafted work that examines the charismatic draw of President Obama by exploring the experiences and insights from dozens of people who have worked alongside the President throughout his career. Abramsky masterfully articulates what qualities draw us to Obama, and how Obama honed those qualities in preparation for his ascent to the Presidency. The book intertwines President Obama’s personal history with his professional accomplishments in a way that makes the book impossible to put down until readers have absorbed every last word of Abramsky’s prose. I never wanted this book to end.

I had the great fortune to speak with Sasha Abramsky last week. To read the interview, click here.

education, election, government, politics, social media

My Year of Hopefulness – Teaching at Hunter College

Christa Avampato

“Good teaching is one-fourth preparation and three-fourths theater.” ~ Gail Godwin, American novelist

“If you have stage fright, it never goes away. But then I wonder: is the key to that magical performance because of the fear?” ~ Stevie Nicks

Today marked my first college class teaching. My friend, Jamie, teaches an introductory political science and an elections class at Hunter College. He asked if I would come in and guest teach on the topic of social media and popular elections. With a great amount of nervousness, I accepted and went this morning at 10am to teach 2 sessions.

I have a secret – I have an awful case of stage fright. I’ve been known to get sick to my stomach several times before making a presentation or acting in a performance. I have a few techniques I have tried over the years and only one really seems to work: quit whining and just do it. It’s amazing that once I get to the stage or the front of the room, I’m completely fine. It’s the anticipation of performance that brings on the butterflies.

And so it was at Hunter. I had made copious lecture notes and rehearsed in my apartment. I was wringing my hands a bit, and worrying. Would I add any value? Would the students think what I had to say was relevant? What if I couldn’t answer a question? And here’s the truly terrifying one – what if there was no reaction at all from anyone? What if all I heard was crickets amid a sea of empty, expressionless faces? Ouch.

True to past experience, none of these things happened. The classes were engaged, interested, and interesting. I learned as much as they did in the course of the preparation and the class itself. Teaching is exactly like theatre with an added component of more front-loaded research, and theatre and research I know I can do. What surprised me most is how much I loved teaching a college class. Truly loved it. The time flew by, and when I was finished, I wanted to teach another session. Yes, the PhD-route is certainly the right one for me. Now I know that for sure.

In preparation for the class, I have had the great fortunate of amazing professors as clear examples. At Darden where I got my MBA, professors teach the case method. No lecturing allowed. The professor’s job is to draw students out, to engage them immediately, and keep the dialogue flowing non-stop for close to two hours. This is no easy task and for two years I had the privilege to sit with masters of this teaching method like Ed Freeman, Robert Spekman, and Alex Horniman.

I have also been watching and studying Michael Sandel, a professor at Harvard who teaches a wildly popular class entitled simply “Justice”. For the first time, the class is being shown on-line for free at http://www.justiceharvard.org. Every Thursday a new class is uploaded. Sandel, like my Darden professors, is a master teacher that manages to engage and facilitate discussion in a very large lecture hall. Watching him made me re-consider teaching as a profession, and reignited my interest in going back to school and getting a PhD. I must remember to send him a thank you card.

I have just created an account on slideshare.net and uploaded the presentation I gave this morning at Hunter. I build presentations as guides for a discussion and not stand-alone documents. I’m glad to walk anyone through the presentation if they’re interested!

government, healthcare, hope

My Year of Hopefulness – The Healthcare Future I’d Like to See

Christa Avampato

Yesterday was my first visit to my new general practitioner. My doctor retired about a year ago and I wasn’t crazy about him anyway so I needed to find a new one. A friend of mine referred me to his doctor. The wait for an appointment with him was a bit long, though my friend assured me that he was the best. I can wait a bit for the best.

I went in to get my annual physical and to have my breathing checked. (The Red Cross had mentioned to me that after the apartment building fire, I should have my lungs checked just to make sure that everything is clear.) I expected to be in the waiting room for about 30 minutes for a routine physical that included about 5 minutes with the doctor. Instead, my doctor picked me up in the waiting room, exactly at my appointment time, with an extended hand and a smile. We spoke for about 20 minutes as he put my medical history into his computer in his office. I had the opportunity to ask him questions and tell him about any health concerns I have.

Then we went to a room that adjoined his office where he measured my weight, height, blood pressure, etc. He checked my breathing, my internal organs, and gave me my flu shot. The doctor. I will be the first person to stand up for nurses and say that they are underpaid, under appreciated, and overworked. And I will also say that it was very refreshing to have a doctor performing the mundane tasks of a check-up.

I told him about my upcoming trip to Costa Rica to make sure I didn’t need any additional vaccines. Turns out that he volunteered in the hospital in the center of the small town where I will be volunteering. What are the odds? He gave me a name of a restaurant his friend owns that I should visit, told me about a few museums and a theatre I should go to, and gave me the contact info for a nearby spa and beach that are also worth checking out. Then he handed me a card with his cell number and email address and told me that I should contact him at any time with any questions or concerns I have. “And please let me know how the trip goes,” he said. And he meant it. I thought I stepped into a healthcare time warp. A doctor was actually taking his time and showing concern and compassion for me as a person, not just me as a patient.

This gives me great hope for healthcare. This is proof that it is possible to deliver quality, empathic care, even for procedures like routine physicals. I recognize that I am one of the fortunate people in this country to have high-quality health insurance and access to top care. What I didn’t realize is that it is still possible in this day and age to deliver care with great concern.

Too often we are held at a distance from our medical doctors. We are seen as case studies and medical files and a combination of numbers and statistics. My doctor’s visit was different. It was compassionate and delivered with real care for the whole person. In other words, it’s exactly what medical delivery should be, not just in this country for those with a high income, but for everyone, everywhere.

The image above is not my own. It can be found here.

art, fear, film, government, happiness, kindness, love, safety, Tibet, war

My Year of Hopefulness – Daniel Ellsberg and John Dean

Christa Avampato

On Tuesday night I attended an event at the New York Society of Ethical Culture. The event was a talk moderated by Ann Beeson, Executive Director for U.S. Programs at the Open Society Institute and former Associate Legal Director at the ACLU. She interviewed Daniel Ellsberg and John Dean on the eve of the release of a documentary entitled The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers. Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith, the film makers, were in attendance as well. I’m looking forward to seeing it some time soon, and you should, too. We all should. While its set around the events of the 1970s, its moral implications are just as relevant today.


From the moment the footage began to role, my eyes started to tear up. With scenes of the massive amounts of missiles that we poured into Vietnam, 7.8M tons, it was hard to not consider all that we have been doing in Afghanistan and Iraq for years. And while the specific circumstances and players may differ, the outcome is likely to be the same. Innocent people are placed in the line of fire, and harmed. Those people are looked at as casualty numbers, the equivalent of statistics in some government report. In truth, those people are someone’s parent, sibling, child, friend, neighbor, lover. And after years of watching the news night after night, watching the death tolls climb higher and higher, I can’t find a logical reason to have incurred any of those losses.

Daniel Ellsberg and John Dean, government insiders, stood up once they realized that we could not win in Vietnam, once they had proof in black and white, via the Pentagon Papers, that there was no morally, ethically, or even legally correct reasoning for our occupation of Vietnam. At great personal peril, they risked everything, even their own freedom, their own lives, to reveal these findings. It would have been easier, far easier, to turn a blind eye – at least in the short run. In the long run, they just didn’t feel like they could live with themselves if they didn’t release the classified information they had that showed the fallacy of the war. They saved, literally, thousands, tens of thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands, of lives by standing up with every odd stacked against them. Their courage is immeasurable.

As I sat in the audience I considered the bravery and fear these men must have had for years, how they risked everything of personal value for the good of the world. It was completely humbling to be in their presence. The most fascinating piece of the talk was the last question they answered: “What would you say to other potential whistle blowers out there who are contemplating taking the path you took?” John Dean couldn’t recommend it. Daniel Ellsberg asked those people to seriously consider taking the same road he took. I left understanding both of their points of view, wondering what I’d do, what my friends would do, if faced with similar circumstances.

I fell asleep Tuesday night thinking about the Dalai Lama’s letter to the world after September 11th. We later found out that he didn’t write the letter at all; it was a hoax written by someone else who was very concerned that in the wake of the attacks, we would find ourselves entering a deadly war that we could not win. The author may have felt that it had more relevance coming from the Dalai Lama; perhaps the author felt more people would listen to its reason. Perhaps that person didn’t have the ability or the knowledge to be as courageous as Daniel Ellsberg and John Dean. No matter; the author’s intention was the same – he or she felt compelled to stand up, speak up, and try to encourage others to do the same.

The letter is a beautiful one and bears repeating. I still cry when I read it; it’s that powerful. It’s reproduced below and can also be found on the website of The Government of Tibet in Exile. Daniel Ellsberg and John Dean seized the time of their teaching. I wonder if we will have the courage to seize ours, too, not just in issues of war but in issues of every day life as well.

“Dear friends around the world,

The events of this day cause every thinking person to stop their daily lives, whatever is going on in them, and to ponder deeply the larger questions of life. We search again for not only the meaning of life, but the purpose of our individual and collective experience as we have created it-and we look earnestly for ways in which we might recreate ourselves anew as a human species, so that we will never treat each other this way again.

The hour has come for us to demonstrate at the highest level our most extraordinary thought about Who We Really Are. There are two possible responses to what has occurred today. The first comes from love, the second from fear.

If we come from fear we may panic and do things -as individuals and as nations- that could only cause further damage. If we come from love we will find refuge and strength, even as we provide it to others.

This is the moment of your ministry. This is the time of teaching. What you teach at this time, through your every word and action right now, will remain as indelible lessons in the hearts and minds of those whose lives you touch, both now, and for years to come.

We will set the course for tomorrow, today. At this hour. In this moment. Let us seek not to pinpoint blame, but to pinpoint cause. Unless we take this time to look at the cause of our experience, we will never remove ourselves from the experiences it creates. Instead, we will forever live in fear of retribution from those within the human family who feel aggrieved, and, likewise, seek retribution from them.

To us the reasons are clear. We have not learned the most basic human lessons. We have not remembered the most basic human truths. We have not understood the most basic spiritual wisdom. In short, we have not been listening to God, and because we have not, we watch ourselves do ungodly things.

The message we hear from all sources of truth is clear: We are all one. That is a message the human race has largely ignored. Forgetting this truth is the only cause of hatred and war, and the way to remember is simple: Love, this and every moment.

If we could love even those who have attacked us, and seek to understand why they have done so, what then would be our response? Yet if we meet negativity with negativity, rage with rage, attack with attack, what then will be the outcome?

These are the questions that are placed before the human race today. They are questions that we have failed to answer for thousands of years. Failure to answer them now could eliminate the need to answer them at all.

If we want the beauty of the world that we have co-created to be experienced by our children and our children’s children, we will have to become spiritual activists right here, right now, and cause that to happen. We must choose to be at cause in the matter.

So, talk with God today. Ask God for help, for counsel and advice. For insight and for strength and for inner peace and for deep wisdom. Ask God on this day to show us how to show up in the world in a way that will cause the world itself to change. And join all those people around the world who are praying right now, adding your Light to the Light that dispels all fear.

That is the challenge that is placed before every thinking person today. Today the human soul asks the question: What can I do to preserve the beauty and the wonder of our world and to eliminate the anger and hatred-and the disparity that inevitably causes it – in that part of the world which I touch?

Please seek to answer that question today, with all the magnificence that is You. What can you do TODAY…this very moment? A central teaching in most spiritual traditions is: What you wish to experience, provide for another.

Look to see, now, what it is you wish to experience-in your own life, and in the world. Then see if there is another for whom you may be the source of that. If you wish to experience peace, provide peace for another. If you wish to know that you are safe, cause another to know that they are safe.

If you wish to better understand seemingly incomprehensible things, help another to better understand. If you wish to heal your own sadness or anger, seek to heal the sadness or anger of another.

Those others are waiting for you now. They are looking to you for guidance, for help, for courage, for strength, for understanding, and for assurance at this hour. Most of all, they are looking to you for love.

My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness.”
entertainment, government, legacy, passion, time

My Year of Hopefulness – The life in your time

Christa Avampato

Today, the world said good-bye to Michael Jackson with all the fanfare, emotion, and celebration that should accompany the passing of someone who changed the world of entertainment forever. 50 short years of pushing the boundaries, taking risks, and going his own way inspired tens of millions of people across the globe.

I read an article in my alumni magazine about the book Plain, Honest Men by Dr. Richard Beeman. It describes the summer when a group of people gathered to write the Constitution of the United States. They made it up as they went along. They focused on writing a document to create a more perfect union, not a perfect union. In one summer, they formed the base laws that would govern a nation for centuries to come, a nation that would be the beacon of hope for people around the world.

Walt Disney wanted to build a place that captured creativity and inspired everyone who walked through its gates. From that park, he built an empire of innovation and entertainment that has caused the many millions of people who visit to wonder and dream. Walt Disney, and a team of believers, built the original Disneyland in 1 year.

Legacies are built one moment, one decision, one vision at a time. They require heart and passion and commitment. Time is the asset, not the constraint, that builds lasting impact. Michael Jackson, the fathers of our country, and Walt Disney are proof that there is a whole lot of living that can be done in a very short span of time.

government, human factors, justice, movie

My Year of Hopefulness – Harvey Milk

Christa Avampato

At 40 years old, Harvey Milk sat in a gray New York City cubicle at a large insurance company. He wasn’t proud of a single one of his accomplishments. Luckily for all of us, Harvey Milk was not content to live out his days in an unremarkable fashion. He rose up, and he took us with him.

In the remarkable portrayal of the first openly gay elected official in the U.S., Sean Penn brought the story of Harvey Milk to a new generation of people, just as the tide of activism, volunteerism, and interest in politics was taking hold again in this country. Harvey Milk stands as a shining example of possibility realized, of personal accountability and responsibility, of the power of a single individual to unite a group of people for a common cause.

Harvey Milk’s story is especially important now as we consider and re-consider laws and propositions whose central issue is decency and respect and dignity. Someone’s sexual orientation, gender, cultural heritage, religion, race, and socioeconomic status too often determines the course of someone’s life in our country. And it must stop.

I’ve heard people say that every generation has its own societal ill that becomes central to its history, shaping the lives of its members going forward. Ours is very basic, very easy to articulate. Once and for all, are we going to support the notion that all humans should be treated humanely, regardless of circumstance? Will we finally make the statement “all people are created (and therefore treated) equal” a reality? If so, then all of Harvey Milk’s efforts, and the efforts of millions like him, will have all been worthwhile.