Category Archives: Advisors

Advisory Council

Commerce, Levine articles

Global Trade and the Trans-Pacific Partnership – by Deborah Levine

While President Trump reconsidered the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)?  Many American cities, like Chattanooga, have built their economies on international industries, their vendors, and outdoors sports competitions including Ironman.  Before the halt to our participation in the TPP, there was a well-attended panel discussion on the controversial TPP  at the Small Business Incubator with moderator Jim Frierson, who was Chief of Staff in the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR) during the Reagan Administration. The cabinet agency is responsible for developing international trade policy for the President and negotiating with our trading partners. America’s first bilateral free trade agreements — with Israel and Canada — were initiated, negotiated, and implemented during his eight-year tenure. As intense competition from Japanese autos and semiconductors appeared to threaten the US and then receded, the seeds of an ambitious Pacific regional trade compact were planted in exploratory meetings by the USTR himself, Ambassador Bill Brock, a Chattanooga native.

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Advisors, Authors A-H, Of Women

Women’s History Month Tribute to Longest Serving Woman in Congress – By David B. Grinberg

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POP QUIZ: What elite body of the world’s most democratic government still has a conspicuous scarcity of women in today’s modern era?
ANSWER: The United States Senate, of course, which is one of the most traditionally male dominated workplaces in American history.
The Senate has an unflattering age-old reputation of being a “Good ‘Ole Boys Club” comprised mainly of privileged rich white men. In fact, women’s representation in the Senate has been dismally low for over 200 long years — even though women now comprise half of the U.S. labor force and earn more college degrees than men, according to government data.

Yet there’s one female former senator who has been an unsung hero and trailblazer for women’s rights inside and outside the U.S. Capitol for decades. She recently resigned from the 114 Congress after becoming the longest-serving woman in Congressional history (House and Senate combined).

Nevertheless, few Americans outside of the Washington-DC area know her name — much less her groundbreaking achievements for women in a legislative body dominated by men for 228 years and counting.

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Around the world, Levine articles

Making a Difference: Goodwill in Africa, Afghanistan, and the Middle East

These stories from Global Goodwill Ambassadors will motivate you to pursue your efforts to change the world for the better. Their words of wisdom will inspire you to be a model for others to follow in your footsteps. Here are interviews with Dr. Nadia Cheaib and Abdul Asill Azizi. Let us celebrate people making a difference in their own way.

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Advisors, Authors A-H, Social Issues

Mental Illness and Reducing Gun Violence – by Marc Brenman

After many mass shooting murders in the US, many elected officials and members of the public condemn the shooters as mentally ill, and want to forcefully control their access to guns. The issue has many dimensions. For example, most mass shootings in the US are by white men, but when they are caused by Muslims, the politicians and members of the public condemn them as terrorists. When African-Americans do the shooting, they are condemned as being racially motivated. What is mental illness, and how severe must it be before action is taken to restrain the freedom of those who have it? A third dimension is that by ascribing the cause of mass murder to mental illness, we provide an excuse, a relief from responsibility for the crime.

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Levine articles, Religious Diversity

Calendars & Religious Diversity – by Deborah Levine

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Religious Diversity is one of the most challenging, controversial, and complex issues of our time. Few diversity professionals speak on the topic, but it’s my passion and I recently gave a seminar on it at a conference at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. Why had these business professionals and administrators chosen this particular session to attend? Some were curious, “I have a general interest in religious diversity, especially learning about other religious traditions.” Others were focused on the application of new information, “I want to understand more about religious diversity so that I can better interact with people from all religious backgrounds.” Our discussion focused not only on the university, but also on business, “I need to increase my understanding and ability to competently work with clients who identify as religious.”

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Holocaust/antisemitism, Levine articles, USA Culture

History, Monuments and Culture Clash – by Deborah Levine

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Any discussion of monuments and cultural symbols tends to be highly emotional, regardless of which side of the controversy you’re on. Here in Chattanooga, the controversy features the statue of General A.P. Stewart at the county court house. For some, Stewart represents post-Civil War bridge building and the creation of the Chickamauga Chattanooga National Military Park. For others, his Confederate uniform and the monument’s funding by the Daughters of the Confederacy symbolizes slavery followed by Jim Crow laws.
My experience with historical monuments began thirty years ago when I was hired as the junior of three assistant directors in the American Jewish Committee’s Chicago office. It was August and when a reporter from The Chicago Tribune called, I was the only staff person not on vacation.

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Go Green, Levine articles

Refugees: Are We Eating our Young? – by Deborah Levine

Islands at Risk

Refugee International reported a few years ago that a Kiribatian man tried to convince a New Zealand court to make him the world’s first climate change refugee. Kiribati is an impoverished group of Pacific islands vulnerable to rising sea levels.  He didn’t succeed, but many experts predict a growing number of displaced people seeking asylum because of global warming. The planet has limited drinkable water, fertile land, clean air, and food. The planet’s current supplies are steadily shrinking.

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Levine articles, Social Issues

Our Domestic Terrorism – by Deborah Levine

What happens in Vegas does NOT stay in Vegas because Domestic terrorism is a national issue. I often write about how  the byproduct of economic dislocation is an increase in violent attacks. When people feel they have little to lose, they lose their socialization and their humanity.  The result is a rise in domestic abuse and acts of violence on strangers, whether individually or in crowds. The anger and divisiveness that now permeate our culture take the phenomenon beyond the disenfranchised. Incidences like this attack on a concert in Las Vegas parallel the rise of  traditional terrorism and are symbolic of the desire to deconstruct society.

I cannot accept the explanation of mental illness which implies that this massacre is just a single individual with no takeaway that impacts the country. Nor can I accept that Las Vegas was punishment for criticizing Trump and not standing for the national anthem, as one religious figure is saying.  Neither denial nor incitement should be acceptable if we are to confront domestic terrorism in our midst.

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Holocaust/antisemitism, Levine articles

The Liberator’s Daughter Writes Post-Charlottesville – by Deborah Levine

 After my father’s eightieth birthday, he told me that he was transcribing his World War II letters for me. My father, the son of an immigrant traveling shoe salesman, went to Harvard, and was trained at a secret US military intelligence camp. He wrote to my mother when he was a military intelligence officer deployed to France, Belgium, and Germany. Assigned to interrogate Nazi prisoners of war, he saw more than one death camp in the process. His letters are now more relevant than ever.

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Levine articles, Music, theater, TV, dance, Of Women, Race & Ethnicity

Interview with Kim Wayans: Comedian & Advocate – by Deborah Levine

Kim is a key member of the Wayans clan that created TV’s In Living Color. The ten Wayans siblings grew up poor in New York City’s Chelsea neighborhood. Elvira, Kim’s mother, was a homemaker and social worker who took the kids everywhere, no nannies, and no babysitter. Their father was a supermarket manager and the Jehovah’s Witness in the family. With no background in the entertainment business and little money, the Wayans’ success is an unlikely story.

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