“Democracy is not so much a form of government as a set of principles.” —Woodrow Wilson February 2025: It was my third year serving on one of Berlin’s integration advisory boards, an appointment I had eagerly sought as a way to help residents in my district who had fled their homelands for a safe haven in Germany. But my enthusiasm at being appointed to my first German advisory …
Lynn Feinerman is the producer of Women Rising Radio, which she describes this way: Women Rising Radio project had its first broadcast in 2003, profiling visionary women in leadership across the globe for all the critical issues of today, including human rights, democracy and civil society, ecology and sustainability, and all the freedoms. Based in California, we’ve been syndicated on over 200 radio stations in the USA, and in …
Photo: artwork by Sarah Jane Lapp I reproduce my paintings as jigsaw puzzles to invite dialogue and delight, joy and justice, maybe some jokes, too. My producing partner, Rani MacNeal, and I produce several public art-oriented resistance initiatives under the rubric of Puzlkind Jigsaw Puzzles. Our most popular event, “Puzzical Chairs & Pie with Live Music,” asks strangers to puzzle together despite partisan politics. In a public space we …
Dan Shore is an opera composer and the author of Freedom Ride, an opera set in New Orleans in 1961. The opera tells a story of the Freedom Riders, young civil rights activists who risked their lives to desegregate interstate travel. The opera premiered in February 2020 with Chicago Opera Theater, directed by Tazewell Thompson, conducted by Lidiya Yankovskaya, and starring soprano Dara Rahming. The opera was inspired by …
How many small actions (like Emily Feiner’s civil disobedience at a Mike Lawler townhall) are “making a dent” in the MAGA onslaught. Two weeks ago, Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) held a congressional town hall meeting in Somers, a small suburban town in northern Westchester County. Even though his team imposed a set of ridiculous requirements on attendees—that they had to prove they were residents of the district, that they couldn’t …
Jess Fisher is a graphic designer and liturgical artist. She served for a time as Digital Minister at the Washington D.C. Presbyterian Church of the Pilgrims, which introduces its website with the title “Where all are pilgrims, but none is a stranger.” The church, under the leadership of Rev. Erin Counihan, has joined with the Washington Interfaith Staff Community in organizing “Faithful Witness Wednesdays,” weekly vigils at the Capitol “call[ing] on Congress to …
May 15, 2025 While the Trump administration has initiated dangerous Executive Orders and policy changes at a dizzying pace, it has been countered at every step by litigation. And while the administration has succeeded in cowing some top law firms from challenging its edicts, there remain many attorneys, and legal organizations, that are uncowed and unbowed, and who have been steadfastly committed to using every legal means necessary, …
Early this month, on May 8th, I went to a “community impact hearing” called by Letitia James, the New York Attorney General. At Westchester Community College, just down the road from my home, James, along with Attorneys General of California, Rob Bonta, Illinois, Kwame Raoul, Minnesota Keith Ellison, and New Jersey, Matt Platken, as well as my Congressman, George Latimer, gave impassioned speeches criticizing the authoritarian actions of …
