Public Agenda announced today that NewTalker Philip Howard, Vice Chair of Covington & Burling, LLP and founder of Common Good, is joining its board of directors.

For over a quarter of a century, Public Agenda has been providing unbiased and unparalleled research that bridges the gap between American leaders and what the public really thinks about issues ranging from education to foreign policy to immigration to religion and civility in American life. Nonpartisan and nonprofit, Public Agenda was founded by social scientist and author Daniel Yankelovich and former Secretary of State Cyrus Vance in 1975. Public Agenda's two-fold mission is to help American leaders better understand the public's point of view. Citizens know more about critical policy issues so they can make thoughtful, informed decisions.

As NewTalk readers know, we work closely with experts from Public Agenda, such as Steve Farkas, Jean Johnson and Ruth Wooden.

Read the full press release here

Obesity qualifies as an epidemic, according to the Centers for Disease Control. One in six children is obese, and almost all of these will develop chronic diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease. Almost 80 million Americans have obesity-related diseases -- resulting annually in over 86,000 foot or leg amputations and 24,000 cases of blindness for diabetics. The cost to society is also crippling -- estimates of direct costs start at $100 billion annually. By 2020, at current rates, over 40 percent of the American population will be obese.

David Walker, President of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, appears in a new documentary on the national debt, I.O.U.S.A.

In the NewTalk forum on “Can the next President break Washington's addiction to short-term goals and special interests?" Walker talks about another deficit, the leadership deficit:

"I agree fully with John Rother that the greatest deficit is the leadership deficit. That point is made clearly in the film I.O.U.S.A. This country only has one CEO and that is the President of the United States. That person must take the lead and work on a bipartisan basis with members in the Congress who will put America's long-term interest above their short-term political interest."

The National Review Online's Media Blog (8/19) commented on the caliber of the "Would 'loser pays' eliminate frivolous lawsuits and defenses?" discussion on NewTalk: "It's worth the time, and about eleven times better than anything you'll see on your daily newspaper's op-ed page."

The New York Sun profiles NewTalk Founder Philip K. Howard and commends NewTalk for bringing together thought leaders from both sides of the aisle:

"Mr. Howard is known for his bipartisan approach. It makes sense that someone who has worked for Vice President Gore as well as a former U.S. senator of Georgia, Zell Miller, has created a Web site that features commentary from such political stalwarts as Bill Bradley, Mayor Bloomberg, and Bob Kerrey.

Mr. Howard said real legal change usually requires consensus, and even then is rare.

'Once something gets passed as a law, changing it is like trying to scrape away concrete and Washington is this huge edifice of legal concrete,' he said.

He said Newtalk, by getting experts together from all political parties, strives to build this consensus."

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