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John Kerry was born on December 11, 1943 at Fitzsimons Army Hospital in Aurora, Colorado. Not long after John Kerry was born, the family settled in Massachusetts. As he was graduating from Yale, John Kerry volunteered to serve in Vietnam, because, as he later said, "it was the right thing to do." He believed that to whom much is given, much is required. John Kerry served two tours of duty. On his second tour, he volunteered to serve on a Swift Boat in the river deltas, one of the most dangerous assignments of the war. For his leadership, courage, and sacrifice under fire, he was decorated with a Silver Star, a Bronze Star with Combat V, and three Purple Hearts. Later, John Kerry accepted another tour of duty - to serve in America's communities. He was elected Lieutenant Governor in 1982. In that office, he organized the nation's Governors to combat the acid rain that was polluting lakes, rivers, and the nation's water supply. Two years later, he was elected to the United States Senate and he has won reelection three-times since. He is now serving his fourth term, after winning again in 2002 by the largest margin in Massachusetts history. John Kerry entered the Senate with a reputation as a man of conviction. He confirmed that reputation by taking bold decisions on important issues. He helped provide health insurance for millions of low-income children. He has fought to improve public education, protect our natural environment, and strengthen our economy. He has been praised as one of the leading environmentalists in the Senate, who stopped President Bush's plan to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In 2003, John Kerry announced that he would be a candidate for president of the United States -- and he went on to mount a come from behind campaign that won the Democratic nomination. The American people reminded him once again that people are the same wherever you go, and he continues in the United States Senate fighting for what motivated him to enter public life in the first place: love of country and the call of duty.

Paul Watanabe is currently director of the Institute for Asian American Studies and associate professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts Boston. His principal research and teaching interests are in the areas of American political behavior, ethnic group politics, Asian Americans, and American foreign policy. He is the author of *Ethnic Groups, Congress, and American Foreign Policy* and principal author of *A Dream Deferred: Changing Demographics, New Opportunities, and Challenges for Boston*. He regularly contributes analysis and commentary to national and local television, radio, newspapers, and news magazines. He has served on several boards of non-profit organizations including the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition, Political Research Associates, the Asian Task Force Against Domestic Violence, the Harvard Community Health Plan, the Nisei Student Relocation Commemorative Fund, and the Asian American Policy Review. Paul was born in Murray, Utah, and he received his PhD in Political Science from Harvard University.

Dr. Ashton Carter, is a nominee for Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics, Department of Defense. Carter, a physicist and current chair of the International & Global Affairs faculty at the Kennedy School, served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy from 1993 to 1996. He directed military planning during the 1994 crisis over North Korea's nuclear weapons program; was instrumental in removing all nuclear weapons from the territories of Ukraine, Kazakstan, and Belarus; directed the establishment of defense and intelligence relationships with the countries of the former Soviet Union when the Cold War ended; and participated in the negotiations that led to the deployment of Russian troops as part of the Bosnia Peace Plan Implementation Force. Dr. Carter managed the multi-billion dollar Cooperative Threat Reduction (Nunn-Lugar) program to support elimination of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons of the former Soviet Union, including the secret removal of 600 kilograms of highly enriched uranium from Kazakstan in the operation code-named Project Sapphire. Dr. Carter also directed the Nuclear Posture Review and oversaw the Department of Defense's (DOD's) Counterproliferation Initiative. He directed the reform of DOD's national security export controls. In 1997 Dr. Carter co-chaired the Catastrophic Terrorism Study Group with former CIA Director John M. Deutch, which urged greater attention to terrorism. From 1998 to 2000, he was deputy to William J. Perry in the North Korea Policy Review and traveled with him to Pyongyang. In 2001-2002, he served on the National Academy of Sciences Committee on Science and Technology for Countering Terrorism and advised on the creation of the Department of Homeland Security. Dr. Carter was twice awarded the Department of Defense Distinguished Service Medal, the highest award given by the Department.

Anne Garrels is a senior foreign correspondent for NPR's foreign desk. She covered Iraq under Saddam Hussein's regime and through the U.S. invasion and its aftermath, and earned international recognition in 2003 by being one of 16 U.S. journalists to remain in Baghdad during the U.S. bombing. Her vivid, around-the-clock reports from the city under siege gave listeners remarkable insight into the impact of the war and the challenges to come. Garrels, who first arrived in Iraq in 2002 under Saddam Hussein, led NPR's coverage there until 2008. Her reports anticipated and documented the sectarian violence; she traveled the country working independently as well as embedding with U.S. forces. Since Sept. 11, Garrels has also reported from Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Middle East. Before covering the Middle East, she concentrated on the former Soviet Union and its successor states for many years, earning an Alfred I. Dupont Award for her Russia coverage of diverse topics ranging from social and economic challenges to military and cultural developments. From Tiananmen Square to the battlegrounds of Chechnya, from Bosnia to Kosovo, Israel to Iraq, Garrels has put a human face on conflict, combining experience in the field with a sharp understanding of the policy debates in Washington. Garrels graduated from Harvard University in 1972. When not on assignment she lives with her husband Vint Lawrence in Connecticut.

Lizabeth Cohen is the Howard Mumford Jones Professor American Studies and currently Chair of the History Department of Harvard University. She is the author of *Making a New Deal: Industrial Workers in Chicago, 1919-1939* (1990, new edition with new introduction 2008), winner of the Bancroft Prize and a finalist for the Pulitzer, and *A Consumers Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar America* (2003). Her interests have focused on integrating social, cultural, and political history in the twentieth century, probing how people's social and cultural experiences and identities shaped their political orientations. In her current research, she is exploring the rebuilding of American cities after World War II by investigating the life and career of a major figure in urban renewal, Edward J. Logue. Her current research is supported by grants from the Real Estate Academic Initiative, the Taubman Center for State and Local Government, and the Rappaport Institute for Greater Boston, all of Harvard University.

Alan Brinkley is the 20th Provost and the Allan Nevins Professor of History at Columbia University in New York City. An eminent scholar of twentieth-century United States history, he has chaired the Department of History since 2000. Brinkley has been a prolific writer and published numerous works including, *Voices of Protest: Huey Long*, *Father Coughlin and the Great Depression*, which won the 1983 National Book Award, *The Unfinished Nation: A Concise History of the American People*, *The End of Reform; New Deal Liberalism in Recession and War*, and *Liberalism and its Discontents*. His latest book is The *Publisher: Henry Luce and His American Century*. In addition, Brinkley is a frequent commentator on current events, government policy, and economic and social trends. Before joining Columbia, Brinkley taught at M.I.T., Harvard and the City University of New York Graduate School. He has received fellowships from the American Council of Learned Societies, the Guggenheim Foundation, the Woodrow Wilson Center, the National Humanities Center, the Media Studies Center, Russell Sage Foundation and others. Brinkley is chairman of the board of trustees of the Century Foundation (formerly the Twentieth Century Fund), a member of the editorial board of The American Prospect, a member of the board of directors of the New York Council for the Humanities and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 1998 and 1999, he was the Harmsworth Professor of American History at Oxford University. He received his A.B. from Princeton and his Ph.D from Harvard.

Arthur Meier Schlesinger, Jr., was a leading authority on the history of the United States. Schlesinger was born in Columbus, Ohio, in 1917. His father, Arthur Meier Schlesinger, Sr., was a prominent historian of the United States. His son also became an American historian. Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. graduated from Harvard University in 1938. Schlesinger published his first book, his Harvard University honors thesis, in 1939. During World War II he serving in the Office of War Information from 1942 to 1943 and in the Office of Strategic Services from 1943 to 1945. He continued to research and write while serving his country. In 1945, he published *The Age of Jackson*. The book won the Pulitzer Prize. In 1946, Schlesinger became a professor at Harvard University. He held the position until 1961. Schlesinger's liberal political and social views heavily influenced his books and articles. He emerged as one of the most respected and influential historians of the twentieth century. He also played an active role in politics. During the administration of President John F. Kennedy he served as a campaign advisor and later became Kennedy's Special Assistant for Latin American Affairs. With President Kennedy's assassination in November 1963, Schlesinger returned to academic life. He wrote a study of Kennedy's administration called *A Thousand Days*. It won the Pulitzer Prize for biography in 1965. Schlesinger became a professor at the City University of New York Graduate Center in 1966. He concluded his teaching career in 1994. After retiring, Schlesinger continued to write books. Schlesinger died on February 28, 2007 from a heart attack.