DR. SANJAY GUPTA

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, senior medical correspondent for the health and medical unit at CNN, is a practicing neurosurgeon and an assistant professor of neurosurgery. He plays an integral role in the network’s medical coverage, which features, the half-hour weekend show House Call with Dr. Sanjay Gupta, and coverage of breaking medical news. Based in Atlanta, he also co-hosts Accent Health for Turner Private Networks, provides medical segments for the syndicated version of ER on TNT, contributes health news stories to CNN.com, writes a column for TIME magazine, and recently launched a weekly podcast on iTunes called Paging Dr. Gupta.

Dr. Gupta joined CNN in 2001 and became part of the network team covering the Sept. 11 attacks in New York City, with breaking news about anthrax and its deadly effects.

In 2003 Dr. Gupta, in Iraq and Kuwait, provided viewers with exclusive reports while traveling with the U.S. Navy’ medical unit, the “Devil Docs” and provided live coverage from a desert operating room of the first operation performed during the war. While there, he performed brain surgery five times.

In 2004, Dr. Gupta traveled to the international Aids Conference in Bangkok, Thailand, reporting on the pandemic for CNN/US.

That December he covered the disaster and aftermath of the tsunami that claimed more than 155,000 lives in South Asia. That coverage contributed to the awarding of an Alfred I. DuPont Award to CNN.

The following year, Dr. Gupta contributed to CNN’s Peabody-winning coverage of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath.

Dr. Gupta also introduced the New You Resolution, the first installment of prime-time, health-related specials which he produces for the network. This program challenges everyone to kick  their unhealthy habits. Dr. Gupta launched Fit Nation, CNN’s first ongoing grass-roots initiative against obesity. After a nationwide tour, Fit Nation, culminated in a one-hour special on CNN.

In addition to his work for CNN, Gupta is a member of the staff and faculty of the department of neurosurgery at Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta and performs surgery weekly at Emory University Hospital and Grady Memorial Hospital, where he serves as chief of neurosurgery.

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Spike Lee

As a writer-director, actor, producer, author and educator, Spike Lee has revolutionized the role of black talent in cinema. Widely regarded as one of today’s premier American filmmakers, Lee is a forerunner in the do-it-yourself school of independent film.

In 1986, his debut film, She’s Gotta Have It, earned him the Prix de Jeunesse Award at the Cannes Film Festival and set him at the forefront of the Black New Wave in American Cinema. His most recent work, When the Levees Broke, a groundbreaking documentary focusing on the plight of Americans stranded in New Orleans after hurricane Katrina, has garnered rave critical reviews and is considered by many to be the definitive account of that catastrophic event.

Just prior to Levees he completed his 19th feature film, Inside Man, starring Denzel Washington, Jodie Foster and Clive Owen. Recent critical and box office successes have included such films as The 25th Hour, The Original Kings of Comedy, Bamboozled, Summer of Same, Girl 6, Get on The Bus, Do The Right Thing, She Hate Me, and Clockers. School Daze, his second feature, helped launch the careers of several young black actors.

Raised in Brooklyn, Lee has also produced and directed music videos for such diverse artists as Miles Davis, Chaka Khan, Tracy Chapman, Anita Baker, Public Enemy, Bruce Hornsby and Michael Jackson. Lee’s commercial work began in 1988 with his Nike Air Jordan campaign with basketball great Michael Jordan. He is well-known for his Levi’s Button-Fly 501, AT&T, and ESPN television commercials. 

Lee is also diversely involved in documentaries and sports programs, having recently completed the Emmy and Oscar nominated documentary, 4 Little Girls for HBO. An Emmy Award was given for Lee’s piece on George-town’s John Thompson which aired on HBO/Real Sports. Lee has authored six books and his most recent book is titled Best Seat in the House with Ralph Wiley. Partnering with DDB Needham, Lee created Spike/DDB, an advertising agency that will concentrate on an urban/ethnic market.

Lee is recognized for his ability to showcase a series of outspoken and provocative socio-political critiques that challenge cultural assumptions about race, class, and gender identity.

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Charlie Rose

Charlie Rose has been acclaimed by critics as “one of television’s premier interviewers.” He is an Emmy Award-winning journalist, anchor and executive producer of Charlie Rose, a nightly one-hour nationally syndicated interview program. He is also a correspondent for 60 Minutes II.

The Charlie Rose Show premiered on Thirteen/WNET in New York City on September 30, 1991. It has been syndicated nationally since 1993 and now airs on 215 PBS affiliated stations.

Rose entered television full-time in 1974 when Public Broadcasting System commentator Bill Moyers hired him as managing editor of the PBS series Bill Moyers’ International Report. A year later, Rose became executive producer for the PBS conversation and documentary series Bill Moyers’ Journal.  In 1976, Rose was named correspondent of the new PBS series USA: People and Politics, a weekly political magazine with Moyers. That same year, their television special, A Conversation With Jimmy Carter was honored with a Peabody Award.

Later in 1976, Rose moved to NBC as a correspondent, based in Washington DC. From then until 1981, Rose hosted
a number of interview programs, including a co-host position with AM Chicago on WLS-TV, and host of The Charlie Rose Show at KXAS-TV in Dallas/Ft. Worth. In 1981, Rose moved The Charlie Rose Show to Washington, where he also anchored a weekly
interview show for WRC-TV, the NBC-owned station. From 1984-–1990, Rose anchored CBS’s Nightwatch, the network’s late-night interview series. During that time, he offered compelling conversations with some of the world’s most interesting people, including Lech Walesa, Helmut Kohl, Saul Bellow, and Woody Allen. He traveled around the world to secure interviews with world leaders, literary figures, Nobel Prize-winners, and entertainers. His interviews with convicted murderer Charles Manson won an Emmy Award.

In addition to Nightwatch, Rose served as an anchor for other CBS News broadcasts, including Face the Nation, CBS Morning News, CBS This Morning, and Newsbreak, and reported for 48 hours.  

Rose graduated from Duke University with an AB in History and a JD from Duke’s law school. Currently, he divides his time, with his family, between New York and his farm near Oxford, North Carolina.

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Dr. Paul Krugman

Paul Krugman is one of the world’s preeminent economists and an insightful, outspoken Op-Ed columnist for the New York Times. He is a passionate and articulate speaker with a gift for relating global economic events to his audiences and committed to speaking the truth as he sees it in the most compelling terms.

Dr. Krugman’s work in economics has earned him broad acclaim and several prestigious awards, including the John Bates Clark medal from the American Economic Association for his work in international trade and finance. This prize is given every two years to “that economist under forty who is adjudged to have made a significant contribution to economic knowledge.”

Paul Krugman is a professor of economics at Princeton University and the author of The Return of Depression Economics and other academic and popular works. He is the author or editor of 20 books and more than 200 papers in professional journals and edited volumes. Dr. Krugman’s recent best seller, The Great Unraveling: Losing Our Way in the New Century, analyzes the economic and political course the United States has taken recently and recommends a roadmap for getting the country back on track.

Krugman is also the leading pioneer in economic geography-—the economic dynamics that determine how and why certain places (like Silicon Valley) end up specializing economically and the advantages this kind of clustering brings to companies and economies.

Dr. Krugman’s current academic research focuses on economic and currency crises. He has been doing and writing policy-oriented economics almost his entire career. He was a staff economist on international trade in 1982 as part of a team put together to deal with the recession by President Reagan. Paul Krugman has been a policy observer and contributor ever since, and he has always had a distinctive attitude to boot.

Paul Krugman’s credentials also include: America’s most important columnist, Washington Monthly; columnist of the year, Editor and Publisher magazine; staff member, President’s Council of Economic Advisors.

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Senator Bob Dole

Raised on the plains of western Kansas, Senator Bob Dole is recognized as one of the most prominent political figures of our time. As a renowned political commentator, Senator Dole is part of the American landscape. While Chairman of the National World War II Memorial, Senator Dole led the nation in honoring the heroes of his generation and helped enshrine their legacy of sacrifice for freedom. His 2006 best selling World War II memoir, One Soldier’s Story, chronicles his harrowing experience on and off the battlefield and the lessons learned through his struggle to survive.

Following the attacks of September 11, 2001, Senator Dole joined forces with former rival, President Bill Clinton,
to serve as Co-Chair of the Families of Freedom Scholarship Fund, which assists the educational needs of the families of the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and United Flight 93. In January 2003, he was appointed Honorary Co-Chair of the President’s Council on Service and Civic Participation.

His candidacy for the White House cemented his reputation as an honest, respected statesman who will long be considered one of the most powerful senators and brilliant legislators of our time. In 1997, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He served as Senate Majority Leader, Chairman of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, became his party’s nominee for Vice President, was a member of the House of Representatives, and Chairman of the Republican Party.

Senator Dole has been featured on The Late Show with David Letterman, Saturday Night Live, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Late Night with Conan O’Brien, and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. He is the author of two best-selling books on political humor—Great Presidential Wit, I Wish I was In The Book and Great Political Wit, Laughing (Almost) All the Way to the White House.

On issue after issue, Senator Dole is a statesman who has made his mark. Says former Secretary of State Colin Powell: “Senator Dole is a plain-spoken man of strength, maturity and integrity.”

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Governor Mario M. Cuomo

Mario M. Cuomo is the longest serving Democratic Governor of New York State in today’s history. As the 52nd governor, he served from 1982 to 1994. He was the first Italian-American governor of New York, and set New York records for having the highest popular vote ever achieved in a state-wide election, twice. During Cuomo’s tenure, he emphasized lower taxes, balanced budgets, public education, affirmative action and a government-private sector partnership for economic progress. The New York Times called Cuomo’s term one of the most celebrated governorships
in history.

Cuomo is best known as an intellectual, passionate and challenging catalyst for social responsibility and diversity. The Boston Globe deemed Governor Cuomo’s recent speech at Harvard’s Kennedy School a “masterpiece” and named him “the nation’s most gifted philosopher-politician.”

Cuomo exploded on the national political scene during the 1980’s, a decade consumed by the conservatism of Ronald Reagan. As a result, he served the State through two national recessions and twelve years of federal policies that slashed federal aid to New York and other states.

Regardless, Cuomo managed to balance twelve budgets; reduce New York’s largest tax, the income tax, by more than twenty percent. He reconstructed much of the State’s infrastructure; reduced the mortality rate on highways every year for seven years with the nation’s first seatbelt law and added an aggressive anti-drunk driving program. Cuomo created the State’s first “Centers of Advanced Technology,” and introduced programs like “Child Health Plus” and the “Children’s Assistance Program,” a reform of the New York welfare system that served as models for later federal programs now in place.

A lawyer since 1956, Governor Cuomo appointed 112 judges, including all the judges of the Court of Appeals, as well as the first and second women judges, the first black, the first Hispanic and the first woman to serve as Chief Judge.

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