Mark Green
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Mark Green has been a public interest lawyer, an elected public official, author, tv/radio commentator and the president of Air America Radio.

He graduated with honors from both Cornell University School of Arts & Sciences (1967) and then Harvard Law School (1970), where he was editor-in-chief of the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review.

Becoming a member of the Washington, D.C. Bar (and later the New York State Bar), he spent 10 years in the 1970s working with Ralph Nader, ultimately running Public Citizen's Congress Watch, the largest consumer lobbying group in D.C. In 1982, The Nation magazine said, "Next to Nader himself, Mark is the leading public interest lawyer of his generation."

In 1981, Mark founded and ran the Democracy Project, a public policy institute in New York City. Over the next three decades, he either ran the Democracy Project or held office (from 1989 to 2001) as the NYC Consumer Affairs Commissioner and then the elected Public Advocate for New York City.

I. PUBLIC SERVICE

From 1990 to 1993, in the administration of Mayor David Dinkins, he served as the Consumer Affairs Commissioner, leading a 340-person, $17-million agency that licensed 45,000 businesses in 72 lines of commerce. Mark left the post in 1993 to run to become the City's first Public Advocate. He was elected with 60% of the vote and was re-elected with 73% in 1997. He served from 1993-2001.

As a consumer prosecutor and public advocate, Mark established numerous local and national precedents: exposing and helping to break up the mob garbage cartel; enacting the law protecting the victims of domestic violence from unjust firings; filing the FTC petition that led to the elimination of Joe Camel ads addicting children; and twice successfully suing Mayor Giuliani because of racial profiling and police misconduct (see www.MarkGreen.com for more details).

In 2001 he won the Democratic nomination for Mayor, losing by two points to Michael Bloomberg in the general election.

II. AUTHOR, COMMENTATOR AND TEACHER

Since 1970, Mark has written or edited 22 books -- ranging from the #1 best-selling Who Runs Congress? (1972 and three later editions) to Reagan's Reign of Error (1983 and 1987), to an agency-by-agency transition volume for incoming President Bill Clinton, Changing America: Blueprints for the New Administration (1993).

His most recent books are The Book on Bush: How George W. (Mis)leads America (with Eric Alterman, 2004), Losing our Democracy: How Bush, the Far Right and Big Business are Betraying Americans (2006), and Change for America, a 700 page transition report for the 44th President that he published with John Podesta and the Center for American Progress

He's appeared several hundred times on programs like CNN's Crossfire debating Pat Buchanan and Bob Novak; PBS's Firing Line with William F. Buckley; and MSNBC's Hardball. From 2002-2008, he was a regular panelist with Ed Koch and Al D'Amato on NY1's weekly public affairs segment, "Wiseguys."

In 2002, Mark was the "Distinguished Visiting Lecturer" at NYU Law School and then for five years taught a freshman honors seminar at the Arts College. He became president of Air America Radio in 2007, taking it out of Chapter 11 until it declared Chapter 7 bankruptcy in January 2010.

Blog Entries by Mark Green

McCain Can't Handle the Truth: "Bin Laden" IS Answer to "Appeaser"

(38) Comments | Posted April 30, 2012 | 4:51 PM

For decades, from McCarthy through McCain to Romney, the GOP has slandered Democrats as unAmerican, weak on defense, or, as Dick Cheney said in 2004, if Kerry won "we'd get hit again." Maintaining that tradition, Mitt Romney last year repeatedly called President Obama "an "appeaser" --...

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Can Occupy Overturn Citizens United? "Dear 99%ers..."

(62) Comments | Posted December 14, 2011 | 8:09 AM

Nothing could enhance American democracy more than if Occupy Wall Street helped enact the 28th Constitutional Amendment to end the pretense that corporations are people who speak with money. The 99% can stop the privatization of government.

There's an important conversation going on about the goals of Occupy Wall Street...

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Jewish Leaders Denounce Kristol Anti-Semitism Charge

(2) Comments | Posted November 1, 2011 | 2:05 PM

A Statement Against Smears

We are publicly engaged American Jews who support both Israel and the ideas behind Occupy Wall Street and who also strongly oppose right-wing attempts to smear that movement with false charges of anti-Semitism.

It's an old, discredited tactic: find a couple of unrepresentative people in a...

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The Right-Wing Smears OWS With Anti-Semitism

(60) Comments | Posted October 25, 2011 | 11:37 AM

I'm a Jewish supporter of Israel and Occupy Wall Street. Not big news, you'd think. But the right-wing noise machine needs some way to undermine this threat to the power and wealth of the 1%. So it's hit on "anti-Semitism." Oy!

When something called The Emergency Committee for Israel aired...

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The 9/11 Election: A Personal Reflection

(2) Comments | Posted September 7, 2011 | 10:40 AM

"Looks like I'll be running for mayor."

It's September 24, 1999, and I'm sitting in my living room overlooking the East River at 90th Street, breaking some news gently to my wife. "But what if you lose?" asks Deni, wary of my irrational confidence that critics call arrogance. "How...

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"JOBS FIRST" -- Starting 'Labor' Day, Obama Can Turn Tables on GOP

(52) Comments | Posted August 5, 2011 | 2:34 PM

After the GOP put Obama into a lose-lose proposition on the debt ceiling, there's a jobs jujitsu opportunity -- post-bus tour and on the day dedicated to American workers, Obama can propose investing $300 billion now in a growth agenda in exchange for reducing the deficit through tax reform by...

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How the GOP Will Re-elect Obama in 2012

(160) Comments | Posted April 24, 2011 | 8:40 PM

Imagine a national politician who's vocally pro-EPA, pro-OSHA, pro-affirmative action and for expanding national health care. Obviously, he'd be a Democrat. He would also be Richard Nixon in 1970. The GOP presidential nominee won't be able to survive the taint of wingers competing for headlines.

As the Tea-Party GOP loudly...

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Rudy vs. The Donald: A Gotham Tale-of-the-Tape

(2) Comments | Posted January 31, 2011 | 9:09 AM

As the Republican presidential primary season gets underway, two big-name Republican brands and NYC icons have been suggesting that they might run.

Rudy vs. The Donald would be a tabloid dream. How real is the prospect? Giuliani told CNN's Piers Morgan and CNBC's Larry Kudlow that he...

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Reality Bites: The GOP Majority Hits the Ground... Stumbling

(176) Comments | Posted January 25, 2011 | 8:31 AM

It's only been three weeks but House Republicans are already losing momentum on health care, deficits, civility, guns, and Issa's investigations. Was Nov. 2 their high point?

Republicans certainly earned bragging rights when they captured 53% of the national vote and netted 63 seats in the House in the mid-term...

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Her Candidacy Is Over -- Palin's "Brainwashing" and "Joe Welch" Moment

(1,453) Comments | Posted January 12, 2011 | 11:27 PM

After the President's remarks in Tucson, ideally the public conversation will be elevated to focus more on serious issues after the tragedy last Saturday -- how can we help the mentally ill before they hurt themselves or us? How can we craft gun control laws to keep semi-automatics away from...

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Stemming the Tide of Secret Corporate Money

(15) Comments | Posted October 27, 2010 | 11:41 PM

Until now the dominant narrative this mid-term election year was that slow growth and high unemployment were sinking the party in power. But other numbers are now showing a new fault-line for 2010, 2012 and beyond. Outside special interest spending will equal or exceed spending by candidates themselves or party...

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Juan Williams Should Have Been Given a Choice -- NPR or Fox

(79) Comments | Posted October 25, 2010 | 12:38 PM

As Juan Williams and the far right decry "censorship" and attempt to elevate his firing a campaign issue, the public should remember several key contexts:

*First, it did seem abrupt and unfair that he was canned within a day after a decade of service, although presumably this was not the...

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'Mosque' Debate Ending -- Will Rudy Join Rauf?

(94) Comments | Posted October 19, 2010 | 8:57 AM

Dear Rudy,

While we've often been on opposite sides, I hope that you'll now publicly agree that the Islamic Cultural Center downtown should be built. Although that debate is ending, a larger one on Muslim and minority rights in America -- witness rising protests around the country...

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The "Mad" Party -- When the Base Goes Beserk

(92) Comments | Posted September 22, 2010 | 3:03 PM

I don't blame Christine O'Donnell, Carl Paladino, Sharron Angle, Joe Miller, Rand Paul, Ken Buck and others in the Far (F)right. I blame the voters -- at least Republican primary voters. As Mel Brooks said in the guise of Louis IV in The History of the World, "the people are...

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The "Mosque" Debate Exposes Bias - Let's Move Beyond 9/11 as Public Policy

(58) Comments | Posted September 8, 2010 | 10:21 AM

Don't get tired of the cultural center/mosque uproar because, actually, we're getting somewhere.

Given that the next 72 hours mark the end of Ramadan, start of the Jewish New Year, anniversary of 9/11 and first public comments from Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, it's a good moment...

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'But' Nothing: Why the Right to Build a Mosque Trumps the "Heckler's Veto"

(512) Comments | Posted August 28, 2010 | 10:14 AM

Many of those opposed to the proposed Islamic cultural center (and mosque within) say they're all for religious freedom -- and then comes the "but." But not Islam. But not there. But not if it offends 9/11 families.

"But" is un-American.

The entire point of the First Amendment's protections of...

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Changing the NYC City Charter. Again?

(4) Comments | Posted August 18, 2010 | 2:45 PM

Admittedly, there may be hotter subjects this month than the City Charter Commission's ballot proposals. But an absurd state law nevertheless allows the New York City mayor to hand-pick a commission to deliberate city governance in the dog days of August and put profound changes on the ballot for November....

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Fox's Six Tricks: How to Spot the Next Sherrod

(621) Comments | Posted August 4, 2010 | 9:21 AM

I know this isn't exactly news but... neither is Fox.

If the FTC could theoretically apply deceptive advertising laws to television content, there would be an hourly disclaimer on Murdoch's network, "Video ads brought to you by the RNC" (e.g., Palin, Gingrich, Huckabee are employees).

For professional...

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BP and the Food Truck Guy

(19) Comments | Posted July 20, 2010 | 11:57 PM

Who's the bigger scofflaw: BP or Yassir Raouli?

You've heard of BP, but perhaps not of Mr. Raouli or his Bistro Food truck, which operates daily in New York City from 11 in the morning until 7 at night at 15th Street and Fifth Avenue, northwest corner.

The City has...

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A Guide to Gaffe-Gate

(8) Comments | Posted July 7, 2010 | 9:17 AM

Gaffes seem to be gushing as much as Gulf Coast oil. John Boehner's antsy metaphor, Joe Barton's apology to BP and Michael Steele's analysis that Obama got us into Afghanistan were heartfelt PR disasters. After his interview, Gen. McChrystal was on his own, like a rolling stone. Last, month it...

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