Bob Beckel
Born	Robert G. Beckel
Nationality	United States
Occupation	Political Pundit

Robert Beckel is an American political commentator and an analyst on the Fox News Channel where he currently co-hosts The Five. He is also a columnist for USA Today where he writes "point-counterpoint" style articles with friend and political opposite Cal Thomas. He is the brother of actor Graham Beckel.

Career[link]

Beckel holds a B.A. from Wagner College.^[1] While in college, he worked for Robert F. Kennedy's presidential campaign in 1968. Early in his career, he joined the U.S. Department of State and became the youngest deputy assistant secretary of state for the Carter administration.^[2] Beckel was the campaign manager for Walter Mondale's 1984 presidential campaign. During that campaign he became known as the man who effectively wrapped the Wendy's slogan "Where's the Beef?" around Gary Hart, Mondale's opponent for the Democratic nomination.

Beckel managed Alan Blinken's 2002 Senate campaign until he was dismissed after being targeted for extortion by a prostitute.^[3]

He was co-host of Crossfire Sunday on CNN alongside Tony Snow and later Lynne Cheney, and went on to Fox News Channel as a political analyst and commentator, regularly appearing on such shows as Hannity & Colmes (later Hannity), America's Newsroom, and Red Eye with Greg Gutfeld. Beckel is a co-host of Fox News's The Five, a political talk show that replaced Glenn Beck in the 5 p.m. Eastern time slot in July 2011.

He made a brief appearance as himself on the Season 8 premier of 24 in a mock debate with fellow Fox News Analyst Monica Crowley.

Beckel is a graduate school professor of politics at the George Washington University.^[4]

Personal struggles[link]

Beckel, a recovering alcoholic,^[5] has spoken openly about his past addictions to drugs and alcohol, admitting in July 2011 on The Five: "I'm a recovering addict and cocaine was my drug of choice."

In 2007, Beckel was involved in an altercation in a Bethesda, Maryland grocery store parking lot with a man who took issue with his anti–George W. Bush bumper stickers.^[6] In October 2011, Beckel says he nearly choked to death at a Fox News reception, but was saved by Fox News chief Roger Ailes and The Five co-host Eric Bolling.^[7]

Controversial comments[link]

Beckel initially evoked controversy in August 2011 when he implied on air that he had held back from criticizing his Fox News colleague Sarah Palin. He agreed with The Five co-host Greg Gutfeld when Gutfeld said he felt awkward making negative comments about Palin, because "it's like (badmouthing) a coworker." "I know exactly what you mean," Beckel added. "I'll be honest, I've pulled my punches."^[8] Both Gutfeld and Beckel later said they were joking, however.^[9]

In December 2010, with reference to Julian Assange, Beckel commented, "This guy's a traitor, he's treasonous, and he has broken every law of the United States. And I'm not for the death penalty, so [...] there's only one way to do it: illegally shoot the son of a bitch."^[10]

On April 16, 2012, Beckel appeared on Hannity with Jennifer Stefano and Neal Boortz. After Jennifer claimed that the Head Start Program, which aims to help poor children, did not work, Beckel replied, "You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about!" Beckel did not realize the show was back from the commercial break, and initially refused to apologize. When persuaded that the show was, in fact, live - Beckel apologized for his choice of language, but stood by the overall intent of the statement.^[11][12]

Bibliography[link]

• 2007, Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America with Cal Thomas (ISBN 978-0-06-123634-1)

References[link]

External links[link]

• Fox News' Bob Beckel
• Weekly USA Today Column Common Ground
• Bob Beckel Topics Page – USA Today
• And You Think He's Feisty on Fox: Beckel's Parking Lot Punch-Out

Ben Carson
Carson being announced as a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the White House on June 20, 2008.
Born	Benjamin Solomon Carson (1951-09-18) September 18, 1951 (age 60) Detroit, Michigan, United States
Nationality	American
Fields	Neurosurgery, psychiatry
Institutions	Johns Hopkins Hospital
Alma mater	Yale University University of Michigan Medical School
Known for	Pediatric neurosurgery
Notable awards	Presidential Medal of Freedom (2008)

Benjamin Solomon "Ben" Carson, Sr., (born September 18, 1951) is an American neurosurgeon and the Director of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award in the United States, by President George W. Bush in 2008.

Early life[link]

Carson was born in Detroit, Michigan and was raised by his single mother, Sonya Carson. He struggled academically throughout elementary school, but started to excel in middle school and throughout high school. After graduating with honors from his high school, he attended Yale University, where he earned a degree in Psychology. He chose to go to Yale because in College Bowl, an old TV program, he saw Yale compete against and defeat many other colleges in knowledge, including Harvard. Carson wanted to participate in College Bowl, but the program was discontinued. From Yale, he attended University of Michigan Medical School.

Career[link]

Carson's eye-hand coordination and three-dimensional reasoning skills made him a gifted surgeon.^[1] After medical school he became a neurosurgery resident at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. Starting off as an adult neurosurgeon Carson became more interested in pediatrics. With children he believed that "what you see is what you get,^[2] ... when they’re in pain they clearly show it with a frown on their face or when they are happy they show it by smiling brightly." Since then he has been the head of the pediatric neurosurgeon department.^[3]

At age 33, he became the hospital's youngest major division director, as Director of Pediatric Neurosurgery. Carson's other surgical innovations have included the first intrauterine procedure to relieve pressure on the brain of a hydrocephalic fetal twin, and a hemispherectomy, in which a young girl suffering from uncontrollable seizures had one half of her brain removed.

In 1987, Carson made medical history by being the first surgeon to successfully separate siamese twins (the Binder twins) conjoined at the back of the head (craniopagus twins). The 70-member surgical team, led by Carson, worked for 22 hours. At the end, the twins were successfully separated and can now survive independently. Carson recalls:

I looked at that situation. I said, ‘Why is it that this is such a disaster?’ and it was because they would always exsanguinate. They would bleed to death, and I said, ‘There's got to be a way around that. These are modern times.’ This was back in 1987. I was talking to a friend of mine, who was a cardiothoracic surgeon, who was the chief of the division, and I said, ‘You guys operate on the heart in babies, how do you keep them from exsanguinating’ and he says, ‘Well, we put them in hypothermic arrest.’ I said, ‘Is there any reason that -- if we were doing a set of Siamese twins that were joined at the head -- that we couldn't put them into hypothermic arrest, at the appropriate time, when we're likely to lose a lot of blood?’ and he said, ‘No way .’ I said, ‘Wow, this is great.’ Then I said, ‘Why am I putting my time into this? I'm not going to see any Siamese twins.’ So I kind of forgot about it, and lo and behold, two months later, along came these doctors from Germany, presenting this case of Siamese twins. And, I was asked for my opinion, and I then began to explain the techniques that should be used, and how we would incorporate hypothermic arrest, and everybody said ‘Wow! That sounds like it might work.’ And, my colleagues and I, a few of us went over to Germany. We looked at the twins. We actually put in scalp expanders, and five months later we brought them over and did the operation, and lo and behold, it worked.^[4]

Awards and honors[link]

Carson has received numerous honors and many awards over the years, including over 61 honorary doctorate degrees. He was also a member of the American Academy of Achievement, the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans, the Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Medical Society, the Yale Corporation (the governing body of Yale University), and other prestigious organizations. He sits on many boards including the Board of Directors of Kellogg Company, Costco Wholesale Corporation, and America's Promise. He was also the president and co-founder of the Carson Scholars Fund, which recognizes young people of all backgrounds for exceptional academic and humanitarian accomplishments. In 2007, Carson was inducted into the Indiana Wesleyan University Society of World Changers and received an honorary doctorate while speaking at the university. He returned to IWU the following year when his friend, Tony Dungy, was also inducted into the society.^[5] On June 19, 2008, Carson received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President George W. Bush. He is a recipient of the Ford's Theatre Lincoln Medal and the William E. Simon Prize for Philanthropic Leadership, and was elected to the Institute of Medicine (IOM) of the United States National Academy of Sciences.

Publications and appearances[link]

Carson has written four bestselling books published by Zondervan, an international Christian media and publishing company: Gifted Hands, The Big Picture, Take the Risk, and Think Big. The first book is an autobiography and two are about his personal philosophies of success that incorporate hard work and a faith in God; Carson is a Seventh-day Adventist. In a debate with Richard Dawkins, Francis Collins, and Daniel Dennett, Carson stated he doesn't believe in evolution: "I don't believe in evolution...evolution says that because there are these similarities, even though we can't specifically connect them, it proves that this is what happened."^[6]

A video documentary about Carson's life titled Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story was released by Zondervan in 1992. Subsequently in 2009, a separate television movie with the same title premiered on TNT on February 7, 2009, with Academy Award winner Cuba Gooding Jr. in the lead role and Kimberly Elise portraying his mother.^[7]

Personal life[link]

In June 2002 Carson was forced to cut back on his public appearances when he was diagnosed with prostate cancer, but the cancer was caught in time. He still operates on more than 300 children a year, but has been trying to shorten his days: prior to his cancer he used to work from 7:00 in the morning until 8:00 at night.^[8]

Carson married Candy Rustin, whom he met at Yale in 1975; she holds a M.B.A. degree and is an accomplished musician, and both are members of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

Appearance in Popular Culture[link]

In The Wire season 4 episode Corner Boys, upon being asked where he sees himself in ten years, Calvin responds that he "want[s] to be a pediatric neurosurgeon like that one nigga," referring to Carson, who had been prominent in local and national news in the period during which the episode was written.

Publications[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Ben Carson

• (2009) Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story, Zondervan Publishing. ISBN 0-310-21469-6
• (2008) Take The Risk, Zondervan Publishing. ISBN 0-310-25973-8
• (2000) The Big Picture, Zondervan Publishing. ISBN 0-310-23834-X
• (1996) Think Big, Zondervan Publishing. ISBN 0-310-21459-9
• (1990) Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story, Review & Herald Pub., ISBN 0-8280-0669-5

References[link]

External links[link]

• Ben Carson interviewed on Conversations from Penn State
• Everyday Matters Magazine Interview with Dr. Ben Carson
• Home Page of the Carson Scholars Fund
• Dr. Ben Carson M.D.
• Benjamin Carson receives a Presidential Medal
• Dr. Benjamin Carson - Pediatric Neurosurgery
• There Is No Job More Important Than Parenting: NPR Interview With Dr. Benjamin Carson
• Dr. Ben Carson: The Gifted Hands Interview with Kam Williams

Dana Perino
Perino in a daily press briefing, September 17, 2007
27th White House Press Secretary
In office September 14, 2007 – January 20, 2009
President	George W. Bush
Preceded by	Tony Snow
Succeeded by	Robert Gibbs
Personal details
Born	Dana Maria Perino (1972-05-09) May 9, 1972 (age 40) Evanston, Wyoming, USA
Political party	Republican
Spouse(s)	Peter McMahon
Alma mater	Colorado State University-Pueblo University of Illinois at Springfield

Dana Maria Perino (born May 9, 1972) is an American political commentator for Fox News. She served as the White House Press Secretary for President George W. Bush from September 14, 2007 to January 20, 2009. She was the second female White House Press Secretary, after Dee Dee Myers who served during the Clinton Administration.^[1]

Early life and career[link]

Perino was born in Evanston, Wyoming, the daughter of Jan and Leo Perino,^[2] and grew up in Denver, Colorado.^[3] Two of her paternal great-grandparents were Italian immigrants.^[4][5] She attended Ponderosa High School in Parker, Colorado, a suburb of Denver.^[3] Perino graduated from Colorado State University-Pueblo in 1994 with a bachelor's degree in mass communications and minors in both political science and Spanish.^[1] While attending the university, she was active on the forensics (public speaking) team and with KTSC-TV, the campus-based Rocky Mountain PBS affiliate^[6] where she served as host of Capitol Journal, a weekly summary of Colorado politics, and producer of Standoff, a weekly public affairs program.^{[citation needed]} Perino went on to obtain a masters degree in public affairs reporting from the University of Illinois at Springfield (UIS).^[7] During her time at UIS, she also worked for WCIA, a CBS affiliate, as a daily reporter covering the Illinois Capitol.^[7]

Perino next worked in Washington, D.C., for Rep. Scott McInnis (R-CO) of Colorado as a staff assistant before serving nearly four years as the press secretary for Rep. Dan Schaefer (R-CO), who then chaired the House Commerce Subcommittee on Energy and Power.^[6]

In 1997, while on a flight to Denver, Perino met her future husband, Peter McMahon. McMahon, born in Blackpool, Lancashire, England, is a businessman involved in the marketing and sales of medical products. The couple was married eleven months later.^[8]

After Rep. Schaefer announced his retirement in 1998, Perino and McMahon moved to the United Kingdom.^[3] After a year in the UK, Perino and McMahon moved back to the United States and resided in San Diego, California, for three years. During that time, Perino worked in the field of high-tech public affairs.

In November 2001, Perino returned to Washington, D.C. and secured a position as a spokesperson for the Department of Justice,^[9] at which she served for two years.^[10]

Perino then joined the White House staff as the associate director of communications for the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), where she provided strategic advice on message development, media relations and public outreach.^[11][12] The House Oversight Committee, chaired by Democratic Rep. Edolphus Towns, asserted in its findings on climate change censorship, that the CEQ exerted undue control of media relations in governmental scientific agencies during her tenure.^[13] Science writer Mark Bowen claimed that Perino directed other public affairs officers to kill press releases about the danger of hydrogen fuel cells after President George W. Bush announced his support for them.^[14]

Press Secretary[link]

This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (March 2010)

Dana Perino, George W. Bush and Tony Snow

Perino served as Deputy Press Secretary from 2005 to 2007. She was hired by Scott McClellan. In the role, Perino communicated many times a day with President Bush's director of communications, his press secretary and his director of media affairs, as well as serving as the spokesperson for the White House on environmental issues. In addition, she served as the coordinator for all agencies on environment, energy and natural resource issues, as well as reviewing and approving the agencies' major announcements,

From March 27 to April 30, 2007 she was the Acting White House Press Secretary while Tony Snow underwent treatment for colon cancer.

On August 31, 2007, Bush announced that Snow would be resigning his post for health reasons and that Perino would become his replacement. Perino was accordingly promoted to the rank of Assistant to the President, and served as White House Press Secretary from September 14, 2007 until the end of the Bush Administration in January 2009.

On December 14, 2008, a TV journalist, Muntadar al-Zeidi, threw two shoes at Bush during a Baghdad press conference. Bush successfully dodged both, but Perino's eye was injured by a microphone stand during the commotion surrounding al-Zeidi's arrest. When pressed, Perino said, "Sure I would take a shoe for the President".^{[15][16][17][18]}

Post-Bush administration career[link]

Since leaving the White House, Perino became a political commentator on Fox News. She is a regular co-host on the talk show, The Five. In addition to her Fox assignment, Perino is a "chief issues counselor" at Burson-Marsteller, a global public relations firm.^[19][20] In November 2009, she was nominated by President Barack Obama to serve on the Broadcasting Board of Governors, an agency overseeing government-sponsored international broadcasting,^[20] and was confirmed by the Senate on June 30, 2010.^[21] In 2009, functioning as Karl Rove's family spokeswoman, she informed the press about Rove's divorce in 2009.^[22] In 2010, she started teaching a class in political communications part-time at George Washington University's Graduate School of Political Management.^[23]

Personal life[link]

In 2007, Perino appeared as the week's celebrity guest on the radio quiz show Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me!.^[24] Perino told a self-deprecating, humorous anecdote about how she had to ask her husband about the Cuban Missile Crisis after it came up in a press briefing. News reports treated her comments as a moment of levity, noting that she was born ten years after the event.^[25][26][27] In May 2012 Perino appeared on Jeopardy! during its "Power Players" week, facing Kareem Abdul-Jabar and CNBC's David Faber.^[28]

References[link]

v t e White House Press Secretaries Akerson Joslin Early Daniels Ross Early Short Tubby Hagerty Salinger Reedy Moyers Christian Ziegler terHorst Nessen Powell Brady Speakes Fitzwater Myers McCurry Lockhart Siewert Fleischer McClellan Snow Perino Gibbs Carney