About Bearing Witness
I began writing here to get my work out, after I was blacklisted from my think tank, the Obama and Biden White Houses, and all my usual mainstream US publication outlets for being Jewish. I write all the time, constantly, or I will explode. I get the sense that I’m not wired like other people.
As a result, I’m currently working on both my fifth book (a reported memoir about how policy affects life in America over the generations, using my Jewish family as a case study) and sixth book (academic book to replace POWER TO THE PUBLIC, about how public interest technology went so wrong in the US, and how other countries’ efforts' compare), with a seventh in the vague idea stages (reported memoir about AI and narcissism based on my father’s work and my upbringing at the Yale AI lab).
Currently, I am in the process packing up my house in Brooklyn and relocating my family to Israel, where I imagine my essays will take a different turn.
In the mean time, here’s what the career progression of a multi-front over-achiever looks like:
Test tube washer at a lab working on the Human Genome Mapping project
Summer camp counselor
Intern at a Democratic polling firm, during the Clinton ‘92 campaign
Intern at Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility
Democratic Field Organizer
Press Secretary for congressional campaigns
Film school dropout
Instructional Designer
Management consultant
GenX columnist for CBS website, ‘96 DNC and RNC conventions
Website Producer
Information Architect
Nonfiction MFA graduate
User Experience Designer
Founder of an all-female tech consultancy
Freelance journalist
Researcher
Early member of the United States Digital Service, President Obama
Head of Research and Product, Department of Homeland Security
Founding member of the Public Interest Technology team at a Biden White House-adjacent think tank
Two-time Congressional expert witness
Car crash and traumatic brain injury survivor, plus advocate against car safety bias
Full-time American Jew calling out antisemitism and speaking truth to power.
The last one doesn’t pay very well, weirdly.
For more visit my website. Trauma is a great motivator.
