Political analyst Gergen to speak at Cornell
February 04, 2010

David Gergen, political analyst, author and advisor to presidents for 30 years, will deliver the Delta Phi Rho Lecture this year, Cornell College announced Tuesay.

His presentation, "The Press, The President and Public Policy," will be at Cornell College's King Chapel at 7:30 p.m. Monday, May 3. The lecture is open to the public free of charge.

Gergen served as director of communications for President Ronald Reagan and held positions in the administrations of Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford and Bill Clinton.

In his Cornell lecture he will discuss how the media impacts the nation's policy focus, what the Obama administration must do to ensure the media does not resist Obama's goals, lessons learned from presidential media greats such as Roosevelt, and mistakes to avoid.

Gergen currently serves as editor-at-large at U.S. News & World Report and as a regular television commentator on CNN. He is also a professor of public service at the John F. Kennedy School of Government and is director of its Center for Public Leadership. In 2000 he published the best-selling book "Eyewitness to Power: The Essence of Leadership, Nixon to Clinton." He also served as moderator of "World @ Large," a 13-part PBS discussion series for two seasons, and teamed with Mark Shields for political commentary every Friday night for five years on the "MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour."

A native of Durham, N.C., he is an honors graduate of Yale University and Harvard Law School and served in the U.S. Navy. He has been married since 1967 to Anne Gergen, a family therapist. They have two children and live in Cambridge, Mass.

This is the fourth lecture funded by Cornell's Delta Phi Rho Centennial Endowment. Previous speakers were Bob Woodward, Fareed Zakaria and George Stephanopoulos. A group of Delt alumni created the lecture series to contribute to the intellectual capital of the college and the community.