• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

The Inside Press

Magazines serving the communities of Northern Westchester

  • Home
  • Advertise
    • Advertise in One or All of our Magazines
    • Advertising Payment Form
  • Print Subscription
  • Digital Subscription
    • Subscribe
    • Subscriber Login
  • Contact Us

Left of Main Street

Empathy and a Moral Compass during Chappaqua’s Lights for Liberty Event

July 14, 2019 by Inside Press

If the speeches at a Lights for Liberty vigil on July 12 in New Castle–one of some 750 such vigils nationwide–shared any one theme, it would be encouraging empathy; and moreover, it would be the “radical empathy” that Secretary Hillary Clinton described as necessary to continue to fight. 

By Grace Bennett

 “The fact that you feel trauma means you’re still feeling, you’re still showing compassion and boy do we need that right now,” Hillary Clinton said during her surprise visit together with Bill Clinton at the Town gazebo where she joined other speakers invited by the event’s local sponsor, Left of Main Street, a Chappaqua-based, national organization which supports progressive issues, legislation and candidates. 

 “We need radical empathy right now,” said Clinton. “We need to put ourselves into other’s shoes and try to relate to that mother who encountered violence…” 

First to speak, New Castle Councilwoman Ivy Pool extolled the Chappaqua community as a tolerant and welcoming community to all. She also pointed out “the tremendous gap between the good fortune, beauty, and comfort of our lives here in Chappaqua and the inhumane and unjust conditions that children of migrant populations face. 

“Moral Compass” 

“My kids are and continue to be in all decisions that I make–my moral compass… But for an accident of birth that children here were born in Northern Westchester Hospital and not in Central America… I’d like to believe that I would do anything to protect the safety and health of my child, and have the courage to leave behind my family and friends to endure dangerous travel conditions and seek asylum for my family if we were faced with the life-threatening violence and persecution.  

“Most of us have never been so threatened,” said Pool. “We are challenged to respond with empathy, love and generosity.” 

Professor Vanessa Merton, director of the Immigration Justice Center at the Pace University School of Law, said that she “won’t dwell on the lice, the feces, the cruelty and sexual assaults and deprivation of food or decent medical care.” She did drive home the anxiety any parent feels being separated even for the shortest period.  

Professor Vanessa Merton also took questions from those gathered after speaking about immigration justice.

“Do you remember being at the shopping mall or beach, and if you became separated for even five minutes… the abject fear you felt?  These parents or guardians are experiencing that all day, every day, and with constant knowledge that their children are in fact in danger. She described the experience the children are having as ‘stunting’ and ‘soul crippling.’

She also described working with families who risked their lives, “who have given up everything they have because they are fleeing a state sponsored terror in the Honduras and in Guatemala.

 “These are not just war lords. These are transnational criminal syndicates that rule every aspect of people’s lives. Small business owners who tried to pay the taxes imposed wake up to find the body parts of their children scattered around.” 

“Vicarious Trauma” 

Dr. Jeanne Devine, a licensed clinical psychologist with a specialty in neuropsychology, said that stress hormones released during trauma results in lifelong impairment. “There’s a new generation of people that we have harmed.  This isn’t just for today. This is about people we are going to have to help find a way to take care of later on.” She also expressed concern for the mental health among those who resist. We are all experiencing “vicarious trauma,” she posited—”every time you get teary, every time your heart crunches, every time you scroll past something because can’t read one more thing.”  

A Policy “Infused with Cruelty” 

Hillary Clinton said that Lights for Liberty represented a way to come together to address what’s happening at the border, “to do whatever we can to stand up for those who are voiceless. 

Left of Main Street founders Ann Styles Brochstein (right) and Cynthia Gray-Ware Metcalf with Secretary Hillary Clinton

“This is not about open borders; it’s not about saying that anyone who can come to America at any time.  Those who are trying to make it that are deliberately trying to confuse the issue. We can have secure borders and be a humane nation that treats people with dignity and compassion. That should be our goal.”

She further noted that if the administration had a “serious interest in dealing with the challenges of the border, that is what we would be doing.” 

The border situation calls out for more properly trained immigration judges “enforcing the law and not shortcutting it,” said Clinton, who also suggested that we could have a functional data system. “There are literally thousands of children who have been separated and no one in this government knows where they are… I fear greatly they will never be reunited with their families... 

“Think about never seeing your parents and family again because you were deliberately snatched away with no effort to try to track you in this system that has been set up… This is a policy that is infused with cruelty. It is a cruel, unfeeling, unfair, meanspirited policy that is not solving the problem because the problem is deeply imbedded in poorly governed, violent countries on average the most violent in the world, with the highest homicide rate–higher than in some conflict zones.” 

The response of the Trump administration, she said, has been to cut off all aid to those countries.  A better approach, Clinton suggested, would be for the U.S. to help these countries with rule of law, “and frankly to help them with their economic problems too (”a failed coffee crop, a failed banana crop”) so people wouldn’t feel compelled to leave. We do have the capacity to respond to the most complicated problems–if we choose to do so.” 

She recalled that during her time as Secretary of State, there were efforts to establish facilities and hire personnel within the capitals of those countries to try to process asylum “so people wouldn’t have to take the dangerous route north and bring their children with them. She said during one trip to Central America “there were discussions over the kind of assistance we could provide that would try to end the corruption and malfeasance of the existing governments and put into place some programs that would begin to diminish the violence.”  

“We have helped to do that in other places over the last 30 years; we could be doing that right here.” Particularly disturbing targets for deportation have been people serving in the U.S. military, Clinton noted.  “They signed up under a program that they would serve in the military and then be put on a fast track to citizenship. “They have already been deported after combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now their spouses and children being targeted. There’s no justification for this policy.” 

Clinton encouraged those gathered to keep fighting and “reclaiming the values of our country that are under so much stress and attack right now.” Striking a lighter note, she mentioned the stress causing construction on Route 120, the redevelopment project known here as Streetscapes. She joked that she chose Chappaqua’s vigil over others because it was the closest.  She advised that residents take their resilience to that into the political environment.

(L-R): Secretary Hillary Clinton, New Castle Councilwoman Ivy Pool and President Bill Clinton: Greeting Congresswoman Nita Lowey upon arrival.

Helen Harrison, a Chappaqua ESL Teacher, described how some of her students at Greeley have expressed their fears to her. Since 2016, she said she “has spent many days helping different students cope–helping them understand the rules of what their rights are should ICE come knocking…. There are many kinds of people living here (in New Castle), and they are all part of the community; together we will overcome.”  Harrison also led everyone gathered holding candles in singing We Shall Overcome.

Secretary Hillary Clinton & President Bill Clinton with Congresswoman Nita Lowey

Congresswoman Nita Lowey arrived as a final speaker: “You don’t take babies and little ones through such hardship unless you are desperate,” said Lowey who noted that she was planning a trip to the Homestead Immigration Detention Center in Miami where she aimed to be given a full tour “and not just one room.”  “Have you heard of Homestead?” she asked. “That’s where John Kelly runs quite an operation.”  Lowey lamented the situations of the men and women “undergoing so much stress to find a better life for their families and children.” She then ‘spoke’ to Trump: “I do remember, Mr. President, when we had all kinds of glorious plans to help those countries in the northern triangle because there is corruption, there is crime and there are people who can’t take care of their families.  

“When you think of what they go through to come to America and just be part of the American dream… for me as member of Congress, it’s not only painful, but an embarrassment, because we worked so hard to fund a whole range of assistance programs.”

Grace Bennett is founder, publisher and editor of the Inside Press, Inc., since 2003.

 

Filed Under: New Castle News Tagged With: Chappaqua, Detention Camps, Empathy, Hillary Clinton, Left of Main Street, Lights for Liberty, Migrant Families, Moral Compass, Nita Lowey, Vigil

The Fourth Estate: Covering the Trump Administration

March 6, 2017 by Inside Press

By Janie Rosman   Photos by Arjun Nadkarni

Left of Main Street Panel (L-R): Kate Stone Lombardi, Helen Jonsen, Peter Katz and Kristen Prata Browde. Moderating, Grace Bennett

Donald Trump’s administration has become expert at diverting negative attention from itself, requiring journalists to be extra vigilant when covering the 45th president.

News professionals offered suggestions about “Separating Fact From Fiction: The Role of the Media in Trump’s America” during a panel discussion hosted by the activist Chappaqua group Left of Main Street (LOMS) Friday night.

Moderated by Inside Press Inc. Publisher and Editor Grace Bennett, the lively and often chilling discussion among panelists—attorney Kristen Prata Browde, a veteran news reporter and anchor; Helen Jonsen, whose broadcast and digital credits include Forbes, WPIX, Fox5, NBC, Working Mother, FIOS1 and international outlets; Westchester County Business Journal editor Peter Katz and Kate Stone Lombardi, who has been a reporter for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, TIME, Readers Digest and other national publications—reinforced that media must double-down on its efforts to cover the 45th president.

Left of Main Street (LOMS) founders and committee members joining the panelists at the conclusion of the Town Hall forum in Chappaqua. (R-L): Committee members Jennifer Sugar Frawley, Beth Hahn and LOMS founders Cynthia Metcalf and Ann Styles Brochstein. LOMS which originated as a Chappaqua-based group advocating for Hillary Clinton, is now “an activist group advocating for progressive ideas, candidates & legislation,” Brochstein explained to the audience gathered.  “After the election we cried for a couple of days and then dusted ourselves off & decided to move forward,” she said.

 

 

Since the election, media has been accused of “not doing its job” and of helping Donald Trump get elected, Bennett said in opening the discussion. Trump’s attempts to silence the press by calling it dishonest, dismissing reports as “fake news” and silencing reporters compound the Fourth Estate’s responsibilities. The panelists jumped right in.

 “You have to keep in mind that Trump is an actor,” Katz said. “At the moment he happens to be acting the role of president, and he has surrounded himself with others who are very skilled at manipulation.”

 “We shouldn’t be loved by people we ask questions of,” Browde said. “That’s what a healthy press does. We’re channeling the questions of the public and holding them (politicians) accountable.”

News delivery changed: social media is available via cell phones, Twitter, and it influences how much the public sees, she said. A comment that once stayed on the cutting room floor is what Trump uses to his benefit.

“Most reporters aren’t intimidated by Trump when he comes after them,” Lombardi said. “I think they double down when he does. To me the danger is not that reporters get nervous; it’s that he keeps suggesting they are telling lies.”

 If reporters don’t feel the companies they work for are backing them, then they’ll back off when facing difficult situations rather than risk losing their jobs, Browde said.

 “Keep in mind that the media is big business,” Katz reminded. “Networks own stations, and stations remain on the air by virtue of the renewal of their FCC (Federal Communications Commission) licenses.”

Democratization of media means someone with a Twitter handle can be “the press,” Browde added. It also created niche media. “We’re narrow-casting options to narrower audiences. Those who watch a conservative news station and read a conservative newspaper get “something very different than you do.”

 Not only that, Jonsen added, people are surrounding themselves with others who agree with them and blocking social media news feeds of people who disagree with them.

This begs the question, What are reputable media sources? Katz suggested watching news stations whose views oppose their own will make the public better news consumers. In most newsrooms he worked in, reporters and editors left their personal viewpoints at the door, “and being impartial was sacrosanct.”

 “We (reporters) were trained not to have political beliefs and to get a balanced story,” Lombardi recalled. While reporters have their own beliefs and opinions, she said, “That’s human bias and is very different from editorial slant. It’s important to distinguish between a newspaper’s slant and the quality of its journalism.

 The difficulty with filling 24 hours a day with news is that there’s no news filter, no editor, no time to fact-check, which allows Trump to speak all things, said Katz.

 Browde agreed the media pandered to Trump the celebrity and didn’t take him seriously.

  “There’s no one around to counter alternative facts” of campaign coverage,’ she said. Because of finances, “we’ve lost a serious amount of the substance. The direct connection between the president’s thumbs and us is now a nanosecond. There is no filter, there is no gatekeeper, (and) it’s created a reactionary press.”

It also changes the public’s relationship to the president, who can Tweet something in 140 characters without anyone fact-checking. Katz agreed, adding this is the first White House to use social media as a main form of communication.

 “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd challenged Trump advisor Kellyanne Conway for citing “alternative facts” and refusing to answer his questions, and American Urban Radio Networks reporter April Ryan stood her ground when Trump asked her to arrange a meeting with the Congressional Black Caucus.

If Trump’s disrespect for journalists is bad, then his disregard for the judiciary is worse. “Unfortunately, I think he’s parroting Adolf Hitler,” Katz said. “There’s a real hazard.”

 “That is the point,” Jonsen said. “The first (act) for a dictator, a Nazi regime, is to shut down a free press. So the press needs to be that much more aggressive and call this administration out at every turn.”

 “I think the media is savvy in not following the latest Tweet and is keeping their eyes on the story,” Lombardi said. “You have to be careful as a news consumer about what you’re looking at. The way mainstream media defends itself is by continuing to put out a really good product.”

Janie Rosman has been published in print and online media, including the Journal News, Westchester Magazine, Today’s Caregiver, Inside Chappaqua Magazine, Rockland County Times, Rivertown Magazine and Westchester Parent. She chronicles the Tappan Zee Bridge replacement project at Kaleidoscope Eyes (www.nykeypad.wordpress.com)

Filed Under: New Castle News Tagged With: Alternative Facts, Fake News, Fourth Estate, Left of Main Street, Media Challenges, press, Seperating Fact from Fiction, the fourth estate, Trump's America

Political Activist Group “Left of Main Street” to Host March 3 Forum on Role of the Media in Trump’s America

February 27, 2017 by The Inside Press

Chappaqua, New York–The Chappaqua-based group, Left of Main Street, will host a round table panel discussion “Separating Fact From Fiction in Trump’s America” on March 3, 2017 from 7-9 p.m. The discussion will be held in the Assembly Room at Chappaqua’s Town Hall located at: 200 S. Greeley Avenue, Chappaqua.

Participating in the discussion are journalists from television and print media, including: Kristen Prata Browde former anchor at CBS News, Helen Jonsen former TV journalist at Fox 5 and WPIX 11, Peter Katz former producer, editor and Washington Bureau Chief at ABC News, and Kate Stone Lombardi a regular contributor to the NY Times.  Chappaqua’s own, Grace Bennett, Publisher and Editor of The Inside Press, will moderate the discussion.

The influence of politically biased news on the outcome of the election will be examined as well as the role consumers play in the media. “A free and fact based press is essential for an informed and free society” said Cynthia Ware Metcalf, Co-Founder of Left of Main Street. “As consumers of news, it’s important to understand that we must hold the media accountable to report fact based news.”

Founded by Chappaqua residents Ann Styles Brochstein and Cynthia Ware Metcalf, Left of Main Street advocates for progressive issues and candidates nationwide. You can follow their activities on Facebook, Twitter @LeftOfMainSt, Instagram, and at www.LeftOfMainStreet.com.

 

Filed Under: Happenings Tagged With: Consumer of News, Fake News, Left of Main Street, Media, Media Forum, Media Panel, News Reader, The Inside Press, Trump, Trump's America

Thank You Cards to Hillary Clinton

December 5, 2016 by Inside Press

An Ongoing Courtesy from the King Street Salon

Article and Photo by Grace Bennett

 When the cards began to arrive for Hillary Clinton from all over the country—“from Washington State to Indiana to Pennsylvania”–Ann Styles Brochstein and Carolyn Filancia-Vento knew they had struck a chord with their post Election effort.  

hill-cards-ann-carolyn
Ann Styles Brochstein (left) and Carolyn Filancia-Vento inside the King Street Salon in Chappaqua following a delivery of some 200 cards expressing gratitude to Hillary Clinton.

Ann had posted and tweeted from her popular local Hillary advocacy blog–Chappaqua 4 Clinton/Kaine(now called Left of Main Street on Facebook and on Twitter @Neighbors4Hill) and on the Facebook “Pantsuits Nation” page that a collection was underway for thank you cards to Hillary Clinton during the harrowing first few days after the election was called to Donald Trump.

“I felt so lost and devastated after the election; I wanted to do something,” said Ann, who together with Chappaqua’s Cynthia Metcalf produces Left of Main Street.  “I asked Carolyn if we could drop off at or mail to the King Street Salon, and she said yes.”   

“Until about eight months before the election,” Carolyn noted, “I was a Republican. I finally realized I could never vote for that man.”  She described Ann as ‘the catalyst’ for her change of heart during long conversations together. Ann is a regular customer.  “After those, I started to also love Hillary.”

 Town Supervisor Robert Greenstein cordially helped make arrangements for delivery, and to date, about 200 cards have been delivered to  the Clinton household. 

Collections for cards will continue until Christmas too. Anyone who wishes to send a card to Hillary Clinton in her hometown, may mail to or drop off at this location: King Street Salon, 229 King Street #2  Chappaqua, NY 10514 

Filed Under: New Castle News Tagged With: @Neighbors4Hill, Ann Styles Brochstein, Carolyn Filancia-Vento, Gratitude, Hillary Clinton, King Street Salon, Left of Main Street, Post Election 2016, Thank you cards

Primary Sidebar

Recent Posts

  • In Chappaqua on April 14th: Remembrance & Dedication of the New Casey Taub Field
  • Over 350 Students From 31 Schools Attend 21st Annual Holocaust & Human Rights Education Center High School Institute at Iona University
  • Greeley Boys Swim & Dive Team Wins State Championship Title Second Year in a Row
  • Chabad Center Invitation to a Community Passover Seder: “Don’t Pass Over Passover!”
  • New Castle Fire District No. 1 Announces Bond Referendum to be Held April 25
  • Don’t Resist JUST DESSERTS at the Chappaqua Performing Arts Center April 28-30

Please Visit

Chappaqua School Foundation
White Plains Hospital
William Raveis – Armonk
William Raveis – Chappaqua
Chappaqua Children’s Book Festival
Houlihan Lawrence – Chappaqua
Houlihan Lawrence – Armonk
Houlihan Lawrence – Briarcliff
Westchester Table Tennis
Compass: Miller-Goldenberg Team
Armonk Tennis Club
Raveis: Stacey Sporn
Compass: Natalia Wixom
Beecher Flooks Funeral Home
Houlihan: Alicja Bohmrich
New Castle Physical Therapy
Kevin Roberts Painting & Design
Eye Designs of Armonk
Briones Weight Loss
King Street Creatives
Compass: Yona Stougo

Follow our Social Media

The Inside Press

Our Latest Issues

For a full reading of our current edition, or to obtain a copy or subscription, please contact us.

Inside Chappaqua Inside Armonk Inside Pleasantville

Join Our Mailing List


Search Inside Press

Links

  • Advertise
  • Contact Us
  • Digital Subscription
  • Print Subscription

Footer

Support The Inside Press

Advertising

Print Subscription

Digital Subscription

Categories

Archives

Subscribe

Did you know you can subscribe anytime to our print editions?

Voluntary subscriptions are most welcome, if you've moved outside the area, or a subscription is a great present idea for an elderly parent, for a neighbor who is moving or for your graduating high school student or any college student who may enjoy keeping up with hometown stories.

Subscribe Today

Copyright © 2023 The Inside Press, Inc. · Log in