With a dedicated career helping children and families adversely impacted by immigration, homelessness, abuse, and oppressive systems in South America, Europe, and his native Milwaukee, Luke serves as Director of Program Design and Community Engagement at the Institute for Child and Family Well-being at Children’s Wisconsin.
As an award-winning Senior Columnist for the Milwaukee Independent, Reggie Jackson covers a range of African American issues. He is also a Consultant with Nurturing Diversity Partners, and volunteers as Head Griot for America’s Black Holocaust Museum (ABHM) in Bronzeville.
REGGIE JACKSON: 7x Award Winner in Best Column categories from the Milwaukee Press Club
As a teacher for over twenty years, Dominic Inouye helped students to develop their reading, writing, critical thinking, and, most of all, their voices. He worked as The Pfister Hotel Narrator, a one-year appointment, and currently manages the ZIP MKE project that photo documents the city to promote cultural understanding.
Dominic Inouye: 2x Award Winner in Best Column category from the Milwaukee Press Club
Dr. Kenneth Cole is a Licensed Psychologist who has spent the past two decades helping members of the community in developing the ability to bring about positive change for their lives, and empowering those individuals to advocate for themselves.
Kenneth Cole: 2x Award Winner in Reporting categories from the Milwaukee Press Club
Pardeep Kaleka is the Executive Director of the Interfaith Conference of Greater Milwaukee, published author of The Gifts of Our Wounds, award-winning columnist with Milwaukee Independent, and a clinician specializing in utilizing a trauma-informed approach to treat survivors and perpetrators of assault, abuse, and acts of violence.
PARDEEP KALEKA: Winner in Best Blog category of the 88th Annual Milwaukee Press Club Awards
John Pavlovitz: Winner of Best Blog at the 89th Annual Milwaukee Press Club Awards
Recent Columns
Defending Democracy: Doris Miller’s legacy at Pearl Harbor faces Trump’s authoritarian ambitions
On the sunny Sunday morning of December 7, 1941, Messman Doris Miller had served breakfast aboard the USS West Virginia, stationed in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and was collecting laundry when the first of nine Japanese torpedoes hit the ship. In the deadly confusion,...
Democracy Defended: South Koreans overturn stunning self-coup and reverse Martial Law in 6 hours
For an astonishing six hours today, South Korea underwent an attempted self-coup by its unpopular president, Yoon Suk Yeol, only to see the South Korean people force him to back down as they reasserted the strength of their democracy. In an emergency address at nearly...
Reshaping government: Why Movement Conservatives attacked the liberal consensus to subvert democracy
Cas Mudde, a political scientist who specializes in extremism and democracy, observed recently on Bluesky that “the fight against the far right is secondary to the fight to strengthen liberal democracy.” That is a smart observation. During World War II, when the...
President Biden pardons son Hunter citing unfair treatment and political weaponization of justice
President Joe Biden pardoned his son, Hunter, sparing the younger Biden a possible prison sentence for federal felony gun and tax convictions and reversing his past promises not to use the extraordinary powers of the presidency for the benefit of his family. The...
Plymouth Myths: How Abraham Lincoln reinvented Thanksgiving amid the bloodshed of Civil War
Thanksgiving is the quintessential American holiday, but not for the reasons we generally remember. The Pilgrims and the Wampanoags did indeed share a harvest celebration together at Plymouth in fall 1621, but that moment got forgotten almost immediately, overwritten...
Reggie Jackson: History teaches us that ignoring the elephant in the room will not make it go away
“My children, you are permitted in time of great danger to walk with the Devil until you have crossed the bridge.” – Old Balkan proverb Those words are an example of how and why people consistently ignore things and make alliances with evil forces in...
Once upon a Tuesday: A political parable about running with scissors in America
Once upon a Tuesday … there was a schoolhouse in a small rural town where some young children spent their time learning in class, while others goofed around at play. Every morning semi-trucks would roar by the schoolhouse without regard to the speed limit or the...
Legacy of Gettysburg: The 2024 election echoes Lincoln’s concern that a divided nation could endure
For three hot days, from July 1 to July 3, 1863, more than 150,000 soldiers from the armies of the United States of America and the Confederate States of America slashed at each other in the hills and through the fields around Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. When the...
Hollow Patriotism: Reconciling the honor that veterans are due with the disrespect of their service
In the aftermath of the 2024 election, as Americans reflect on Veterans Day, a familiar narrative emerges across the nation as it has every year since it was first observed in 1919, before being recognized as a Federal holiday in 1954. There are genuine and heartfelt...
