On June 6th the Senate will vote on the Federal Marriage Amendment (FMA), which would declare that marriage is only between a man and a woman.  While the debate over the amendment generally focuses on arguments for or against legalizing same-sex marriage, many people fail to consider whether a constitutional amendment is the proper was to resolve the issue.

The United States is in peril of forfeiting its global leadership, to the detriment of America and the world. Americans must engage their partners in the world, and each other, in an open and honest debate about the interplay between power and leadership, and the common stake in peace and prosperity that American cooperation with the international community will advance.

Accelerating competition, the inexorable march of technology, and the convergence of globalization are among the powerful forces that have collided to shape today’s “dynamism” economy. These forces, combined with public policies that are grounded in a “you’re on your own” mindset, have led to a fraying of the social contract and a gnawing sense of economic insecurity for a large and growing number of Americans.

Recent news about National Security Agency (NSA) programs and the misuse of intelligence in the lead up to the Iraq War led to a national debate about the proper role of intelligence. While much attention has been focused on the role of the executive branch, Congress has been missing in action in its responsibility to conduct oversight of the intelligence community. Intelligence is a vital asset in the war on terrorism, and good oversight is a fundamental component of good intelligence. What role can Congress play in shaping intelligence and overseeing its progress? How can Congress work with the intelligence community to make it more effective within the parameters of the Constitution?

Join the Center for American Progress and our distinguished panel of experienced intelligence professionals in a discussion on the role of congressional oversight of intelligence.

Under the Labour Government, the United Kingdom has made a national commitment to end child poverty by 2020, with interim targets of reducing it by one-quarter by 2005 and by one-half by 2010. In pursuit of its goal, the UK has taken a set of dramatic and innovative steps, including establishing and repeatedly increasing a national minimum wage, expanding tax-based assistance to families, and initiating a 10-year national child care strategy. Earlier this year, the Department of Work and Pensions announced that child poverty had "only" fallen by 17 percent so far, and UK officials responded by indicating that they would intensify their efforts in the coming years. 

In this special event, John Hutton, the UK's Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, will describe the reasons for the UK's commitment to end child poverty, the approach taken, the experience to date, and the challenges ahead. Following his talk, Peter Edelman, Georgetown University professor of law and co-chair of the Center for American Progress' Task Force on Poverty, will discuss the recent growth of child poverty in the U.S., the need for action, and what the U.S. might learn from the UK's experience.

Contrary to urban myth, the Internet was not built by the U.S. government. Nor was it built by Google, Amazon, Microsoft, or Cisco. The Net was built by thousands of engineers from all over the world who cooperated across organizational, ideological, and national boundaries.

Since the inception of "the war on terror," the Bush administration has confused American leadership with American empire, vision with aggressive unilateralism, national security imperatives with adventurism, says author Peter Beinart. As a result, he says, the United States has alienated its allies, discounted the relevance of international law, and the threat of Islamic terrorism has only grown to make Americans less safe. Beinart argues in The Good Fight that today's progressives need to offer a distinct alternative to such a flawed interpretation of American exceptionalism. This entails reclaiming the vision and tradition of liberal internationalism that not only accepted constraints on American power, but also shared power with America's democratic allies.

The federal government's plan for responding to the twin threats of natural pandemics and biological terrorism bear a striking resemblance to the plan that was to guide the federal response to Hurricane Katrina: both assume that state and local entities have the resources and capabilities to take over primary responsibility for managing the crisis. The Center for American Progress brings together a distinguished group of experts from the homeland security, nonproliferation, and public health communities to discuss U.S readiness for a major biological incident and a new report, Biosecurity: A Comprehensive Action Plan.

Recent reports on Jordan's industrial zones have uncovered sweatshop conditions where workers toil as virtual prisoners. More than a year ago, the AFL-CIO Solidarity Center recognized serious worker rights abuses in Jordan and commissioned research that became the basis for a comprehensive report on worker rights, Justice for All: The Struggle for Worker Rights in Jordan. Despite the promise of the groundbreaking U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement, the first to incorporate worker rights into its enforceable provisions, critics say that workers in Jordan have yet to reap the benefits of expanded economic growth and development. Advocates maintain that free trade will help promote foreign investment and higher wages, eventually eliminating sweatshop conditions. How will Jordan's workers fare under free trade? A distinguished panel will discuss this question from the viewpoint of labor, economic policy, and human rights.

The Center for American Progress and Foreign Policy magazine teamed up to ask over 100 of America's top terrorism and national security experts for their assessment of the war on terror. The survey was evenly balanced among liberals, conservatives and moderates. The Foreign Policy/Center for American Progress Terrorism Index shows surprising consensus among the participants in the survey, despite the diversity in ideological perspective.

In New News Out of Africa, acclaimed Emmy and Peabody-winning journalist and civil rights crusader Charlayne Hunter-Gault shows us an Africa -- a continent that is home to more than 800 million people -- that is far more complex than previously thought and also rarely seen by many. In a unique approach that combines personal memoir and journalistic observation and analysis, Hunter-Gault divides her New News into three parts. She focuses first on South Africa, then on the continent-wide efforts to make the most changes since the end of colonialism, and lastly on the challenges that journalists must confront to report from the continent. With New News Out Of Africa, Hunter-Gault's reporting promises to redefine what is news about this vast and complex continent and its people and its hopeful future that have been, until now, all but invisible to the outside world. Publishers Weekly calls New News Out Of Africa   "an incisive, informative work that provides a balanced perspective on the continent's recent past, transformative present and potentially rich future."

Please join us for a lively discussion with Charlayne Hunter-Gault.