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About the Author

Gary Hart: Gary Hart represented the state of Colorado in the US Senate from 1975 until 1987. During his senate years, he played a leadership role in major environmental and conservation legislation, military reform initiatives, new initiatives to advance the information revolution, and new directions in foreign policy. He is currently Scholar in Residence at the University of Colorado, cochair of the US-Russia Commission, and vice chair of the Homeland Security Advisory Council. He is also chair of the American Security Project, a Distinguished Congressional Fellow of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and a member of the board of the Eurasia Foundation. He was cochair of the US Commission on National Security for the 21st Century, which performed the most comprehensive review of national security since 1947, predicted the terrorist attacks on America, and proposed a sweeping overhaul of US national security structures and policies for the post–Cold War century and the age of terrorism. Senator Hart is the author of 18 books, including The Courage of Our Convictions, The Shield and the Cloak, Under the Eagle’s Wing, and God and Caesar in America.

Douglas Brinkley: Dr. Douglas Brinkley previously served as director of the Theodore Roosevelt Center for American Civilization and Professor of History at Tulane University. In July 2007, he joined RICE University and the James Baker Institute for public Policy.

Four of Dr. Brinkley’s biographies have been selected as New York Times "Notable Books of the Year": Dean Acheson: The Cold War Years (1992), Driven Patriot: The Life and Times of James Forrestal, with Townsend Hoopes (1992), The Unfinished Presidency: Jimmy Carter’s Journey Beyond the White House (1998), and Wheels for the World: Henry Ford, His Company and a Century of Progress (2003). And three more recent publications have become New York Times best-sellers: The Boys of Pointe du Hoc; Ronald Reagan, D-Day and the U.S. Army 2nd Ranger Battalion (2005), Tour of Duty: John Kerry and the Vietnam War (2004) and Parish Priest: Father McGivney and American Catholicism (2006). His most recent publications include a two-volume edition of Ronald Reagan’s unpublished White House diaries and The Wilderness Warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for America.

Dr. Brinkley is contributing editor for Vanity Fair, Los Angeles Times Book Review, and American Heritage. A frequent contributor to the New York Times, Boston Globe, Rolling Stone, and The Atlantic Monthly.
He lives in Austin Texas with his wife Anne and two children Benton and Johnny.

Praise for The Thunder and the Sunshine: Four Seasons in a Burnished Life…

"If you are interested in politics and policy, you will find it absorbing and instructive."—James Fallows, The Atlantic

"By continuing to follow his passion for the scholarly analysis of foreign and public policy issues, Gary Hart has risen from late-night punchline to elder statesman..." —Examiner.com