San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom just introduced the concluding speaker here at Netroots Nation, Van Jones (two ridiculously good-looking guys, by the way). First time I’ve heard Newsom speak in person. He is indeed high-wattage, a policy wonk with a commanding stage presence and no end of charisma.
I’ll confess to having no idea who Van Jones was before last week, to the dismay of Andrew Golis, our deputy publisher, who’s been giving me no end of grief about that. For those of you who don’t know Van, he’s a Yale law grad who went on to found the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights in Oakland and is president of Green for All, which focuses on the unequal impacts of environmental degradation and climate change on the poor and disenfranchised.
Van arrived in Austin directly from an 8-day boat trip above the Arctic Circle with President Carter, Madeline Albright, Google’s Larry Page and other business and political leaders.
We’re going to be interviewing Van after his speech for TPMtv and will bring you that interview in the coming days.
