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| Acting On These Ideas The third hour of The American Promise looks at what draws us forward: opportunity, leverage, common ground. When we act on these ideas, we can make progress together. OPPORTUNITY • Ken Smith is an entrepreneur in the salvage business: He salvages opportunity for homeless veterans. • In the grand tradition of the Wright Brothers, Gary Fisher made the plain-vanilla bicycle take off by taking bikes off the road and creating a whole new industry: mountain biking. • Pauline Lo Alker, a high-tech entrepreneur defied her family to get a degree and fought to find a place in the computer industry. Today her company is one of the hottest start-up businesses in California. • Americans don't wait for opportunity to knock; they chase after it. In 1831, while watching American sailors rush to load and unload cargo, Frenchman Alexis de Tocqueville put his finger on a unique American trait: hustle. LEVERAGE • Five African-American women in Chicago stand as collateral for each other to secure loans for their small business. There's strength -- and leverage -- in numbers. • In Portland, Ore., citizens found leverage in junk. With a little paint and a few tools, an organization has turned junked bicycles into public transportation. • Members of COPS, Communities Organized for Public Service, found a way to get the attention of the city when they banded together and educated themselves on an issue affecting their community. COMMON GROUND • The irrigation ditches, or acequias, of New Mexico have a long democratic tradition that stretches back hundreds of years to a time before the Pilgrims landed. • Venice in the 14th century was the richest, safest, best-run and most beautiful city in Europe. Venice's guilds helped by investing in the health and welfare of their neighbors, an investment that is still paying off. • The baptismal font of Santa Maria de la Paz, a Catholic community in Santa Fe, New Mexico, is forged from bits of history. Common ground is literally forged from bits of history to create a font -- and a link between the community's past and its present.  |
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