The Demise of Soft Power and Harsh Times, Million Mile Walker Dispatch, May 2025

  Friends and Colleagues from Around the World, I’ll focus on the impact of dismantling overseas development programs in Culture Watch. Then it’s What We’re Reading and Why, a new Scanning Project segment, What Others Are Saying, plus an updated Calendar.       Culture Watch  Many Americans are unaware what USAID does and few realize the impact of its dismantling.  Humanitarian programs like USAID and the Peace Corps comprise our “Soft Power” which impacts how we are perceived abroad. The number of lives lost by its disappearance. Brooke Nicols, a Professor of Global Health at Boston University, developed an impact […]

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The Million Mile Walker Dispatch, July 2023, Best Travel Book & Poverty by America

Dear Friends and Colleagues from Around the World, I want to reflect on the meaning behind my latest book being named by the Peace Corps Writers Award as the Best Travel Book. Culture Watch will introduce a compelling book by Matthew Desmond and then explain why Phoenix feels like the “canary in the mine,” as triple-digit temperatures have been the norm for 26 days. I’ll share my column in the Arizona Authors Association newsletter in My Writing and Reviews. Voices in Action will include a provocative quote from author Matthew Desmond, and I’ll end with an updated Calendar.  My Saddest […]

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Hey Buddy! Portraits of Friends by Lawrence F. Lihosit, Reviewed by Mark D. Walker

Lihosit and I were contemporaries in the Peace Corps in Central America and both married women south of the border. Still, I didn’t connect with him until I became a writer after my international development career ended. Lihosit has written 19 books so far, and I’ve delighted in reading and reviewing several of them. I even used his book on writing and publishing a memoir to write my first book, Different Latitudes.  After all he’s seen and done over the years, these memorable descriptions of his friendships seem a perfect time as he dedicates his book “For the Next Generation.” […]

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