For me and the millions of other Americans who understand the connection between their local PBS and NPR stations and access to local news and sometimes life saving information; who value the outstanding dramas, the important documentaries, the educational and safe children’s programs; and who recognize the negative impact of their loss on communities and on our democracy, this is an indefensible decision.

It’s become a tradition to recommend reading each July, and this summer, the challenge was making choices as there are so many new books to suggest. I have chosen to focus this summer’s reading list on women authors (no surprise there) and books that offer new perspectives on the nature and climate emergency being felt by each of us.

Throughout his award winning, groundbreaking lifetime of work as a courageous journalist, author, and advocate for our democracy, Bill Moyers inspired us to be steadfast in defending the freedoms specifically guaranteed in the Declaration of Independence while also recognizing that our democracy and its founding documents and principles created a far from perfect union.

As friends, family, and faithful readers know, I believe that braver and bolder leaders are needed now more than ever. With the accelerating climate crisis, the violent conflicts with enormous loss of lives in so many places, widening inequality, rising authoritarianism, and the ongoing degradation of nature, the question before us is how will each of us, individually and collectively, lead forward?