A Titan Fades from the Fight

David Gergen's battle with Lewy body dementia robs us of a good man

Authors note

After a lower back multilevel laminectomy on Monday of last week, I am slowly moving back to functioning. It’s been steady progress for the most part and I am doing really well by every measure. I will start writing a bit again and hopefully be back on camera in the New Year. I appreciate your support and patience as I’m offline and recovering. My content will be a little sporadic in the meantime but hope to have regularity and predictability back shortly.

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David Gergen’s legacy looms as his light fades

On December 19th David Gergen’s daughter, Dr. Katherine Gergen Barnett, wrote a heartbreaking story for the Boston Globe about her father’s mental and physical state as he battles Lewy body dementia (LBD). She explains the disease as “a combination of Parkinson’s meets Alzheimer’s. People with LBD have abnormal aggregates of alpha-synuclein protein in their brain (these aggregates are called “Lewy bodies”) that cause a progressive neurological disorder.”

It’s damage to the mind and body are devastating as it progresses. She describes symptoms including “cognitive decline, motor symptoms (tremors, stiffness, slow movements), sleep disturbances, visual hallucinations, and autonomic dysfunction (affecting issues such as digestion). Those living with LBD also often suffer from depression, anxiety, and agitation. While there are medications that can help diminish some of the mood and physical symptoms, there are few clinical trials and even fewer medications specifically geared toward halting LBD.”

She wrote the piece as she spent time with him recently, and, in a rare recent moment of lucidity he offered her some lessons he wanted to share with the world. He would draw from his long life as an advisor to four Presidents from both parties, on the international stage, and as a professor of leadership at the renowned Harvard Kennedy School.

“Just call David Gergen.”

I heard those words from my former boss and mentor, General David Petraeus, in the late spring of 2006. I had just returned from my second tour of duty in Iraq where I had served as his public affairs officer, and his successor then Lt. General Marty Dempsey. During that time he had encouraged me to apply to the Kennedy School for their well regarded Mid-Career Masters of Public Administration degree program for folks like me who had been out in the world for a bit.

Without belaboring the details but after months of wrangling with the Army and Harvard Admissions, I had been accepted on a full ride scholarship and would need to attend a mandatory summer program for Mid-Career’s in July. This six-week mini-course was sort of a “Grad School for Dummies” set of classes to get you ready to face a rigorous academic program after being out of college for 20 years or more.

Unfortunately, the Army hadn’t budgeted for that extra cost. The guy literally said, “We don’t have the money for that. You’ll have to go somewhere else.” Needless to say it was May at this point, I hadn’t applied anywhere else, and I wasn’t going to walk away from a full ride to the number one school in the country because some idiot Lt. Colonel at Fort Meade hadn’t read the fine print of the degree program.

I called Petraeus, whose bright idea the whole thing was in the first place, and he mentioned having been hosted by David Gergen while visiting at Harvard recently. He had mentioned my pending arrival. I was like, “you want me to just call one of the most famous people in politics and say, ‘Hi…you don’t know me at all, but can I get $6,000 for a summer program?”

“Yes. I do,” he replied.

Hosting a panel on military leadership with David Gergen in 2007

So I did it. Long story short, it worked. I reached out and he called me back and I heard that famous sonorous voice, “Fred? David Gergen here.”

“….uhhhh…hi.”

We had a lovely conversation and not long after, we settled on a plan for me to be a Fellow at the Center for Public Leadership and support their efforts. What that led to is for another day but included a standing room only panel on military leadership and a wildly successful traditional military dinner. In the end, I had the privilege of learning under the wing of one of our wisest bipartisan political minds of the last 60 years.

It was an experience I will treasure to my last breath.

Lessons from a life well lived

I believe that David left us an unrivaled legacy of service and will leave behind thousands of lessons for us all. On the day he sat down with his daughter she grabbed a pen and pad to capture his thoughts to share them with us.

They are as profound as he was in his prime.

On service: “As awful as life is currently in the public sphere, there is still reason to believe in our country and its leadership and to go into service. The country has given a great deal to us and lots of people have been killed or lost their families for our country. We must give a salute to those who are trying to change the country and have fought for our country. Young people entering national service — military, AmeriCorps, Teach for America — people like that are holding things together. There should be more people that should run [for office] and contribute for a few years.”

On future generations: “Many in the next generation are going to the best schools and not giving back what is remotely needed by our country. We need to continue to ensure that we have people in the next generation out front pulling the wagon — innovators and people in the public sector — delivering on the goods.”

On resilience: “Working through years when you are challenged and being pushed down, you grow. On the cusp of the Civil War, people were grieving the loss of life on farms and villages but leaders like Dwight Eisenhower reminded people to accept responsibility and move on. We do not need to continue to relive the past. Americans can endure any crisis, but they need to continue to take a sense of responsibility for their country.”

On heroes: “Remember the Greeks who said, ‘Pity the country who has no heroes. No, pity the country that needs heroes.’ … But I would argue we do need heroes, and good-hearted people are more heroic than those who are simply smart.”

On fear: “We are going through a period of fear. People are terrified. We have been tested, we are being tested now, but we must recognize that politics in our country is like a pendulum. The pendulum has swung back in a way that may be very dangerous. But books such as Arthur Schlesinger Jr.’s ‘The Cycles of American History’ show us that as a country we have been here before. We must hold onto the inspirational moments of our history and use them to light our path forward. … I keep thinking about Martin Luther King Jr.’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech — and though we still have so far to go as a country, you could not have imagined everything that could have happened from that moment.”

On the strength of our country: “This is a country that has carried the weight of the world. We carry the intellectual leadership and have the highest number of Nobel laureates in the world. We have a dynamic economy, host the great universities and centers of education, and are leaders in innovation and technology. We have the strongest military and some of the greatest medical breakthroughs, such as vaccine development. We still have a strong global leadership presence, though we must not take that for granted.”

On purpose: “Bill Moyers once wrote that to be a fulfilled person in today’s world, people must shape their purpose. If everyone needed to put three logs into a fire in their lifetime, my question would be ‘what are your three logs?’ ”

On timeliness: “In Ecclesiastes, we read ‘Is there anything new under the sun?’ Ultimately, we know that everything here has been said before but must be said again.”

My last time seeing him

I last got to spend time with my old professor and mentor in the fall of 2022. I had just left the Lincoln Project. I always got the impression he didn’t like my involvement with them and their style of politics. His forehead wrinkled when we discussed how it all ended as if to say, “I told you so.”

I had sought advice on my next steps, but in the end we reminisced and discussed the state of things at Harvard and life. He would leave the Center for Public Leadership the next year and retire. I was not surprised.

We met at his favorite spot in Cambridge and I noticed he had an aid escorting him back and forth to his office for our meeting. He seemed philosophical and somewhat distant from our past times together. I know now he was likely dealing with the early symptoms of his illness.

I was fortunate to get that time and share one last meal with someone who changed my life so much. We are a nation blessed by those who step into public service like him.

I am fortunate that I was able to learn from him and make my life better for it. I am not the only one.

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Final thoughts

As we head into the new year I have been busy planning a number of changes to my professional career trajectory and content creation. I am eager to roll them out. A big part of it will be growing our community here on Substack and YouTube. I appreciate you all for joining me here. I would be grateful if you would consider upgrading to a paid subscription as we move in this new direction.

Reminder you will be billed by “UPEND Collective” for your subscription. That is my company.

In the meantime, have a wonderful New Year.