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Karen KwiatkowskiAmerican activist and commentator
Date of Birth: 24.09.1960
Country:  USA |
Content:
Childhood and Education
Born Karen Unger in western North Carolina, Kwiatkowski earned a Master of Public Administration from Harvard University and a Master of Science in Management from the University of Alaska. She holds a PhD in World Politics from The Catholic University of America, where her dissertation focused on overt and covert warfare in Angola as "an illustration of the implementation of the Reagan Doctrine."
Military Career
Kwiatkowski's military service began in 1982 as a second lieutenant at Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska, providing logistic support for missions along China and Russian coasts. She also served in Spain and Italy. Kwiatkowski later joined the National Security Agency (NSA), eventually becoming a speechwriter for the agency director. After leaving the NSA in 1998, she became a Pentagon analyst specializing in sub-Saharan African policy.
On September 11, 2001, Kwiatkowski was working in her Pentagon office when it was attacked. From May 2002 to February 2003, she served in the Pentagon's Near East and South Asia (NESA) office. While at NESA, she authored the anonymous "Pentagon Insider Notes" series that appeared on David Hackworth's website. Kwiatkowski left NESA in February 2003 and retired from the Air Force the following month as a Lieutenant Colonel.
Political Activism
Raised as a Goldwater Republican, Kwiatkowski registered as a Republican from 1981 to 1994. She joined the Libertarian Party in 1994 and remained a member until 2011. She was a featured speaker on military and foreign policy issues at the party's national convention in 2004. In 2011, she returned to the Republican Party and sought to run for the House of Representatives, hoping to join Ron Paul, Justin Amash, and others in the House Republican Liberty Caucus. She received support from the former Republican Party of Virginia chairman and other fiscal and constitutional conservatives.
Kwiatkowski has faced calls from several Libertarian Party members and supporters to run for president as the party's nominee in recent election cycles. She has so far declined to do so. On April 15, 2007, Kwiatkowski was nominated as the Libertarian Party's vice presidential nominee for New Hampshire in 2008, but she declined the nomination within a couple of weeks. She endorsed Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul in 2007.
Personal Life
Kwiatkowski resides with her family in Mount Jackson, Virginia, in the Shenandoah Valley, where she works as a farmer and part-time professor. She is married to Hap Kwiatkowski and has four children and seven grandchildren. Kwiatkowski identifies as a Christian.
