A Force of Nature

Ellen Ratner is A FORCE OF NATURE. A member of the powerful Cleveland family that controls Forest City Enterprises, Ellen channels her considerable energy toward progressive causes. She's an analyst for Fox News and Washington bureau chief for the Talk Radio News Service. You might think this would keep her busy, but Ellen finds time to talk with enslaved people in South Sudan and to help Hurricane Katrina victims. Ellen is a study in contrasts. A strict boss who knows her own mind, she's also an enthusiastic kisser of barnyard fowl. Though she professes to dislike kids, she arranges for a blind young Sudanese to have surgery in the U.S. Her partner Cholene Espinoza, a fearless woman who flew the U-2 reconnaissance aircraft in the Air Force and was embedded with the Marines in Iraq, gets teary-eyed when speaking of the goodness of Ellen. Ellen Ratner inspires strong feelings from everyone whose path she crosses. –B.B.