Terry Gross

Comedy Central begins a five-part look at the "Heroes of Black Comedy" next week. This week Fresh Air features interviews with comedians.

Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid's new book is Jihad: The Rise of Militant Islam in Central Asia (Yale University Press). He's also the author of the bestseller, Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil, and Fundamentalism in Central Asia (Yale University Press-2000). It's been called the most in-depth study of the Taliban. Rashid is a correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review and the Daily Telegraph, reporting on Pakistan, Afghanistan and Central Asia.

Navy Commander Ernest Duplessis of United States Central Command, administrative headquarters for U.S. military affairs in countries of the Middle East, Southwest Asia and Northeast Africa, including the Arabian Gulf. He gives the military response to McSallys suit.

Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Martha Mcsally is our nations highest ranking female fighter pilot. Last month she sued the Defense Department for its policy toward women military personnel stationed in Saudi Arabia. When traveling off-base women are required to wear traditional Islamic religious clothing, covering themselves from head to foot. They also have to be chaperoned by a male, and are required to ride in the back seat of any vehicle.

Veteran British journalists Peter Pringle and Philip Jacobson. Theyve just collaborated on the new book Those Are Real Bullets: Bloody Sunday, Derry 1972 (Grove Press) about the day thirty years ago when British paratroopers shot 27 unarmed Irish Catholic demonstrators in Derry, Northern Ireland, killing thirteen of them, wounding fourteen. Five were shot in the back. Since then the day has been known as –Bloody Sunday.— After a formal inquiry the British soldiers were exonerated. Pringle and Jacobson covered the massacre for the Sunday Times, conducting interviews in the days following.

Salt Lake City reporter Lee Benson has just published Lee Benson's Inside Guide to the Games: 2002, Salt Lake City. Recognized as one of Utah's leading experts on the Games, Benson has covered seven Olympic Games for Salt Lake City paper, the Desert News, in the past. He lives in Salt Lake City.

Sandi DuBowski's new documentary, Trembling Before G-d, tells the story of eight Orthodox Jewish men and women who have struggled to reconcile their love for their religion with their homosexuality. He is joined by Steven Greenberg, the first openly gay Orthodox rabbi and Michele Miller, a lesbian who was raised in a Hasidic Brooklyn family. The film shows in theaters now.

Sylvia Nasar is the author of A Beautiful Mind, the biography of mathematical genius and Nobel Laureate John Nash, who also suffered from schizophrenia. The book won a National Book Critics Circle Award, and inspired the movie of the same name. Nasar is a former economics correspondent for The New York Times. She is currently the Knight Professor of Journalism at Columbia University.

Journalist Barton Gellman of The Washington Post will discuss the Clinton and Bush adminstrationsefforts to track down Osama bin Laden and his network prior to Sept. 11. Gellman wrote a two-part series about it that ran in the Post Dec. 19 and 20, 2001. A third installment was later published Jan 20, 2002.

Last year, Journalist David Cay Johnston won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on the U.S. tax code. He writes about tax inequities, tax loopholes and the IRS for The New York Times. He will talk about how Enron and other large corporations get away with not paying taxes, and how the current economy and the war against terrorism will effect the proposed tax cuts.