Government & Politics

Journalist David E. Hoffman's new book is called The Oligarchs: Wealth and Power in the New Russia. He profiles a group of men who became leaders in post-soviet Russia, taking over industry, commanding private armies and buying up television stations. Hoffman is the former Moscow Bureau chief for the Washington Post. Now he is based in D.C. as the newspapers Foreign Editor.

Human rights leader Jeri Laber. Shes one of the founders of Helsinki Watch, which eventually became Human Rights Watch. Her new book, The Courage of Strangers: Coming of Age with the Human Rights Movement is a memoir that is part personal history and part history of the human rights movement. Laber was executive director of Helsinki Watch from 1979 to 1995 and has written many articles for newspapers and magazines. She's been awarded the Order of Merit by President Vaclav Havel on behalf of the Czech Republic, and she's also won the prestigious MacArthur Grant.

His book is called Them: Adventures with Extremists. (Simon and Schuster). He traveled around the world interviewing different types of extremistsfrom Islamic fundamentalists in a Jihad training camp, to Ku Klux Klansmen at rallies. Them was first published in the U.K. in the spring of 2001.

Journalist Christopher Dickey is the Paris bureau chief and Middle East regional editor for Newsweek magazine. He's co-author of the cover story for the Sept. 23 issue, "How We Helped Create Saddam: And Can We Fix Iraq After He's Gone?" Dickey is also a novelist, and author of Summer of Deliverance: A Memoir of Father and Son about his relationship with his father, poet and novelist James Dickey.

Founder of the Federal Witness Protection Program, Gerald Shur, and journalist Pete Earley. They've collaborated on the new book, WITSEC: Inside the Federal Witness Protection Program (Bantam Books). Shur started the program in the 1960s after realizing that many witnesses would not testify because they were afraid of being killed as a result. WITSEC assigns a new identity and relocates witnesses and their dependents. Witnesses have included everyone from mobsters to drug traffickers to terrorists in the first world trade center bombing. Shur headed the program for 34 years.

Chris Giannou, surgeon for the International Committee of the Red Cross. For about 20 years he has been a medic in war torn parts of the world including Burundi, Somalia, and in a Palestinian Refugee Camp. As such he has seen the devastation on human beings from landmines. Giannou is currently leading the Red Cross's campaign for a ban on anti-personnel landmines worldwide, which kill or injure hundreds of civilians each week. Giannou has just returned from six weeks in Afghanistan.

Linguist Geoffrey Nunberg looks at the word, "evil".

We speak with two people involved with "Youth Portraits," a radio skills training program for ex-offenders released from Riker's Island prison in New York City. Riker's Island is the biggest jail in North America. "Youth Portraits" is a joint project of Friends of the Island Academy and Sound Portraits Productions. First, we hear from Andre Vaughn, a 21-year-old ex-offender who was released from Riker's and became involved with the "Youth Portraits" program. He was caught stealing at the age of 17 and subsequently served three sentences.

We speak with Clinton Lacy, a longtime program director of Friends of the Island Academy. FOIA was founded in 1989 by the first principal of the high school on Riker's Island. The program is designed to break the cycle of return to Riker's by providing education and counseling. Each year, FOIA works with 350 young people.

Language commentator Geoff Nunberg looks at the term "capitalism." He says it is back in fashion after an era of "free enterprise".

Journalist Andrew Meldrum is the Guardian Zimbabwe correspondent. Currently, he covers the upcoming presidential election in Zimbabwe and the crackdown that the media faces as election time nears. In the past few weeks, he written a series of articles focusing on the bill President Mugabe signed, requiring all journalists working in Zimbabwe to have a license from the Minister of Information.

Yossi Klein Halevi is the Israeli correspondent for the New Republic magazine. He was born and raised in New York City. He's lived in Jerusalem since 1982. His book Memoirs of Jewish Extremist: An American Story is about his years first as a follower and then as an opponent of Rabbi Meir Kahane. His latest book is At the Entrance to the Garden of Eden: A Jews Search for God With Christians and Muslims in the Holy Land (William Morrow).

Raja Shehadeh is a Palestinian lawyer and writer whose latest book is Strangers in the House: Coming of Age in Occupied Palestine. (Steer Forth Press) He is a founder of the nonpartisan human rights organization Al-Haq, an affiliate of the International Commission of Jurists, and author of several books about international law, human rights and the Middle East. Shehadeh lives in Ramallah.

He reviews the political documentary, Journeys with George, a behind-the-scenes look at the 2000 presidential race.

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.

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.

Milt Bearden spent 30 years in the CIA. He ran the CIA covert operations in Afghanistan during the Soviet invasion, and helped train the Afghan freedom fighters. Bearden also was station chief in Pakistan, Moscow, and Khartoum. He received the CIA highest honor, the Distinguished Intelligence Medal. Since the Sept. 11th attacks, Bearden has been a frequent commentator on TV and in print. He is also the author of the novel, The Black Tulip: A Novel of War in Afghanistan (paperback, Random House).