Government & Politics

New York Times reporter David Rohde was covering Pakistan and Afghanistan in November 2008 when he and two companions were kidnapped by the Taliban and held in the tribal areas of Pakistan for seven months. Rohde recounts the ambush — and his subsequent imprisonment and escape.

A staff writer for The New Yorker, Jane Mayer joins Fresh Air host Terry Gross to talk about what she discovered while researching her upcoming article "The Predator War." The story explores the ethics and controversies surrounding the CIA's covert drone program, in which remote-controlled airplanes target and kill terror suspects within Pakistan — a country that's a U.S. ally, not an adversary.

Journalist David E. Hoffman revisits the high stakes maneuverings of the Cold War arms race and details the inner-workings of the Soviet nuclear program in his new book.

Max Cleland served in Vietnam — where he lost both legs and his right arm — before being elected to the U.S. Senate. His new memoir is Heart of a Patriot: How I Found the Courage to Survive Vietnam, Walter Reed and Karl Rove.

Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid discusses the challenges facing President Obama in Afghanistan and Pakistan. His most recent book is Descent into Chaos: The United States and the Failure of Nation Building in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia.

The New York Times columnist and political spitfire, who died Sept. 27 of pancreatic cancer, left behind an indelible legacy in speechwriting and political reporting. We remember Safire with a conversation from the Fresh Air archives.

During the eight years that Bill Clinton was president of the United States, he secretly recorded interviews with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Taylor Branch.

Film critic DAVID EDELSTEIN reviews Michael Moore’s newest documentary, Capitalism: A Love Story.

Is the conservative right undergoing a transformation? Journalist David Weigel thinks so. Weigel covers the Republican party for the online magazine The Washington Independent.

Matt Latimer, speechwriter to President George W. Bush during his last months in office, says his old boss didn't always stick to the script. His new tell-all memoir recounts more than one startling comment that Latimer says his boss made behind closed doors.

After working together on the films Ocean's 11, 12 and 13, actor Matt Damon and director Steven Soderbergh teamed up together again on the new film The Informant!, a dark comedy about a rising corporate executive at Archer Daniels Midland who blows the whistle on price fixing.

One year after the collapse of Lehman Brothers, New York Times financial columnist Gretchen Morgenson reflects on what has — and has not — changed about the financial industry.

Book editor Jonathan Karp worked closely with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy in the final year of the senator's life, getting to know the man behind the public persona, sifting through a half century of papers and finding out Kennedy's deepest feelings about family controversies, successes and tragedies

In his new book Republican Gomorrah: Inside the Movement that Shattered the Party, investigative reporter Max Blumenthal theorizes that a culture of "personal crisis" has transformed the Grand Old Party — and threatened its future.

Writer and director Cherien Dabis talks about her feature film Amreeka, and the immigrant childhood that inspired it.

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy died Tuesday night of complications related to a cancerous brain tumor. In this archival interview from 2006, Kennedy spoke with guest host Dave Davies about the problem of — and possible solutions to — America's burgeoning health care costs.

Puppies Behind Bars is a canine training program that enlists prison inmates to train puppies as bomb-sniffing dogs or as service animals. Many of the dogs are then paired with wounded or disabled veterans.

Charles Sennott has been reporting on the Taliban since 1995. He recently returned to Afghanistan and Pakistan, where he revisited the people and places he got to know through his reporting.

Cult director John Waters discusses his friendship with Manson family member and convicted murderer Leslie Van Houten, who he believes should be released on parole.

In 1993, a freighter with 300 terrified, half-starved Chinese immigrants went aground off the shore of Queens, New York. Author Patrick Radden Keefe chronicles the incident in his new book The Snakehead.