Journalism

Jeremy Scahill has been investigating Blackwater, a military contractor with a long involvement in the Iraq war. His latest story, published Nov. 23 in The Nation, uncovers the contractor's involvement in a covert program in Pakistan run by the U.S. Joint Special Command.

Despite the economic recession — or perhaps because of it — the kidnapping business is booming. In his recent New York Times Magazine article, journalist Nicholas Schmidle explores the international hostage market and its impact on workers.

In a new book, journalist Joshua Kosman predicts a coming credit crisis, and assigns blame to private equity firms. While such firms make a fast profit from buying companies, improving them and reselling them, the companies take on the debt incurred from the purchase, leaving them in danger of financial collapse.

Working for Japan's Yomiuri Shinbone newspaper, reporter Jake Adelstein uncovered a world unknown to many of the Japanese public, let alone to foreigners: the world of organized crime. He details its landscape -- and the dangers of covering it -- in a new memoir.

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.

Financial journalist Andrew Ross Sorkin discusses his investigation into what really happened one year ago during the financial collapse and bailout. That's the epic tale he tells in his new book Too Big To Fail: The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System — and Themselves.

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.

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.

Don Hewitt, who died on Aug. 19 at age 86, didn't invent the TV newsmagazine, but he sure invented the most successful and durable one. David Bianculli offers a remembrance of the man behind 60 Minutes.

Newspapers are in trouble, and many Web sites, blogs and cable news shows have opinionated hosts at the helm. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Alex Jones talks about his book, Losing the News, and the crisis facing impartial reporting.