September 5, 2010 | NPR · This is an unsettled time in the American economy. Last week, the stock market rose, but so did the unemployment rate. The nation lost jobs overall, but the number of private-sector jobs was up.  One thing everyone can agree on, though: The recovery has slowed. And this week, President Obama will unveil a new economic package including tax cuts for small businesses. The price tag: as high as $300 billion.

September 5, 2010 | NPR · Six years ago, he woke up naked behind a Burger King dumpster with no memory of who he was before. Nothing, that is, except a few brief snatches from his past and the way he spelled his first name: Benjaman.

September 5, 2010 | NPR · Almost every ethnic group in this country has gone through a period of transition when they had to fight to prove that, indeed, they were Americans. Right now it seems to be Muslim Americans' turn.

September 5, 2010 | NPR · Hentoff was 11 years old, strolling along a Boston street, when he first heard jazz clarinetist Artie Shaw's famous composition "Nightmare" and was hooked. He has spent roughly six decades covering the world of jazz, and he's collected his thoughts and memories in a new book, At the Jazz Band Ball: Sixty Years on the Jazz Scene.