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NPR's Chitra Ragavan reports on the efforts by lobbyists to influence the tort reform debate in Congress. This week, the House of Representatives passed a measure which limits the dollar amount that juries can award plaintiffs who sue doctors and manufacturers.

Michael Jordan returned to the National Basketball Association this afternoon. NPR's Scott Simon was at Chicago Bulls game against the Indiana Pacers and talks with Jacki about Jordan's return.

Jyll Johnstone and Barbara Ettinger have explored the way they each were raised by nanny's in the 1950's in a new documentary called "Martha and Ethyl." Johnstone's nanny was a rigid disciplinarian, Ettinger had the opposite with a woman named Ethyl who she now look upon as a second mother.

Jacki Lyden talks to Geraldine Brooks, former Wall Street Journal corresspondant who has written a book on women and Islam. The book, "Nine parts of Desire" details some of Brooks more unusual experiences in the Middle East including a visit with the late Ayatollah Khomeni's family. Brooks says that there are many advantages in being a woman in that part of the world. The book is published by Doubleday.

Jacki talks with Dr. Sigmund Eckhouse. He's a former chemical engineer who for 36 years worked for the Army in developing the chemical agents that would be used in chemical weapons. They discuss the history of chemical weapons from World War one and up to the present.

NPR's Melissa Block reports survivors of the Long Islan Railroad shooting in New York made courtroom statements this past week in th trial of Colin Ferguson. He was convicted of killing 6 people during a shooting rampage on the railroad. Crime victims and their relatives are making their case in court more and more often.

We present the best and worst of the responses to last week's request for spring cleaning music - music while you clean!

NPR's Julie McCarthy reports on conflicting feelings in Japan as the August anniversary of the end of World War Two approaches.

Alice Magill recalls the time ..just before her wedding when she learned why her father would not be able to give her away.

Daniel talks with Martha Manning, psychologist and author of "Undercurrents: A Therapist's Reckoning with Her Own Depression," (HarperSanFrancisco) which recounts her descent into a debilitating depression and her decision to undergo electro-shock therapy as a last resort. She says the treatment, sometimes considered outdated by professionals like herself, helped her regain her ability to function in the world.

NPR's Laura Knoy reports on another presidential hopeful. Alan Keyes, a former top state department and United Nations official will be the first Black to run as a Republican presidential candidate. Knoy reports that Keyes is a real long-shot.

NPR's Claudio Sanchez reports on the fact that two out of three households cannot afford a computer. Experts say the technology gap between the haves and have nots is a growing problem for the nation's workforce.

Karen Michel reports from New York on the stage adaptation of neurologist Oliver Sacks' book "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat."

Laura Seidel reports from New York on the extradition to Oklahoma of convicted double murderer Thomas Grasso. Grasso had been serving a sentence of 20 years to life in New York--a state with no death penalty--but is scheduled to be executed in Oklahoma early tomorrow morning.

Daniel talks with NPR's Maria Hinojosa, who covered the economic and refugee crises in Cuba six months ago and returned to the island recently to find significant changes in both Cuba's economy and mood. State-sanctioned farmers' markets are flourishing, food is plentiful and Cubans appear upbeat, Hinojosa says. But with the Castro dictatorship still in power, these changes have no legal protection.

Jacki talks to NPR's Brian Naylor about the lastest budget cuts in Congress. Last week House appropriations subcomittes cut $7.2 billion from non-military domestic programs such as low income housing and nutritional programs for pregnant women and children.

Jacki speaks with Professor Dirk Vandewalle of Dartmouth College..and Algerian artist TAhar Bouqeterie about the recent violence in Algeria. More than 30-thousand people have been killed in that conflict.

Maria Hinojosa reports that law enforcement is increasingly relying on the use of informants to catch people suspected of crimes. The problem is that often those informants have criminal records themselves and have been known to lie to law enforcement about what they've discovered, which, in some instances has meant that innocent people have been dragged through criminal proceedings.

Daniel talks to Goeran Carstedt, President of Ikea North America about his company's take on American lifestyles. According to an Ikea report Americans center all their furnishings around the television...which is getting bigger and bigger. By contrast in Ikea's homebase Sweden, people tend to centre their lifestyles around a dining room sets..they talk more and watch T.V. less.

NPR's Linda Gradstein reports from Jerusalem that Palestinian strawberry growers are struggling to export their fruit to foreign purchasers. But an Israeli agricultural company is doing everything it can to keep direct exports from taking place.