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Avoiding back-room deals | Who will give out the new green jobs? Who will get them? ASK THIS| March 83, 2009 The stimulus bill could lead to a million or more “green” jobs, many of them created at the state and local levels. For reporters this is an important story on two levels: keeping track of energy and environmental enhancements as they develop, and the doling out of jobs: how will hiring work? 
We’re at war now, too | Ask Obama about a truly progressive income tax ASK THIS| March 83, 2009 In the World War II era the marginal tax rate was 90 percent, starting at incomes of $250,000. Obama is asking for a modest increase of a few percentage points, to 39.6 percent, at upper income levels.
Look for a student loan controversy | Following up on Obama’s plans for higher education ASK THIS Can the U.S., now lagging badly, regain a position as one of the world leaders in educational attainment? Pedro de la Torre III poses some questions and offers leads for reporters.
Vestiges of the cold war | Ask Obama the hair-trigger alert question ASK THIS How many ballistic missiles do the U.S. and Russia have pointed at each other, ready to be set off in an instant? Will you work with Russia to bring down the threat level?
What do we want banks to do? | Questions about nationalizing the banks ASK THIS The U.S. government may be on the verge of nationalizing large banks. Two experts who anticipated America's financial collapse on this Web site as early as 2005, Martin Lobel and Henry M. Banta, propose basic questions reporters should ask about nationalization.
New administration | Basic questions Treasury still hasn’t answered ASK THIS| March 65, 2009 The oversight panel appointed by Congress to watch over the government's $700 billion financial bailout still can't get straight answers to simple questions. No wonder public confidence isn't high.
Up 63 percent in 5 years | Pentagon PR spending soars ASK THIS Reporters need to examine where the line is between public relations and propaganda, or if there is a line at all. This year the cost of 'winning hearts and minds' at home and abroad is expected to be at least $4.7 billion. Can we expect change in an Obama administration?
Computer Assisted Reporting | Food and health in a failing economy ASK THIS Judith Bell of the advocacy group PolicyLink lays out the dramatic correlations, in low-income neighborhoods, between the lack of healthy food choices and the onset of obesity and diabetes.
Words matter | A stimulus bill by any other name is...? ASK THIS How to define the newly-enacted $785-billion bill? Is it a bailout bill? A jobs bill? Is it pork? Reporters and editors need to reject political spin and be precise because from day to day they will, in large degree, be defining the current economic debate.
The new administration | Nine climate questions for President Obama ASK THIS What's Obama's strategy for dealing with climate change? Former Shorenstein Fellow Eric Pooley writes that it is time for the president to make clear what sort of climate-change legislation he’s looking for -- not by wading into the all the minutiae, but by explaining to the American people why a climate bill is important and what basic principles he thinks should guide it.
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