Fired NPR news analyst Juan Williams fought back on Good Morning America on Friday to defend his controversial comments about fearing Muslim-garbed passengers on airplanes. He also criticized NPR CEO Vivian Schiller for saying that Williams' feelings about Muslims should be between him and "his psychiatrist or publicist." Schiller has apologized for those remarks but defends the firing of Williams. NPR is being pilloried by many listeners and editorials in major newspapers. We speak with Frank Sesno, director of the School of Media and Public Affairs at George Washington University.

Bobby Ghosh served as TIME Magazine's Baghdad bureau chief for five years. Nate Rawlings served two tours of duty there in 2006 and 2008. Recently, they traveled back to Iraq together and found a country that's still dangerous but held together by a fragile sort of progress.

Riot police in Paris shoved aside striking oil workers to force open an important refinery in Paris, Friday. The workers' stand at the refinery had become a symbol of union resistance to the French government's plan to reform pension plans. The protests have crippled transportation across the country and left the country with large piles of un-removed garbage. The French Senate is expected to pass the controversial measure shortly. We have a report from the BBC's Matthew Price in Marseille.

Once upon a time, many people theorized that oil came from dinosaurs. But scientists now believe that most petroleum and natural gas originated as marine organisms, and that's why we keep finding so much of it under the ocean. Our guest, Warren Allmon, says even the oil we get from places like Texas was once under the ocean, and that getting any oil out of the ground is like sucking on a slushie. Allmon is professor of paleontology at Cornell university and director of the Paleontological Research Institute in Ithaca, New York.

"Man up" seems to be the political catchphrase of the season. Sharron Angle, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in Nevada, taunted Democrat Harry Reid to "man up" during a recent debate. Sarah Palin used the phrase to challenge elected officials in her own Republican party to support the Tea Party movement. We talk to Ben Zimmer, the On Language columnist for the New York Times, about how political jargon is resonating this campaign season. We also look at how satirists, like Stephen Colbert who coined the term "truthiness," sometimes warp language to drive their points home.

• Medeski, Martin and Wood, "Bloody Oil"
• Freddie Hubbard, "Little Sunflower"
• Herbie Hancock, "Watermelon Man"
• Massive Attack, "Saturday Come Slow"
• Ken Vandermark, "New Acrylic"
• Kar Kar Madison, "Boubacar Traore"
• Joe Jackson, "Steppin' Out"