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Ed Gordon talks with soul singer and songwriter Ronald Isley of The Isley Brothers about the group's latest album, Baby Makin' Music, which features collaborations with R. Kelly and Jermaine Dupri.

The Nat King Cole Show debuted in 1956, making singer and jazz pianist Nat "King" Cole the first black man to host a nationally televised variety program. Cole reluctantly challenged segregation on television and in American society, but a year later the show ended.

The FBI says it has video footage of Rep. Bill Jefferson (D-LA) accepting $100,000 from an FBI informant. Jefferson, who has not been charged with anything, insists that he has committed no crime. NPR's Brian Naylor reports.

The Dixie Chicks are back after a three-year break with a new album, Taking the Long Way. It's the band's first release after it experienced a furious backlash in 2003 after an anti-Bush comment by lead singer Natalie Maines.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair visits Iraq's new prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, in Baghdad. British officials say the leaders spoke about the eventual departure of foreign forces from Iraq. Maliki has said his top priority is halting insurgent attacks and stemming sectarian violence that has wracked the country.

The owner of a Los Angeles firm that a supplies legal immigrant farm labor is being fined by federal authorities for allegedly failing to pay 88 temporary workers from Thailand. The owner of the company, Mordechai Orian, was recently profiled by NPR's Carrie Kahn, who has a follow-up report on his problems with the government.

Oil shale is an idea that was tested a generation ago, then abandoned when the price of crude oil plunged. Now, a self-taught inventor is once again eyeing the vast shale deposits of the Rocky Mountains.

In Salinas, Calif., tens of thousands agricultural workers heed the call for a national work boycott by staying away from the fields. As Ben Adler of member station KAZU reports, they had union and industry support for the action, designed to demonstrate immigrant worker strength.

A few miles from the Turkish border, in the former mining town of Vale, stands the House of Culture. Once the heart of the community, the huge structure is now a monument to post-Soviet decline. One flamboyant resident of Vale, known by locals as "Uncle Gocha," has worked without pay for 15 years to keep what's left from collapsing.

The number of American babies born prematurely has been creeping up, and nobody knows entirely why. An Institute of Medicine panel recommends a national effort to reduce these births, which cost the nation $26 billion a year.