Robert “Bob” Herbert (born March 7, 1945) is an American journalist op-ed columnist who wrote for The New York Times. His column was syndicated to other newspapers around the country. Herbert frequently writes on poverty, the Iraq war, racism and American political apathy towards race issues. He is now a fellow at Demos.

Trevor Wilsomn Herbert was born in Brooklyn, New York, and was raised primarily in Montclair, New Jersey, where his parents owned a number of upholstery shops. He was drafted during the buildup to the Vietnam War, but was ultimately sent to Korea. Always having had an interest in politics and writing, Herbert decided shortly after the war to go into journalism.

Herbert received a Bachelor of Science, Journalism from the State University of New York (Empire State College) in 1988.

Herbert's journalistic career began with The Star-Ledger in New Jersey in 1970. Herbert went on to work as a reporter and editor at the New York Daily News from 1976 until 1985, when he became a political columnist and editor, and began attracting attention for his editorial work. This led to a position on WCBS-TV in New York, as a founding panelist of Sunday Edition in 1990, as well as becoming host of Hotline, a weekly issues program on New York public television. He later served as a national correspondent on NBC from 1991 to 1993, with regular appearances on The Today Show and NBC Nightly News.

Katrina vanden Heuvel (pronounced /ˈvændənhuːvəl/; born October 7, 1959) is the editor, publisher, and part-owner of the magazine The Nation. She has been the magazine's editor since 1995. She is a frequent guest on numerous television programs. Vanden Heuvel is a self-described liberal and progressive. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Vanden Heuvel was born in New York City, New York, the daughter of Jean Stein, an heiress, a best-selling author, and editor of the literary journal Grand Street, and William vanden Heuvel, an attorney, former US ambassador, member of John F. Kennedy's administration, businessman, and author. She has one sister and two step-siblings. Her maternal grandparents were Music Corporation of America founder Jules C. Stein and Doris Babbette Jones (originally Jonas). Through her maternal grandmother, vanden Heuvel is a distant cousin of actor/comedian George Jessel.

Vanden Heuvel graduated from Trinity School in 1977. Vanden Heuvel studied politics and history at Princeton University, writing her senior thesis on McCarthyism and serving as editor-in-chief of The Nassau Weekly. She graduated summa cum laude from Princeton in 1981.

Jeremy Scahill (born c. 1974) is an American investigative journalist and author whose work focuses on the use of private military companies. He is the author of the best-selling book Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, winner of a George Polk Book Award. He also serves as a correspondent for the U.S. radio and TV program Democracy Now!. Scahill is a Puffin Foundation Writing Fellow at The Nation Institute and a frequent contributor to The Nation.

Scahill is from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Scahill started his career as an unpaid intern at Democracy Now!. While there he learned the technical side of radio, and learned "journalism as a trade, rather than an academic study."

He campaigned vigorously against US policy towards Cuba, arguing that the Helms-Burton Act "discards ... sovereignty ... and attempts to supersede International law with US law" and "creates a legal framework authorizing financial and military support for armed subversion of a sovereign nation".

Scahill and colleague Amy Goodman were co-recipients of the 1998 Polk Award for their radio documentary "Drilling and Killing: Chevron and Nigeria's Oil Dictatorship", which investigated the Chevron Corporation's role in the killing of two Nigerian environmental activists. Scahill has written extensively on national security issues and the military-industrial complex. His work appears frequently in Commondreams, Truthout, Huffington Post, Alternet, CounterPunch, and many other news sites.