Paige Cowett

Stanley Tucci’s blue hair, Elizabeth Banks’ pink eyelashes, and the brutal slaughter of young children could easily have distracted you from a quieter question at the center of dystopian future in The Hunger Games: who fights in wars and why do they volunteer to do it?

President Obama will deliver the State of the Union speech tonight. What do you know about this tradition and how have other presidents used this address in past years? We'll be giving this quiz to those attending our SOTU watching party at The Greene Space, but you can take it from home too. And -- no googling!

Below you'll see the political networks of each of the major New York gubernatorial candidates. These network maps illustrate confirmed political ties between each of the candidates and their allies. These ties include professional relationships and reported campaign contributors--but they also include the harder-to-track social ties and informal advisory roles that are invaluable in politics. For example—Jennifer Cunningham is not a paid advisor to Andrew Cuomo, but she's known to be an influential advisor nonetheless.

»» Click here to see a bigger/navigable version of the influence map

As part of the Brian Lehrer Show's August weekly series, Book Futures, on the future of the publishing industry with Michael Cader, founder of Publishers Marketplace and Publishers Lunch, we asked you to help us make a reading list for young adults. Here are your suggestions!

As part of our 10 Questions that Count census project, we asked you to Map Your Moves by filling out a survey where you've lived over the last ten years and why you moved. Then we asked all of you graphic designers, mappers, statisticians or any other kind of data visualization gurus, to play with the data and make the information beautiful. (More information about the Map Your Moves challenge here)

Here are the the submissions we've received. Feel free to add your thoughts below. Any favorites? Learn anything new? Share your feedback!

Brian famously misses big news while on vacation. What is the most important news that happened while he was away for the past two weeks?

Tell us the most interesting or underreported news of the last two weeks. Post your pick below and be sure to listen in to the show on Monday when Brian returns.

Everyone's paying attention to Avatar and Up, but all this week at the Brian Lehrer Show we're highlighting some of the documentaries up for a 2010 Oscar. They may not get the hype, but they still deserve to be seen. Hear the BL Show segments and watch the trailers below.

from Pierre Bedat

Rufus Griscom, the founder of Babble.com, has been the weekly guest for the month of January. Each week we delved into one of the parenting taboos highlighted on the taboo-smashing ...

New York, NY —

A grand jury has charged Democratic New Jersey Assemblyman Anthony Chiappone and his wife Diane with taking more than $8,000 from state paychecks for legislative aides and moving the money into campaign and personal accounts. Chiappone represents Bayonne.

He told The Jersey Journal that he was ...