Laughter on the road to sobriety. At age 13, Augusten Burroughs’ mentally ill mother gave him up to her psychiatrist. At 19, he was drinking heavily and by 30 he was in rehab. Along the way, he kept copious notes and his wickedly funny sense of humor.

Now, years later, the best selling author of “Running With Scissors” looks back on kicking the bottle while working in the New York world. Equal parts hilarious and horrifying, his new book “Dry,” reveals the sobering side of addiction. From gay rehab to AA, Burroughs takes us on a wacky adventure where comedy and calamity go hand in hand — all the while, leaving us to wonder if laughter isn’t the best medicine of all.

Guests:

Augusten Burroughs, author of “Dry,” a memoir about a recovering alcoholic

Charles Taylor’s out, if not down. Liberia lies in ruins. Thousands of Marines lie off-shore. Some see this is the test case, for America’s policy to Africa, and a window on the Bush-men’s attitude to race. Other say no, this is an African problem, Africa should solve it. Two views, same corner.

African-Americans are divided on Liberia, Zimbabwe, and the U.S. moral duty to the whole continent. South Africa was easy, the bad guys were white, the good guys were black. Apartheid, deep south segregation, exported. The hero was Mandela. But when the villains are black — the case is less clear. Sankoh of Sierra Leone, Zimbabwe’s Mugabe and Taylor too, once found favor with the Black Caucus on the Hill.

Guests:

Salih Booker, Executive Director of Africa Action, a nonprofit organization concerned with American foreign policy in Africa

Representative Donald Payne, (D) N.J., ranking member of the International Relations Subcommittee on Africa and past chairman, Congressional Black Caucus

There. I said it. I’m Lyse Doucet, as if I am my name, those two words. For most us, our name is one of the few parts of our lives we don’t choose for ourselves. My name is French for “soft lily,” pronounced the Acadian way of New Brunswick, in eastern Canada, where I grew up.

All of our names tell stories. Moon Unit Zappa, that child of the ’60s, said as a girl she dreamed of having a “normal name like Debbie, Mary or Jane.” But the news in names is there’s no normal anymore. Many American parents are just making up their children’s names. Or they’re reaching back a couple of generations. It’s why the names you hear on playgrounds are the same as the ones in nursing homes. Hello, Sophie. Hello, Max. I’m Lyse.

Guests:

Stanley Lieberson, Professor of Sociology, Harvard University, author, “A Matter of Taste: How Names, Fashions, and Culture Change”

Cleveland Kent Evans, Associate Professor of Psychology, Bellevue University, co-author, “The Ultimate Baby Name Book.”

The new leader of the World Health Organization is obsessed with numbers. Huge numbers, like three million AIDS patients he wants to provide with anti-retro-viral drugs, and 13 times that number infected with the disease. And smaller numbers, too, like thousands of new polio cases each year, despite the aggressive, and successful, decade-long WHO campaign to eradicate the disease.

But the most important number to Dr. Jong Wook Lee is fourteen-thousand. That’s the number of WHO employees he hopes will embrace his vision and plan of action for their Geneva based agency. He’s the WHO’s new Director General and wants to take his agency from headquarters to the field in the battle for global health. A conversation with the new disease gatekeeper.

Guests:

Dr. Jong-Wook Lee, the new Director General of the World Health Organization

Charles Piller, science writer for the Los Angeles Times

Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery. But when it comes to fine art, it’s a bit more complicated. For centuries, budding painters have honed their technique and honored their teachers by copying their masters’ works. The best copy cats, Rubens and Rembrandt among them, soon became artists in their own right. But those who failed could still earn a tidy living turning out the replicas, brushstroke for brushstroke. Not much has changed.

Today, there’s a booming business in commissioned fakes. Let the billionaires spend millions on the genuine article, a newly minted “Renoir” only sets you back by a couple of thousand. But when reproductions are passed off as real, the police take note. Fakers, forgers and felons.

Guests:

John Myatt, founder, Genuine Fakes, Ltd.

Alan Chong, Norma Jean Calderwood Curator of the Collection at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Frederick Ilchman, Assistant Curator, Art of Europe, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

“Good fences make good neighbors.” So ends the Robert Frost poem “Mending Wall.” It’s a sentiment Israel’s Prime minister Ariel Sharon often evokes when he speaks of the wall, or fence, depending on your view, that Israel is building to separate its citizens from the Palestinians living in the West Bank.

For Israelis who support it, its a vital security weapon, a physical barrier to stop the suicide bombers. For Palestinians, its a Berlin Wall, cutting them from their land, and livelihoods. And now its become a hurdle for President Bush, as he struggles to push forward a road map for peace. His administration is even hinting it could cancel loan guarantees if construction doesn’t stop. Considering “something there is that doesn’t love a wall.”

Guests:

Michael Tarazi, legal advisor to the Negotiations Affairs Department of the PLO

Labor party member of the Israeli parliament Danny Yatom, former chief of the Israeli intelligence service Mossad

James Rodgers, BBC correspondent currently in Jerusalem.

Guests:

t.b.a.

Tonight, look up into the northern sky. If you’re lucky, you’ll see constellations like The Great Bear. But, like most stargazers, you may long to see it in all its glory, as close and crisp as possible, and your telescope in the backyard may not help that much. For decades, astronomers, yearned to see the universe more clearly.

In 1990, they got their wish. NASA launched the Hubble Space Telescope. It’s captured spectacular images of planets and galaxies. It’s inspired stargazers and students, and it’s helped scientists answer the biggest of questions: How old is our universe? What are black holes? Why do stars explode? But NASA is planning to end Hubble’s life and scientists and amateurs alike are protesting.

Guests:

Robert P. Kirshner, Clowes Professor of Science at Harvard University at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, and author, “The Extravagant Universe”

Jim O’Leary, Senior Director of Technology, The Imax Planetarium at the Maryland Science Center

Rick Feinberg, editor-in-chief of Sky & Telescope.

Guests:

T.B.D.

Separate but equal. It still has a place in American education. There are same sex schools, and all Black colleges. And now there’s a high school for gay students. Harvey Milk High School, the nation’s first all-gay, public high school opens its doors this Fall to 100 students and a whole lot of controversy.

Named after the slain gay rights activist, the school is sparking heated debate in New York City and beyond. Supporters says it’s a safe place for kids facing harassment and discrimination. Critics say they don’t want their tax dollars supporting special treatment for gay teens. Meanwhile, Mayor Bloomberg and some City Council members wish the issue would just go away. Segregation or integration? The debate over Harvey Milk High School.

Guests:

David Mensah, Executive Director of the Hetrick-Martin Institute, a gay lesbian, bisexual and transgender youth group that’s working with the Harvey Milk School

Jonathan Turley, professor at the George Washington University Law School

Feyla McNamara, bisexual student at Windsor High School in Windsor, Connecticut.