Federal stimulus money is quietly funding subsidized job placements in Sonoma County.

One the funding was released to the local program, it took only a few weeks to begin working. Conner clearly recalls the first person they were able to get hired.

In some cases, explains Fran Conner, the federally subsidized employment program covers the employer’s full cost of hiring the new worker. But even in those other cases, the substantial major of the workers’ wages are reimbursed.

Employers who are interested in participating in this program are invited to contact Karen McCarty, the Subsidized Employment Coordinator, at (707) 523-0550, extension 214. Job seekers should contact either Kirsten Gardner (707) 565-8543 or Isabel Garciabedoya-Melara (707) 565-8559.

There are short stories, and then there’s “micro-fiction,” such as the ultra-brief vignettes featured in Weekend All Things Considered’s “Three-Minute Fiction” contests.

Approximately 15,000 writers have submitted their creations in the first three rounds of the 3-Minute Fiction contests, and Guy Raz says that, even among the finalists, only a fraction of them have ever had anything published

With this level of participation, the process of reading and judging all the entries has become a bigger job, but Raz says listeners to his program will be kept apprised of the process as it unfolds.

Details on how to submit a story for the fourth round of the contest (which will be judged by author Ann Patchett , right) , as well as samples of some of the best submissions from the previous rounds can be found at  3-Minute Fiction.

Long-time NPR listeners will recognize Guy Raz as a well-traveled reporter for the network (his professional bio appears below) . It was just about a year ago that he made the transition to hosting the weekend afternoon newsmagazines, which he says required him to make a considerable adjustment.

Guy Raz joined NPR as an intern in 1997 and became Berlin bureau chief in 2000. In 2003, he was moved to London as NPR's bureau chief. In 2004, Raz left NPR for two years to work as CNN's Jerusalem correspondent.

During his six years abroad, Raz reported from more than 40 countries with a focus on Iraq, Israel and the Palestinian Territories, Afghanistan, Eastern Europe and the Balkans.

His reporting has been part of two Alfred duPont Awards and one Peabody awarded to NPR. He's been a finalist for the Livingston Award four times. For his reporting from Germany, Raz was awarded both the RIAS Berlin prize and the Arthur F. Burns Award.

He has profiled and interviewed dozens of world leaders, including Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Shimon Peres, General David Petraeus and Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Michael Mullen.

As CNN's Jerusalem correspondent, Raz chronicled everything from the rise of Hamas as a political power to the incapacitation of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to Israel's withdrawl from the Gaza Strip in 2005. In May 2004, he spent six weeks with U.S. forces in Najaf during a period of heavy fighting with Shiite insurgents.

In 2006, Raz produced a a five-part series called "The Language of our Times" which ran on All Things Considered. The stories attempted to turn words and terms like "Jihad" and "War on Terror" into "audio characters."

Raz's written work has appeared in Salon, Washington City Paper, The Washington Post, The Christian Science Monitor and the German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung.

As NPR’s Chief European Correspondent Sylvia Poggioli has covered momentous events there over the past 25 years. She has also observed some broad changes in the way journalism is conducted.

Even though there are fewer other foreign reporters working alongside her in Europe, Poggoili says the sharp cutbacks that have swept through American newspapers are just beginning to be felt among their European counterparts.

Somewhat ironically, Poggoili (seen at left with KRCB News Director Bruce Robinson outside the studio where this interview was recorded)  is practicing western-style First Amendment journalism in a nation where very little of that still exists. Most of the new media there. She notes, is either controlled by or subservient to Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

California’s far north coast is home to a nationwide campaign for a constitutional amendment to revoke the concept of “corporate personhood,” as recently extended by the US Supreme Court.

More information about the proposed constitutional amendment can be found at the website for Move to Amend. Humbolt County Attorney David Cobb predicts that this issue that will generate a grassroots political movement that will gain momentum as it sweeps across the country over the next 1-3 years.

Drafting a constitutional amendment to address this issue is a complex and delicate matter, so Cobb says that, too, is being worked out in a transparent and inclusive process.

Murray Hill, a public relations firm in Silver Spring, Maryland, has seized on the Citizens United ruling to become the first "corporate person" to run for public office. Here's "his" somewhat satirical campaign ad.

By way of contrast, Ira Glasser, head of the American Civil Liberties Union offers a dissenting view  on the Supreme Court decision.