Paul Fitzgerald and Elizabeth Gould

Paul Fitzgerald and Elizabeth Gould, a husband and wife team, began working together in 1979 co-producing a documentary for Paul's television show. They acquired the first visas to enter Afghanistan ever granted to an American TV crew, and in the spring of 1981, they found themselves in the middle of the most heated Cold War controversy since Vietnam. As the first American journalists to get deeply inside the story, they not only got a view of an unseen Afghan life, but a revelatory look at how the U.S. defined itself against the rest of the world under the veil of superpower confrontation.

In the years since 9/11, much has happened to bring Paul and Elizabeth's story into sharp focus. Their efforts to combine personal diplomacy with activist journalism is a model for restoring a healthy and vibrant dialogue to American democracy. Their book "Invisible History: Afghanistan's Untold Story" lays bare why it was inevitable that the Soviet Union and the U.S. should end up in Afghanistan, and what that means to the future of the American empire. Their 2011 book, "Crossing Zero," focuses on the nuances of the Obama administration's evolving military and political strategy, those who have been chosen to implement it, and the long-term consequences for the U.S. and the region.