As the president prepares to address the Muslim world from Cairo University in Egypt, The Takeaway previews his speech with two experts on the Middle East: Professor Peter Awn, director of the Middle East studies program at Columbia University and Noah Feldman, professor of law at Harvard and author of The Fall and Rise of the Islamic State (Council on Foreign Relations).

Game on! The NBA Finals start tonight, with the Lakers facing off against the Orlando Magic in what should be a great NBA series. The Takeaway’s sports contributor Ibrahim Abdul-Matin joins us with a heads up on who’s likely to make that last second three-pointer.

Speaking at Cairo University, President Obama touched on issues including Iraq, women's rights, economic development, and religious tolerance. For more analysis on relations between America and the Muslim world, we turn to Professor Peter Awn, director of the Middle East studies program at Columbia University and Noah Feldman, professor of law at Harvard and author of The Fall and Rise of the Islamic State (Council on Foreign Relations).

In President Obama's speech at Cairo University, he made it clear that U.S. and Israel have an "unbreakable" bond. He explained how the Holocaust continues to shape Israeli reactions to threats from the Arab world and to anti-Semitism around the world. But he also said it was undeniable that the Palestinian people – Muslims and Christians – have suffered in pursuit of a homeland. For reactions to this portion of the President's speech we turn to Ethan Bronner, Jerusalem Bureau Chief of the New York Times. We also have Professor Peter Awn, director of the Middle East studies program at Columbia University and Noah Feldman, professor of law at Harvard and author of The Fall and Rise of the Islamic State (Council on Foreign Relations) .

There are more than seven million Muslims in the United States, and they overwhelming supported President Obama in the election. To learn about what they anticipated, and what they heard, in today's speech, John and Andrea talk with Ibrahim Abdul-Matin, a Takeaway contributor, Hanien Hassan Hannesy, a resident of Egypt, and Asra Nomani, journalism professor at Georgetown University and author of Standing Alone in Mecca: An American Woman's Struggle for the Soul of Islam. Peter Awn, director of the Middle East studies program at Columbia University, is also offering commentary.

Miss the President's address? Watch it here:

The New Deal brought us the CCC, the TVA, and the WPA. All thanks to FDR. And today’s stimulus comes along with its own bumper crop of acronyms, like SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and the TIGER Team. (That’s Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery, in case you didn't know.) Wall Street Journal reporter Louise Radnofsky had to read the entire stimulus bill for her job, and she started to keep track of the ever-growing list of new acronyms, some of them pretty ridiculous. She joins John and Andrea with a look how acronyms get in the way of government transparency.

Twenty years ago today the Chinese army rolled their tanks into Tiananmen Square in Beijing and quashed the massive protests that were taking place there. Seven weeks of uprisings, demonstrations, and hunger strikes were wiped out under the treads of Chinese tanks. Casualties numbered in the hundreds or the thousands — there has never been an official accounting — but the toll on the democracy movement was near fatal. To help recreate the scene for us we are joined by the BBC's Kate Adie, who reported from the ground in Tiananmen Square. We are also joined by photographer Jeff Widener, who captured the quintessential image of the struggle — a lone man standing against a line of tanks.

See also the New York Times Photo Essay Behind the Scenes: Tank Man of Tiananmen.

Also: watch a BBC interview with Kate Adie about her experiences that day and her hopes for the future of democracy in China.

President Obama called for a new beginning for the relationship between the U.S. and the Muslim world. How is the Arab world reacting: what did they want to hear about Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel, and women's rights? And what do they want to happen next? The Takeaway turns to Amir Moussa, the Secretary-General of the Arab League and former Egyptian foreign minister, Marcus Mabry, the international business editor for the New York Times, and Muna Shikaki, a correspondent for Al Arabiya, an Arabic news network.

In his message to the Muslim world, President Obama made special mention of Iran's history of hostage-taking and violence against Americans as well as America's own history of meddling in Iranian politics. The President's comments came after a so-called "prebuttal" of his speech by Iran's Supreme Leader, the Ayatollah Khamenei, who claimed the U.S. was "deeply hated" in the Middle East. Jon Leyne, the BBC's Tehran Correspondent, joins us with reactions to the President's speech from Iran and Marcus Mabry, international business editor for the New York Times, joins us in New York.

We've been discussing President Obama's address to the Muslim world from Cairo University. The president touched on a wide range of issues. To hear more global perspectives on his efforts to improve U.S. relations in the Middle East, we are joined by Marcus Mabry, New York Times international business editor, Rami Khouri, editor-at-large of the Daily Star in Beirut, and Muna Shikaki, a correspondent for Al Arabiya.

The State of California is in a bind. The economic downturn has hit the state hard, but when the governor asked the voters to approve a tax increase to help cover the shortfall, the voters flatly said no. The governor has responded with a series of proposed budget cuts that would drastically reduce the state's services to the poor including health care and housing. Californians are balking at these cuts, but Schwarzenegger says there's no alternative. For more on this dilemma we turn to Patricia Nazario, a health, housing and immigration reporter for KPCC in Southern California.

Watch the governor's comments on California's budget in the video below.

While the President is making headlines with his call for a renewed relationship between the U.S. and the Muslim world, there are other things going on in the world today. New jobless numbers are out, showing a drop in claims for the first time in five months. Retailers are reporting some falls in sales while worker productivity increased. For a brief rundown of the business week ahead we are joined by Marcus Mabry, International Business Editor for The New York Times.

Here at The Takeaway, we've been hearing reaction to President Obama's speech in Cairo all morning. Our partners at the BBC have also been getting a lot of reaction. They are devoting their program World Have Your Say, a showcase for global listener response and interaction, to the world's reaction to Obama's address. The host of that show is Madeline Morris and she joins us from London with some of the responses pouring into their site.

To add your voice to the conversation email us at mytake@thetakeaway.org, call us at 1-877-8-MY-TAKE.

Family members continue to mourn the loss of the 228 lives aboard Air France Flight 447, which crashed into the Atlantic ocean on its way to Paris from Brazil. What caused the crash may never be known: French officials have expressed concern that the black box recorders from the plane may never be recovered due to the depth of the water and the mountainous terrain on the sea floor. Captain Patrick Keenan is the U.S. Navy Director of Ocean Engineering and Supervisor of Salvage and Diving and he joins The Takeaway to discuss the challenges of searching for black boxes in deep water.