For the hour of Wednesday's State of the Union address, MSNBC anchor Chris Matthews said he "forgot" President Obama was black, causing a wide range of responses (including some on our show) the next day. Do we all need to forget about race to be post-racial? Or do we just need to acknowledge and accept people's race?

• CONGRESS TAKEOUT: Takeaway Washington correspondent Todd Zwillich reports on the re-confirmation of Federal Reserve Chief Ben Bernanke.
• SPORTS TAKEOUT: Sports Illustrated writer Jon Wertheim joins us with the latest from the Australian Open.
• LISTENER TAKEOUT: Listeners react to Chris Matthews comment that he "forgot" the president was black during the State of the Union.

President Obama's State of the Union Address didn't have much to say on foreign policy or the war effort, but John Hockenberry got to ask Gen. David Petraeus about it when he sat down the head of U.S. Central Command this week. In part two of our wide ranging interview, Gen. Patreaus lays out the strategies and challenges in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

All this week, we’ve been focusing on the State of Our Union. President Obama offered his version on Wednesday night. Today in Washington, Jefferson Keel, the president of the National Congress of American Indians and a member of the Chickasaw Nation of Oklahoma, offers his take on the state of the Indian union.

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair is making his highly anticipated appearance before a public inquiry in London today, culminating a dramatic couple of weeks which have seen several high-profile politicians publicly defend their controversial decisions to follow the United States to war in Iraq in 2003.

On Tuesday, the oft-thanked Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will announce this year's Oscar nominations, and for the first time since 1943 there will be ten nominees for Best Picture, instead of five. How will the increased number of films affect the Best Picture race? And what movies won't be nominated, despite the wider playing field?

In his State of the Union address, President Obama proposed to spend $30 billion to help small businesses weather the tough economy. This is the latest move by the administration to support small business owners, but has any of these plans materialized into practical help? We put the question to small business owners in different parts of the country.

• BUSINESS TAKEOUT: New York Times reporter Louise Story reports on Apple's new iPad tablet. Many people don't like the name "iPad." In fact, some can't even pronounce it. 
• SPORTS TAKEOUT: Takeaway sports contributor Ibrahim Abdul Matin reportrs on the controversy surrounding the Pro Bowl. Does moving the game up to a week before the Super Bowl hurt the best players in the league— by forcing them to watch from the sidelines and lose a day of rest at home?

Every seven days, the editors of The Week put their stamp on the news with their "Good Week/Bad Week" feature. It was a good week for James Cameron, whose film broke the world box office record.  It was a bad week for fans of reading in Laredo, Texas. The city's only bookstore closed down.

Yesterday, we talked about the anticipated influx of Haitian immigrants to Florida in the upcoming weeks. Today, we look at a place where Haitians are already seeking refuge: across the border in the Dominican Republic. Before the earthquake, up to a million Haitians were already living in the neighboring nation – many of them undocumented. Now thousands more are expected to cross into the Dominican Republic in the coming months.

The Grammy Awards are notorious for being disconnected from what people – critics and listeners alike – actually think about music. Will the awards be any different this year? Caryn Ganz from Rolling Stone magazine shares her predidtions.

J.D. Salinger, author of "The Catcher in the Rye," died yesterday at age 91. The critically acclaimed novel about teenage angst shocked and inspired the world of literature for decades, while its author refused interviews and eventually withdrew to a small town in New Hampshire.

The Obama administration is considering moving the trial of chief organizer of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed out of New York City. Benjamin Weiser, reporter at The New York Times tells us why.

The economy grew 5.7 percent in the fourth quarter of last year. That makes it the second straight quarter of growth and the fastest since 2003. We find out more about the numbers and whether they say anything about the employment situation, with Wall Street Journal reporter Kelly Evans.

Retired Air Force Lt. Col. Lee A. Archer died this week in New York City at age 90. Archer was a Tuskegee Airman and considered to be the only black ace pilot.  The Tuskegee Airmen were America’s first black fighter pilot group in World War II.