POLL: Strong Iowa Presence Lifts Romney, But Republican Enthusiasm is Low  —  Republican Contenders Meet in Iowa for First Network Debate Sunday  —  A strong presence in Iowa has lifted Mitt Romney over his Republican rivals in overall support and ratings of personal attributes alike.

Al Qaeda member: U.S. embassies prime targets  —  (CNN) — U.S. Embassies and American interests "at home and abroad" are prime targets for terrorist attacks, American al Qaeda member Adam Yahiye Gadahn said in a newly released al Qaeda-produced video.  —  "We shall continue to target …

Lead Pipes vs. Leaky Pipes  —  The netroots is reveling in Chicago, and the natural reaction is to ask, "Where's our YearlyKos?"  —  It's a good question, but ultimately a short-sighted one from an historical perspective.  Go back and re-read the TNR piece on the netroots from May.  Especially this part:

'Establish Islamic state'  —  Radical UK Islamist group holds London conference.  'Why is Palestine still occupied?' asks speaker  —  Yaakov Lappin  —  The British branch of a world-wide radical Islamist group, Hizb ut-Tahrir, held a conference London on Saturday, in which speakers called …

I have seen the horror  —  Al Qaeda is guilty of monstrosities in Iraq - no matter what anyone says  —  Amid all this talk of timetables for the War in Iraq, blurred as they are by a strange lemming-like compulsion to declare the "surge" strategy a failure almost before it actually began …

The Rise Of Jeri Thompson  —  Ex-Senator's Wife Is Helping to Shape His Probable Bid  —  On a hot Saturday in June 2002, Fred D. Thompson married his second wife, Jeri Kehn, in an unventilated Congregational church in her home town of Naperville, Ill. Kehn, in a Valentino gown …

The vanishing jihad exposés  —  Mark Steyn column  —  How will we lose the war against "radical Islam"?  —  Well, it won't be in a tank battle.  Or in the Sunni Triangle or the caves of Bora Bora.  It won't be because terrorists fly three jets into the Oval Office …

The Dumbest Move the Dems Could Make  —  "Impeach or else!"  —  That was the headline that one liberal Web site ran over a recent interview with the antiwar activist Cindy Sheehan, who has been demanding that President Bush and Vice President Cheney be chucked out of office.

TNR: Not Quite All the News that's Fit to Print  —  A funny thing happened on the way to The New Republic's verification/justification/re- investigation of the series of stories published in TNR by one Scott Thomas Beauchamp.  —  The editors of The New Republic declared:

Republicans hardening stance on immigration  —  (08-04) 04:00 PDT Washington — An anti-immigration backlash has taken hold among Republicans in the Capitol, led in some cases by the staunchest supporters - Sens. John McCain and Jon Kyl of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina …

Better red than dead  —  Healthcare pressures may cause the trend towards free-market capitalism to reverse, with a large chunk of the economy reverting to a socialist system.  —  Will the inexorable rise in medical costs around the world someday pose a major challenge to contemporary capitalism?

Bomb Scare in Goose Creek After Routine Traffic Stop  —  Goose Creek - Police have detained two men after finding and detonating a suspicious item found in their car during a routine stop for a speeding violation on a highway near Charleston.  —  Sources say a four-door sedan was stopped during …