AMES: Romney WIns; Huckabee In Second  —  Gov Mitt Romney won the 2007 Ames straw poll, receiving 4516 votes, or 31%.  —  In a surprise, Gov. Mike Huckabee finished second with 2587 votes at 18.1%  —  11. John Cox with 41 votes.  —  10. John McCain with 101 votes.  —  9. Duncan Hunter with 174 votes.

How the Fight for Vast New Spying Powers Was Won  —  For three days, Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence, had haggled with congressional leaders over amendments to a federal surveillance law, but now he was putting his foot down.  "This is the issue," said the plain-spoken …

Hizbollah buys frontier land to attack Israel  —  Hizbollah is buying up large tracts of land owned by Christians and other non-Shias in southern Lebanon as the militant group rebuilds its defences in preparation for a new war with Israel, The Sunday Telegraph has been told.

The Sacrifices of Albania's 'Sworn Virgins'  —  A Rockville Filmmaker Tells Of an Old Custom That Both Liberates and Limits Women  —  When the Albanian journalist and author Elvira Dones was traveling in the mountains of northern Albania, she asked for directions from someone she thought …

New Iraq report to warn of attack  —  The Bush administration is finishing a National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq that paints a sobering picture of a mature civil war unlikely to be snuffed out through political progress, according to officials involved in the report's preparation.

Confessions of a BBC liberal  —  The BBC has finally come clean about its bias, says a former editor, who wrote Yes, Minister  —  In the past four weeks there have been two remarkable changes in the public attitude to the BBC.  The first and most newsworthy one was precipitated …

The Army Responds  —  I recently emailed Col. Steve Boylan asking for whatever information he could provide regarding the status of the investigation of Scott Thomas Beauchamp.  Here is his response:

Local Minister, Helper Charged With Assault  —  Flowers, Bassitt Allegedly Dragged Girl Behind Van  —  SAN ANTONIO — A local minister and one of his assistants Friday were charged with aggravated assault in connection with a Nueces County dragging incident.