Polls don't reflect Obama's star power  —  The Democrat creates a stir wherever he goes, but runs far behind Clinton nationally.  Some observers are puzzled; others say he's too gentle.  —  DES MOINES — Hutton Street, a modest, racially mixed working-class neighborhood on the city's east side …

Record numbers go abroad for health treatment with 70,000 escaping NHS  —  Record numbers of Britons are travelling abroad for medical treatment to escape the NHS - with 70,000 patients expected to fly out this year.  —  And by the end of the decade 200,000 "health tourists" …

Tancredo says he's leaving Congress  —  Even if he loses his long-shot bid for the White House, Rep. Tom Tancredo will be leaving the U.S. House of Representatives at the end of 2008.  —  Tancredo, 61 , waited until after the Colorado Rockies' last out of the World Series on Sunday night …

Obama campaign spokesman blasts gays at Gospel concert; white preacher and Obama say nothing  —  UPDATE: Per the NYT, the anti-gay activist turned the entire final half hour of the concert into an anti-gay harangue: … Surprise, surprise, surprise.  Obama's anti-gay religious right activist used …

VIN SUPRYNOWICZ: G.I. Joe was just a toy, wasn't he?  —  Hollywood now proposes that in a new live-action movie based on the G.I. Joe toy line, Joe's — well, "G.I." — identity needs to be replaced by membership in an "international force based in Brussels."

The Wiretap This Time  —  EARLIER this month, the Senate Intelligence Committee and the White House agreed to allow the executive branch to conduct dragnet interceptions of the electronic communications of people in the United States.  They also agreed to "immunize" American telephone companies …

EXCLUSIVE: FBI Whistleblower Sibel Edmonds Will Now Tell All - and Face Charges if Necessary - to Any Major Television Network That Will Let Her  —  Attention CBS 60 Minutes: we've got a huge scoop for you.  If you want it.  —  Remember the exclusive story you aired on Sibel Edmonds …

Court to rule on Exxon Valdez verdict  —  The Supreme Court agreed on Monday to rule on the legality of the $2.5 billion punitive damages award against Exxon Mobil Corp. and its shipping subsidiary for the massive oil spill in Alaska's Prince William Sound in 1989 — an incident that has sparked …

Ann Coulter: On the Gay Circuit in West Hollywood  —  We had dinner last night at Murano, a new West Hollywood restaurant, owned by gay circuit party promoter Jeffrey Sanker, and lesbian night club owners Robin Gans and Sandy Sachs.  It's a visually stunning space, straight lines …

Fearing Fear Itself  —  In America's darkest hour, Franklin Delano Roosevelt urged the nation not to succumb to "nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror."  But that was then.  —  Today, many of the men who hope to be the next president — including all of the candidates with a significant chance …

Which Republican candidate is más macho?  —  In Iowa, McCain, Thompson and Giuliani vie for the title of Most Manly, in styles that range from low-key to aw-shucks to making glib jokes about torture.  —  Salon photo composite of Rudy Giuliani, John McCain and Fred Thompson.

THE INVISIBLE PRIMARY—INVISIBLE NO LONGER  —  A First Look at Coverage of the 2008 Presidential Campaign  —  In the early months of the 2008 presidential campaign, the media had already winnowed the race to mostly five candidates and offered Americans relatively little information …

Full Text of Email Reveals Greenwald Mischaracterizations  —  Welcome, fellow minions of the lgf New World Odor  —  Glenn Greenwald, as he had promised in his post at Salon, has forwarded the email he says he received from Colonel Steven A. Boylan, Public Affairs Officer for General Petraeus.