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Pollsters often ask: "If the election were held today, who would you vote for?" The fundamental problem is that the election is not being held today. But while a lot will change between now and November, strategists say campaigns use early polling to help shape a winning message.

U.S. oil production has been on the rise, and that's been widely noted. But the same is true throughout the Americas, which are now home to four of the world's top nine producers.

After more than a decade busting corruption, Patrick Fitzgerald is stepping down. The federal prosecutor, known as "Eliot Ness with a Harvard degree," went after the Gambino crime family, al-Qaida and even the White House — not to mention two former Illinois governors who are now in jail.

Rollie Pemberton often wrote about about his hometown of Edmonton, Alberta when he was its poet laureate. But running parallel to that career was one in hip-hop. As Cadence Weapon, Pemberton remains locally minded on his third album, Hope in Dirt City.

Egypt held its first free election for a national leader this week. Though the official results are not yet in, the election is certainly a milestone in the democratic awakening known as the Arab Spring. Host Scott Simon talks with NPR's Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson in Egypt, Eleanor Beardsley in Tunisia and Kelly McEvers in Beirut.

In Massachusetts, Democratic Senate candidate and Harvard Law Professor Elizabeth Warren continues to be dogged by the question of her American Indian heritage. Friday, in the wake of a report from The Boston Globe, Republican Sen. Scott Brown accused Warren of misleading Harvard about her Native American ethnicity. From member station WBUR in Boston, Fred Thys reports.

South Africa's youth unemployment rate is staggeringly high. The country's overall unemployment rate is 24 percent, and an incredible 73 percent of those people are under the age of 35. Many fear the situation is a ticking time bomb, with the threat of violence looming. Now political parties are strongly lobbying for the support of the youthful unemployed, who have played a huge role in determining the country's leaders.

Headphones have become common in the workplace, allowing people to tune out their co-workers. But in many cases, those same co-workers are still communicating — online. Critics say technology is letting us hide from one another, but in one case study workers who posted on an internal company blog actually increased productivity.

Election results set the stage for a runoff vote between the Muslim Brotherhood's Mohamed Morsi and Ahmed Shafik, the last prime minister under former President Mubarak. International monitors called the election one of Egypt's most transparent, but violent protests broke out after the final tally.

In The Last Full Measure: How Soldiers Die In Battle, Michael Stephenson traces the history of combat. He describes how soldiers fight and die, how those who survive deal with the experience of combat, and what it reveals about warfare and human nature.