NPR News

Ukraine's parliamentary elections on Sunday pitted an unpopular government against a fragmented opposition. The ruling Party of the Regions is predicted to hang on to its majority, despite widespread allegations of repression and corruption. One of the main opposition leaders, former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, is in prison on charges on what her supporters say are trumped up corruption charges. The next most popular opposition leader is a heavyweight boxing champion with no political experience.

A poll released Monday by the Pew Research Center shows that President Obama has failed to regain much of the support he lost in the days after the first presidential debate.

The poll shows that among likely voters, the race is now a statistical dead heat with both Obama and Mitt Romney receiving 47 percent support. Among registered voters there is what Pew calls a "statistically insignificant two-point edge" of 47 percent to 45 percent for Obama.

When smoking is banned in bars and workplaces, the number of people who suffer heart attacks and die drops within months, according to two new studies.

They found benefits not only in saving lives, but in lowering the cost of medical care for heart attacks, stroke and other smoking-related illnesses. It's the best evidence yet demonstrating big, swift health improvements when secondhand smoke is banished.

The rest of the government may have been shut down for the hurricane, but not the U.S. Supreme Court.

The justices were in court Monday to consider a challenge to the 2008 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, known as FISA. The new law broadly expanded the government's ability to conduct large-scale monitoring of international phone calls and emails to and from people in the United States.

While the rest of the federal government shut down Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court was open for business as usual — at least long enough to hear two cases argued.

It is hardly the first time that the high court was the macho guy in town, staying open when the rest of the government was closed. The reason appears to be tradition, albeit a modern tradition.