Alberto
Gonzales

U.S. Attorney General
Age: 52
HLS J.D. 1982
Home Base Vienna, VA
Rank Last Year Not Ranked

Précis Using twists of legal logic, Gonzales has reinterpreted everything from the Geneva Conventions to warrant-free eavesdropping.

Work in Progress Though his testimony before Congress impressed neither Republicans nor Democrats, Gonzales has so far survived the scandal over the firing of U.S. attorneys for partisan purposes. Yet it's not going to go away soon, and the expanded concept of executive privilege that he has promoted isn't convincing many. Meanwhile, morale at the Justice Department recalls that of the Watergate era, and when FBI director Robert S. Mueller contradicted Gonzales' testimony regarding NSA wiretapping, support for the atto-rney general hit a new low. He may survive - but can he function?

LEGAL EAGLES Gonzalez was introduced to President Bush in the mid-1990s by Harriet Miers.

jared
kushner

Owner, the New York Observer
Age 26
College A.B. 2003
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis The son of a real estate magnate, Kushner purchased the Observer, an insider read for the New York elite, for a sweet $10 million.

Work in Progress Trying to turn a profit - the Observer loses an estimated $2 million annually. Kushner has promised editor Peter Kaplan that he won't interfere editorially, but vows to boost advertising and circulation, and he has already turned the paper into a tabloid and redesigned its website. While attending NYU's law and business schools, Kushner shifted dad's real estate empire from New Jersey to New York. He continues to deny that he's dating Ivanka Trump.

secret of his success He was developing properties while still a sophomore at Harvard, taking calls about broken toilets during class.

michael
chertoff

U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security
Age 53
College A.B. 1975; HLS J.D. 1978
Home Base Potomac, MD
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis The poster boy for bureaucratic bungling, Chertoff remains our first defense against domestic terror attacks and natural disasters.

Work in Progress The sizable funds at Chertoff's disposal give him inevitable influence, but his stewardship of the DHS doesn't inspire confidence. His revelation this summer that he assesses terror threats based on a "gut feeling" was scoffed at by local officials. Yet Chertoff marches on. He has reversed himself in response to criticism, such as his push to give more antiterrorism funding to cities at greater risk of attack than the department's lopsided formula had meted out, and his de-emphasis of the much-mocked color-based warning system.

seeing redFor being an especially aggressive Republican special counsel to the Whitewater investigation, he earned the nickname The Vulture.

rahul
gandhi

Member of Parliament, India
Age 37
College Class of 1993, no degree
Home Base New Delhi, India
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Sonia Gandhi's son, Rahul, is the next great dynastic hope to lead the Indian National Congress Party back to victory.

Work in Progress In India, you don't get a pedigree any better than this: from his great grandfather, Jawaharlal Nehru, to his grandmother, Indira Gandhi, to his father, Rajiv Gandhi, prime ministers all. In 2004, Rahul made a run for Parliament in Uttar Pradesh, where the Congress Party is weak, and won. Ever since, he's been bogged down in controversy - making rash claims about his family's accomplishments, denying accusations of rape - but the handsome, dimple-cheeked Gandhi remains a media darling.

latin lover Rumors that he'll marry his Spanish girlfriend have nationalists atwitter.

amory
lovins

Co-founder, Chairman, and Chief Scientist, Rocky Mountain Institute
Age 59
College Class of 1968, no degree
Home Base Snowmass, CO
Rank Last Year 95

Précis The physicist-economist-environmentalist gives win-win green advice to corporate America: Conserving energy is good for the planet and saves money.

Work in Progress Lovins' worldview is optimistic: " I don't do problems; I do solutions, " the 1993 MacArthur Award winner told the New Yorker. Rather than the federal CAFÉ gas standards, for example, which mandate mileage for cars, Lovins supports a " feebate, " in which consumers who buy fuel-efficient cars would get a rebate. Once dismissed as eccentric, Lovins and RMI, which he co-founded in 1982, are currently consulting with Wal-Mart and the Pentagon on energy - use issues.

oil's well that ends well Lovins has argued that the United States can end its oil use altogether by the 2040s - and enjoy a stronger economy as a result.

susan l.
lindquist

Professor of Biology, MIT; Member, Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research
Age 58
GSAS Ph.D. 1977
Home Base Cambridge, MA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Lindquist is on a mission to understand how proteins fold into their proper form and why occasionally they don't get it right - with deadly consequences.

Work in Progress Protein-folding defects are at least partially responsible for Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, Huntington's disease, diabetes, cystic fibrosis, mad cow disease, some cancers, and heart disease. Despite new revelations about Parkinson's that Lind-quist's lab recently published in Science, " We are still many, many years away from a drug, " she says ruefully.

overachiever " When I got to graduate school [at] Harvard, " Lindquist said in April, " there were one or two women professors among the 65 in the biological sciences department. You could not look at that and think you had a chance."

caroline
hoxby

Former Freed Professor of Economics, Harvard University; Now at Stanford University
Age 41
College A.B. 1988
Home Base In transition
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis A specialist in the economics of education, Hoxby has provided key support for school vouchers; she determined that they improve the quality of education by fostering competition among schools.

Work in Progress Hoxby's writings on school choice have attracted many followers but have also sparked a bitter public feud with a Princeton economist who took issue with her methods. Her decision this year to move to Stanford, where both she and her husband were offered tenured positions, came as a blow to Harvard, which has been laboring to recruit female and minority professors.

lonely legacy Without Hoxby, Harvard's economics department has only two tenured women - and 39 tenured men.

ron
kind

U.S. Representative, Wisconsin
Age 44
College A.B. 1985
Home Base La Crosse, WI
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis The soft-spoken former Harvard football player has drawn attention to himself as a dairy state congressman fighting against farm subsidies.

Work in Progress Kind has been a leader in the effort to reform the federal government's incoherent farm-subsidy policies. By backing a bipartisan bill that would create " savings accounts" for farmers in lieu of handouts, he has drawn praise from both sides of the aisle, though the bill that passed the House this year backed away from real reform. Still, Kind keeps getting elected by increasingly large margins - 65 percent in 2006 - in a formerly Republican district.

manure slinging Kind's Republican opponent in 2006, Paul Nelson, claimed that Kind " pays for sex, but not for soldiers, " referring to Kind's support for NIH research on sexual issues.

joan a.
steitz

Sterling Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry, Yale University School of Medicine
Age 66
GSAS A.M. 1967; Ph.D. 1968
Home Base New Haven, CT
Rank Last Year 37

Précis The trailblazing Steitz discovered snRNPs (pronounced " snurps"), which stitch together messenger RNA molecules and play key roles in gene regulation.

Work in Progress Steitz entered graduate school the year after Watson and Crick won their Nobel and flourished as Watson's first female graduate student. Now she's a staunch advocate for women in science and quality science education, and her lab continues to research snRNPs as they pertain to autoimmune diseases such as lupus and to the uncontrolled cell growth central to cancer.

progeny Steitz's son, Jon, was drafted in 2001 as a pitching prospect by the Milwaukee Brewers but was released a couple of seasons later. He has recently enrolled at Yale Law School.

G. richard
wagoner jr.

Chairman and CEO, General Motors
Age 54
HBS MBA 1977
Home Base Birmingham, MI
Rank Last Year 56

Précis The once mighty GM is faring better than Ford, but that's not saying much.

Work in Progress High gas prices were easy to predict, but truck-and-SUV-addicted GM is struggling with demands for fuel efficiency. Wagoner's prized hybrid, the Chevrolet Volt, may help, but other challenges, such as an estimated $46 billion in health care obligations to employees, could overwhelm him. He sold off GM's Allison Transmission for $5.6 billion to the Carlyle Group - but swears he has no plans to sell SAAB, as Ford did with Volvo - and executives have agreed to reduce their salaries by half. Wagoner now takes home $1.1 million.

safety in numbers Wagoner's largest reported perk at $284,523) is security: personal protection, home security, and a chauffeured limousine.

pehr
harbury

Associate Professor of Biochemistry, Stanford University School of Medicine
Age 42
College A.B. 1986; GSAS Ph.D. 1994
Home Base Stanford, CA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Using revolutionary biochemistry and computing techniques, Harbury designs synthetic proteins with unique forms.

Work in Progress In other words, Harbury sculpts molecules. One of his major advances is a technique called DNA Display, in which scientists build, screen, and "evolve" quadrillions of small molecules at a time in a test tube in order to develop new drugs and industrial reagents. " We're trying to put the 'magic' in the magic bullet of drug design, " Harbury says.

when it rains The day after winning a $2.5 million NIH Director's Pioneer Award in 2005, Harbury learned he'd also won a $500,000 MacArthur Fellowship.

russ
feingold

U.S. Senator, Wisconsin
Age 54
HLS J.D. 1979
Home Base Middleton, WI
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis This idealistic reformer is the conscience of the Democratic Senate.

Work in Progress Feingold doesn't always win fights, but he's never afraid to start them. The campaign-finance legislation for which he's best known, McCain-Feingold, was gutted by a Supreme Court ruling in June which held that a key provision on issue ads was unconstitutional. Adding insult to judicial injury, the case involved ads taken out against Feingold around the time of his reelection bid in 2004.) Feingold's most recent call for George Bush's censure in July caused Majority Leader Harry Reid to distance himself from his colleague - but Reid did endorse a Feingold plan to cut off funding for the Iraq War by April 2008.

poor man, rich man Feingold ranks among the poorest of U.S. senators, while his Wisconsin colleague Herb Kohl, owner of the Milwaukee Bucks, is among the top five richest.

sheryl
sandberg

Vice President, Global Online Sales and Operations, Google
Age 37
College A.B. 1991; HBS MBA 1995; HLS 1995
Home Base Mountain View, CA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis The executive behind Google's advertising programs, Sandberg helps generate almost all of the company's sizable revenues.

Work in Progress With Google's text-advertising programs, AdWords and AdSense, Sandberg has turned the company's proprietary search algorithm into a money-making machine. She oversees GoogleGrants, a program that provides nonprofits with free advertising, and was also instrumental in convincing Harvard to participate in the Library Project, Google's plan to digitize virtually everything ever written.

the bucks stopped here Sandberg served as chief of staff to Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers from 1999 to 2001.

aga
khan IV

Ismaili Spiritual Leader; Chairman, Aga Khan Development Network
Age 70
College A.B. 1959
Home Base Gouvieux, France
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis As hereditary imam to an estimated 15 million Ismaili Muslims a Shiite sect), the globe-trotting billionaire has served as a pro-Western, moderating influence in the Islamic world.

Work in Progress He was born Prince Karim Al Husseini, a direct descendant of the Prophet Mohammed, and anointed the Aga Khan in 1957, at the age of 20. Since then, he has devoted his fortune to starting 90 businesses, from hotels and pharmaceutical companies to smaller enterprises in the developing world. In June, he went to Kabul, Afghanistan, where he called for the private sector to take a more active role in the country's development.

starstruck After divorcing Aga Khan's mother, Aly Khan married Rita Hayworth and was romantically linked to Joan Fontaine, Kim Novak, and several other actresses.

karla
kirkegaard

Professor of Microbiology and Immunology, Stanford University School of Medicine
Age 53
GSAS Ph.D. 1983
Home Base Stanford, CA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Kirkegaard applies lessons learned from polioviruses to find new drug targets in related viruses that plague people around the world.

Work in Progress Her focus is on polio-like " positive-strand RNA" viruses for which no vaccines exist and that are still a health threat. Last year, the NIH gave Kirkegaard's research program its $2.5 million Director's Pioneer Award, which she is putting to work studying drug-resistant strains of hepatitis C, West Nile virus, and Dengue fever.

viral sisyphus Kirkegaard's grant proposal was rejected four times before she bagged the Pioneer Award.

tim
wu

Professor of Law, Columbia University Law School
Age 35
HLS J.D. 1998
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Having left high-tech corporate life for academia, Wu is free to lobby independently for " net neutrality, " the principle that regulations should not provide an anticompetitive edge to Internet-access providers.

Work in Progress Writing for Slate and launching a media assault, Wu highlights issues in popular culture and technology and how they relate to public policy. In July, he appeared before Congress to promote " wireless neutrality, " asserting that cell phone owners should be able to switch phone service and Internet providers without being forced to buy a new phone, thus stifling innovative products such as Apple's iPhone.

sibling revelry Wu's brother, David, created the Xbox 360 game Full Auto.

nicholas
kristof

Op-ed Columnist, the New York Times
Age 48
College A.B. 1982
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 42

Précis The two-time Pulitzer Prize winner uses his Times column to shine a light on the misery of the powerless around the globe.

Work in Progress While Africa especially the genocide in Darfur) remains his principal obsession, Kristof also ventures to other insalubrious locales, including Chinese safe houses and Cambodian brothels. He claims that a 1996 column helped inspire Bill Gates to devote his new foundation to global health.

rags to riches Supports third-world sweatshops, contending that they do more to raise people out of poverty than foreign aid does.

william
kristol

Editor, the Weekly Standard; Chairman, the Project for the New American Century; Fox News Commentator
Age 54
College A.B. 1973; GSAS Ph.D. 1979
Home Base McLean, VA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis This neoconservative Standard-bearer will turn off the lights in the Bush White House.

Work in Progress While his fellow warriors of the right go AWOL, Kristol fights the good fight for Bush administration tactics and policies, especially regarding Iraq. But he's no rubber stamp: He criticized the nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court and Donald Rumsfeld's tenure as secretary of defense. There may be fewer conservative allies to rally than there were in the glory days of 2002, but Kristol remains their most seductive Pied Piper.

power play Kristol's recent Washington Post op-ed, "Why Bush Will Be a Winner," generated more than 260 pages of com-ments on the Post website.

atul
gawande

Assistant Professor of Surgery, Harvard Medical School; Associate Director, World Health Organization's Global Challenge for Safer Surgical Care; Staff Writer, the New Yorker
Age 42
HMS M.D. 1995; SPH MPH 1999
Home Base Newton, MA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis As a cancer surgeon, author, and medical columnist, Gawande has spearheaded a campaign to improve patient care by reducing human error.

Work in Progress Two of his pragmatic solutions are tracking surgical tools with bar codes to make sure they don't go home with or inside) patients, and an Apgar-like score for rating surgery outcomes. He recently brought together medical professionals from Mongolia to Nigeria to compile a checklist for operating rooms. His new book, Better: A Surgeon's Notes on Performance, was published in April.

sound medicine Gawande plays Aimee Mann and the Killers on his iPod while operating.

tommy lee
jones

Director, Producer, Academy Award - Winning Actor
Age 61
College A.B. 1969
Home Base San Saba, TX
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis A Hollywood heavyweight with a nose for classy material, Jones has an eye-opening gift for directing.

Work in Progress He nabbed a starring role in Crash writer-director Paul Haggis' new Iraq-vet film, In the Valley of Elah, and plays a sheriff in the Coen brothers' Cormac McCarthy adaptation, No Country for Old Men, which wowed the critics at Cannes. This former roommate of Al Gore made his directorial debut with the well-received if little seen) Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, mining a plum script by Guillermo Arriaga, Babel writer du jour.

pony tales A polo enthusiast, he raises polo ponies on his 3,000-acre ranch and invites Harvard polo players to practice there every fall.

george
demetri

Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School; Director, Center for Sarcoma and Bone Oncology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Age 60
College A.B. 1978
Home Base Boston, MA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Demetri works at the forefront of a new generation of designer " smart drugs" for treating solid tumors.

Work in Progress Smart drugs target only cancer cells, leaving healthy cells virtually unscathed. Demetri's most dramatic success came seven years ago with Gleevec; he demonstrated that the compound, which has become a miracle drug for treating certain leukemias, also worked wonders against rare and deadly gastrointestinal tumors known as GIST. He's currently investigating backup drugs for Gleevec, with promising early-phase results for treating GIST and other forms of cancer.

fit to be ride Saying it was " better than a bake sale, " Demetri cycled 200 miles across Massachusetts to raise money for cancer research.

Richard
stallman

Founder of the Free Software Foundation and GNU Project
Age 54
College A.B. 1974
Home Base Boston, MA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Stallman launched and continues to crusade for the " open-source" software movement, which aims to make computer software freely available to everyone.

Work in Progress Fifteen years ago he developed GNU, a free computer operating system that opened the floodgates for free software such as Firefox and Wikipedia. Stallman continues to travel the world and campaign for " copyleft" licenses - i.e., the use of copyright law to eliminate restrictions on the free distribution and modification of software and documents represented by a flipped-left copyright symbol).

sticks to his wands To protest a Canadian ban on reading embargoed copies of Harry Potter books, Stallman called for people to stop buying the books altogether.

donald
tsang

Chief Executive, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, People's Republic of China
Age 63
KSG MPA 1982
Home Base Government House, Hong Kong
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis With his approval ratings near 70 percent, Tsang stealthily balances Beijing's caution against local hopes for democratic reform.

Work in Progress In March, Tsang won the vote by an 800-member election committee for his second term as chief executive, and for the first time, the position was actually contested. Hong Kong is thriving despite competition from other Chinese trade centers such as Shanghai, but the demand for direct public voting is strong and, in his second term, the astute Tsang will wrestle with the question of which democratic model to adopt.

colonial vestige A lifelong civil servant, Tsang loves to wear bow ties and is caricatured in the media as Bow Tie Tsang, with an enormous tie dominating his image.

robert b.
zoellick

President, World Bank Group
Age 54
HLS J.D. 1981; KSG MPP 1981
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Polarized by the rein of Zoellick's fellow Bushie Paul Wolfowitz, the Bank now looks forward to low profile, savvy leadership.

Work in Progress Though described as a " foreign-policy realist, " Zoellick will likely build on Wolfowitz's efforts to maintain anticorruption standards in the Bank's lending policies. Approved by the Bank's board in June, Zoellick has plenty of time to soothe bureaucratic nerves: His term doesn't expire until 2012.

get me rewrite In a 1998 letter to Bill Clinton, Zoellick and other signers called for the United States to oust Saddam Hussein: " Although we are fully aware of the dangers and difficulties in implementing this policy, we believe the dangers of failing to do so are far greater. "

lee hsien
loong

Prime Minister and Minister for Finance, Singapore
Age 55
KSG MPA 1980
Home Base Singapore
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Lee, the autocratic son of an autocrat, is (like the anti-Kim of North Korean infamy), running a vibrant trade-and-finance economy that's the envy of Southeast Asia.

Work in Progress To the United States, tiny Singapore is a pro-Western beacon, and its restraints on press, personal, and political freedoms are ignored (the government recently banned gay events in public parks); Lee was elected, but the opposition was never a threat. Within the past year, George Bush visited Lee, and Lee was welcomed to the White House. The prime minister, much like the nation he leads, keeps things dull and prosperous.

paycheck This year, Parliament is raising Lee's salary to $2 million, five times that of President Bush.

tim
kaine

Governor of Virginia
Age 49
HLS J.D. 1983
Home Base Richmond, VA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis A centrist Democrat finds favor in the Old Dominion.

Work in Progress Kaine follows in the footsteps of outgoing governor Mark Warner, another centrist Democrat. After Kaine's competent handling of the Virginia Tech massacre - he quickly flew home from Japan to meet with victims' families and closed a gun-law loophole - his approval ratings soared to 67 percent. Without Kaine ensconced in Richmond, it's unlikely that Democrat Jim Webb, an ex-marine who opposes the Iraq War, would have eked out a win in his 2006 run for Senate. Now Kaine has become an attractive choice for VP.

smoke filter Kaine favors a ban on smoking in Virginia restaurants - a gutsy position in Philip Morris' home state.

neil
degrasse tyson

Astrophysicist; Frederick A. Rose Director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History
Age 49
College A.B. 1980
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Tyson, the most prominent African-American astronomer since colonial scientist Benjamin Banneker, has authored 10 books and is an educational force in science.

Work in Progress Tyson led the charge to declassify Pluto as a bona fide planet. He hosts the PBS series NOVA scienceNOW - what Tyson calls " science for the shorter attention span. " A frequent guest on Good Morning America, he recently did the late-night rounds promoting his new book, Death by Black Hole: And Other Cosmic Quandaries.

hot space In response to Tyson's explanation of " panspermia" - life forms being carried to Earth from space - on the Daily Show, host Jon Stewart asked, " Why is it that when you talk about science, I get horny? "

richard a.
posner

Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit; Senior Lecturer in Law, University of Chicago Law School
Age 68
HLS LL.B. 1962
Home Base Chicago, IL
Rank Last Year 55

Précis Celebrated economics-minded legal theorist and prolific writer.

Work in Progress Posner has been applauded by the right and vilified by the left for advocating secret trials for terrorists, expanding warrantless wiretapping, and stripping the federal courts of their ability to rein in the president. Still, he's all in favor of judicial activism, and for this and various iconoclastic ideas (he has argued that baby auctions make more sense than adoptions), he also makes conservatives wary.

the read not taken He planned to go to grad school for literature before deciding on the law.

paul m.
ridker

Braunwald Professor of Medicine, MIT; Director, Center for Cardiovascular Disease Prevention, Brigham and Women's Hospital
Age 47
HMS M.D. 1986; SPH MPH 1992
Home Base Chestnut Hill, MA
Rank Last Year 59

Précis Transforming the way we look at cholesterol, Ridker discovered that even low levels of inflammation in blood vessels could contribute to heart attacks.

Work in Progress Ridker's key revelation was that measuring the levels of a blood-borne biomarker of inflammation, called C-reactive protein (CRP), proved at least as accurate as cholesterol levels for predicting heart attack risk. Cholesterol levels, doctors now realize, aren't the final word in heart health. In February, Ridker unveiled the Reynolds Risk Score, a new formula to predict the risk of heart attack and stroke in women.

baby doc Ridker first appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine at age nine - as a medical case-study subject.

ma
ying-jeou

Kuomintang Candidate for President of the Republic of China Taiwan)
Age 57
HLS S.J.D. 1981
Home Base Taipei, Taiwan
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis With Taiwanese president Chen Shui-bian's approval numbers at ankle level, opposition leader Ma Ying-jeou has taken an early lead as front-runner for the 2008 election.

Work in Progress Supporters see Ma as a moderate voice, particularly in the vicious debate over unification with the mainland (he prefers " one China" to Taiwanese independence, but says it won't happen until China democratizes). As mayor of Taipei, he was known as an anticorruption reformer, although he resigned from his post as KMT chairman on charges of mishandling state funds (he was acquitted). A Ma presidency would be a major relief for Washington, which would rather not see Beijing provoked.

reagan redux Ma's ability to slough off scandal has earned him the nickname Teflon-man.

matt
damon

Actor, Producer, Academy Award - Winning Screenwriter
Age 37
College Class of 1992, no degree
Home Base Miami, FL
Rank Last Year 69

Précis A character actor in a leading man's body.

Work in Progress Though action-hero franchises based on star charisma have sagged like Sly Stallone's pecs, Damon bucked the trend with a trio of summer blockbusters capped by this year's Bourne Ultimatum. Alternating audience-friendly genre pieces (Ocean's Eleven through Ocean's Thirteen) with Oscar bait such as Syriana, The Departed, and The Good Shepherd, Damon has a work ethic and willingness to do supporting roles that have truly made him an actor's actor.

project greenlight Damon promoted the pro - tree, anti - junk-mail organization GreenDimes on Oprah in April.

mortimer b.
zuckerman

Chairman, Boston Properties; Chairman and Editor in Chief, U.S. News & World Report; Owner and Publisher, New York Daily News
Age 70
HLS LL.M. 1962
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Zuckerman's real estate empire allows him to wield a big stick in the media arena.

Work in Progress Real estate ventures helped him amass a personal fortune of $2.8 billion, but his media properties are struggling. The Daily News is losing a tabloid war with the New York Post and continues to undergo management turmoil. U.S. News' annual college-rankings list, aka the magazine's swimsuit issue, is under siege from a growing number of schools (close to 80 at last count) refusing to cooperate.

news you can use Zuckerman's reason for not pursuing a law career: " I decided law was the exact opposite of sex. Even when it was good it was lousy. "

benazir
bhutto

Chairperson, Pakistan People's Party
Age 54
Radcliffe A.B. 1973
Home Base Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis The charismatic Bhutto looms in exile as a political force if President Pervez Musharraf is finally pressured into sharing power.

Work in Progress Hoping to return to Pakistan - and political leadership - Bhutto has charged that the Musharraf government is rife with al-Qaida and Taliban sympathizers. As Musharraf's popular support evaporates, Bhutto, a shrewd populist, may find a way to surmount the obstacles confronting her, such as a constitutional ban on prime ministers serving more than two terms (Bhutto was twice forced out of office on corruption charges).

tough love Rumor has it that she and her hubby have split. " In the end, " Bhutto has written, " personal life is sacrificed on the altar of political commitment. "

clive
davis

Chairman and CEO, BMG North America
Age 75
HLS LL.B. 1956
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 13

Précis A music mogul with more lives than a cat, Davis has a talent for finding, signing, and managing talent, from Janis Joplin to Sean "Diddy" Combs.

Work in Progress Advancing age hasn't affected Davis's hearing - or his ability to make noise. Hence his clash with American Idol star Kelly Clarkson, which nearly drowned out her new album, My December, after she refused to relinquish creative control. She subsequently apologized to Davis, calling him " one of the great record men of all time. " Befitting Davis' stature in the music industry, his pre-Grammy party is still the hottest ticket in town.

recovery Davis has predicted the comeback of his discovery, Whitney Houston, who began recording a new album in March for Davis' Arista Records.

tim
draper

Founding and Managing Director, Draper Fisher Jurvetson
Age 49
HBS MBA 1984
Home Base Menlo Park, CA
Rank Last Year 52

Précis The maverick Silicon Valley venture capitalist prefers to invest in " back of the napkin" ideas.

Work in Progress Credited with inventing "viral marketing," Draper is now behind Pay Per Post, a cyber product - placement service that hires impoverished bloggers to pitch goods in shameless ways. He's also on the boards of such DFJ-supported ventures as Chroma Graphics, which uses pattern-recognition technology for energy and mineral exploration. On the nonprofit front, the education-keen Draper is chairman of BizWorld, where kids learn firsthand about entrepreneurship.

sexy sibling Draper's sister is actress Polly Draper, of Thirtysomething fame.

nancy m.
barry

President, Enterprise Solutions to Poverty
Age 58
HBS MBA 1975
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Having shaped the Women's World Bank into a respected pioneer of microfinance, Barry's newest initiative is launching business-based movements against poverty in six developing countries.

Work in Progress A strong social conscience developed in childhood (her uncle worked with César Chévez on migrant farmworker issues) combined with formidable business savvy has kept Barry at the forefront of organized efforts to combat poverty. Enterprise Solutions to Poverty, which she views as the culmination of her work to date, mobilizes MBA students and CEOs to create entrepreneurial opportunities for the poor in countries such as India and China.

upwardly mobile After graduation, Barry caught a freighter to Peru with $400 and no job. Within ten years, she was negotiating with the Mexican Minister of Finance.

frank o.
gehry

Architect, Gehry Partners
Age 78
GSD Class of 1957, no degree
Home Base Santa Monica, CA
Rank Last Year 51

Précis Revered for the way he reinvents materials and sculpts idiosyncratic forms, Gehry turns buildings into landmarks.

Work in Progress Fierce grassroots opposition to his massive Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn, which includes a Nets basketball arena, hasn't slowed Gehry down. He has several other projects in New York (including his just-opened rippling-glass InterActiveCorp); museums in development on the Panama Canal and in Biloxi, Miss.; and newly announced hotel complexes in Utah and Denmark. Each location hopes to become a tourist mecca, like Bilbao, the sleepy, industrial Basque city that Gehry's Guggenheim transformed.

sticks and stones Gehry wears a " Fuck Frank Gehry" T-shirt - designed by a New York artist to counter the architect's celebrity - around his office, and he has sent the shirts out as gifts.

arata
kochi

Director, World Health Organization Global Malaria Program
Age 58
SPH MPH 1981, S.M. 1982
Home Base Geneva, Switzerland
Rank Last Year 54

Précis Leader in the war against malaria, Kochi uses his position at WHO to bulldoze his way through bureaucracy and achieve tangible results.

Work in Progress Strong-arm tactics led to his ouster as head of the WHO campaign against tuberculosis, but even critics credit him with getting the job done. Much of his current effort against malaria has been to get drug makers, governments, and scientists to stop battling and work together. But if spraying DDT is effective in halting malaria in Africa, Kochi is going to push it, Western environmental sensitivities be damned: " This method is underutilized, " he says. " It has been suppressed in the past, but it has worked very well. "

global manifesto " Science comes first, " Kochi said upon taking his new job. " Politics comes second. Make everybody, including WHO, accountable. "

barney
frank

U.S. Representative, Massachusetts; Chairman, House Financial Services Committee
Age 67
College A.B. 1962; HLS J.D. 1977; GSAS Class of 1968, no degree
Home Base Newton, MA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Finally in a chair to match his powerful command of policy, Frank pushes for pet causes that were suppressed by the Republican ex-majority.

Work in Progress The pro-labor Democrat has been acting more business friendly than usual, but that won't stop him from trying to rein in executive compensation. He'll play a major role in ongoing legislative debates over gay marriage. And he continues to take his formidable debating skills to the airwaves, appearing regularly on Real Time With Bill Maher, where he makes no bones about his ideological opponents. Frank recently called Mitt Romney " the most intellectually dishonest human being in the history of politics. "

bashing hazard Frank, who came out publicly in 1987, supports the outing of closeted public figures who demonize gay people - a rationale that has become known as the Barney Frank Rule.

thom
mayne

Architect, Founder of Morphosis
Age 63
GSD M.Arch. 1978
Home Base Santa - Monica, - CA
Rank Last Year 82

Précis A refined interpreter of subversive, futuristic design concepts, Mayne is an oft-imitated architect's architect.

Work in Progress Unlike the designs of Frank Gehry, which computer technology makes feasible, those of Mayne and Morphosis, his firm, look almost computer-generated: overlays of floating steel, glass, and screens; windows dotting walls like digital bits. Mayne's recently completed San Francisco Federal Building, a light-filled behemoth, and his sensuously curved Warne L. Morse U.S. Courthouse in Eugene, Ore., show remarkable maturity for a man who won the Pritzker Prize only two years ago. " Mr. Mayne seems to be telling us that the values of Old-World Modernism may not be so bad, " wrote one critic.

impolitic " In the first 25 years" of his practice, Mayne has said, " I didn't have a client who would talk to me afterward. They said, 'Arrogant bastard.' "

jAMES J.
cramer

Host, Mad Money, CNBC; Director, TheStreet
Age 52
College A.B. 1977; HLS J.D. 1984
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 28

Précis Cramer has parlayed an impressive hedge fund career into becoming financial guru to the small investor.

Work in Progress While his Mad Money, ratings fall short of O'Reilly's or Dobbs', Cramer is the only one who can claim his own buzzword: " Booyah! " He promises to teach viewers the unspoken rules that drive Wall Street, and the impact of his show is instantly measurable: Stocks he recommends jump 15 percent or more. Though he stirs controversy when his picks don't pan out, he insists that the point of Mad Money, is to give viewers the tools to choose for themselves.

losing it? Appearing on CNBC in August, Cramer launched a screaming tirade against Fed chair Ben Bernanke that caused some viewers to worry for his health.

martin
peretz

Editor in Chief, The New Republic
Age 68
GSAS M.A. 1965, Ph.D. 1966
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Mentor of such talent as James Cramer, Andrew Sullivan, Ed Zwick, and financier Bill Ackman, Peretz has been caretaker of one of D.C's key political weeklies for more than 30 years.

Work in Progress In February Peretz sold his controlling interest in TNR to CanWest Global Communications while retaining his Editor in Chief title. Peretz & Co. have reinvigorated the neoliberal stalwart with a new design and revamped website. Peretz strongly advocates another presidential run by Al Gore (whom he taught in a freshman seminar in 1965) and still gives him sotto voce advice. The ultimate connector, he links power players from D.C. to NYC to Boston and Tel Aviv.

old dog's new trick Love it or hate it, his blog, The Spine, is probably the most compelling read on TNR.com.

michele R.
obama

Vice President of Community and External Affairs, University of Chicago Medical Cener
Age 43
HLS J.D. 1988
Home Base Chicago, IL
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis The spouse of the most viable black presidential contender in American history, Obama is a formidable legal figure in her own right.

Work in Progress The Obamas met when she mentored him at a Chicago law firm and later introduced him to the city's power brokers, thus promoting his political career. Her husband's success has come at a cost to her: She's had to put her own aspirations - and her job - on the back burner. On the campaign trail, she speaks out on the hardships facing working women and mothers (the Obamas have two daughters) and is thought to influence her husband's thinking on family and health care issues.

smoke screen Obama's support for her husband's presidential run was partly contingent on him stopping smoking (he quit before he announced).

andrew
sullivan

Blogger, The Atlantic Online; Senior Editor, the New Republic; Columnist, the Sunday Times of London
Age 44
KSG MPA 1986; GSAS Ph.D. 1990
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year 53

Précis By virtue of his impassioned blogging, Sullivan has become one of the country's best-known human rights advocates.

Work in Progress He made waves by taking his blog to Time, in 2006, then jumped (or, thanks to Time layoffs, was he pushed?) to The Atlantic earlier this year. Regardless, he is an increasingly liberal gay conservative who vigorously promotes gay rights and calls the Bush administration's interrogation policies by another name - " torture. " One problem: As evidenced by his support of congressman Ron Paul for president, Sullivan may be so idiosyncratic that he becomes marginalized.

money where his mouth is In lieu of gifts, guests at his Massachusetts wedding were invited to contribute to a group backing gay marriage.

craig c.
mello

Professor, Program in Molecular Medicine, University of Massachusetts Medical School
Age 47
GSAS Ph.D. 1990
Home Base Washington, DC
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis While studying microscopic soil roundworms with his colleague, Stanford biologist Andrew Fire, Mello discovered a simple way to " silence" any gene, including those genes that cause disease.

Work in Progress Mello and Fire's method, (called RNAi or RNA interference), is based on a natural function in most organisms, including humans. It has applications in research - identifying gene functions - and is now being tested in treating conditions from Huntington's disease to hair removal. RNAi earned Mello and Fire the 2006 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. At UMass, Mello is currently working on an RNAi approach to treating Lou Gehrig's disease.

for whom the nobel tolls Upon answering the call from Stockholm, Mello's wife hung up, thinking it was a prank.

christopher
cox

Chairman, Securities and Exchange Commission
Age 54
HBS MBA 1977; HLS J.D. 1977
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis A strong pro-business bent hasn't stopped Cox from playing a tough cop with the markets.

Work in Progress Before he became SEC chairman in 2005, Cox, a Republican congressman from California, had sponsored legislation making it harder for shareholders to sue corporate managers and was generally seen as a commissioner who'd resist imposing headline-grabbing corporate fines. Still, he hasn't let up on enforcing market regulations and recently launched a dozen formal inquiries into subprime lending practices.

gotcha! Cox has a history of April Fool's Day press releases. This year, one was issued quoting SEC spokesperson " April Fuhrst, " requiring companies to reveal the pay and perks of " the top 100 people who make more than the CEO. "

lawrence H.
summers

Managing Director, D.E. Shaw & Co.; Charles W. Eliot University Professor, Harvard
Age 52
GSAS Ph.D. 1982
Home Base Brookline, MA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis After his turbulent five-year stint as Harvard president, Summers has rebounded as a part-time hedge fund manager and advocate for the " global middle. "

Work in Progress Not that he needs more venues to get his views out - Summers holds an endowed chair at Harvard and writes a monthly Financial Times column. The former Treasury secretary for Clinton has found avid listeners in Asia and on congressional committees stateside. His message (as he put it to the New York Times Magazine), " I think the defining issue of our time is: Does the economic social and political system work for the middle class? "

reunited and it feels so good Under the aegis of the Hamilton Project, a new think tank, he has helped reconvene much of the Clinton-era economic team: Robert Rubin, Laura D'Andrea Tyson, Gene Sperling, Roger Altman, and others.

debra L.
lee

President and CEO, Black Entertainment Television
Age 52
HLS J.D. 1980; KSG MPP 1980
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year 93

Précis Lee has broadened the mission and raised quality at the nation's leading station devoted to the African-American audience.

Work in Progress After abandoning a white-shoe Washington law firm to join the fledgling BET 20 years ago, Lee helped orchestrate its purchase by Viacom in 2000 and succeeded founder Robert Johnson as CEO two years ago. To expand programming beyond reruns and music videos, and to generate original material, she hired Hollywood director Reginald Hudlin as president of entertainment. On the downside, a new series Hot Ghetto Mess later renamed We Got to Do Better), lampooning images of African-Americans, provoked outrage even before it aired.

affirmative reaction Lee and some Greensboro, N.C., neighbors were so proud of their segregated black high school, they protested against an integration plan.

deval
patrick

Governor of Massachusetts
Age 51
College A.B. 1978; HLS J.D. 1982
Home Base Milton, MA
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis In the bluest of blue states, a Democrat hadn't been governor since 1990; an African-American, never. Enter Patrick: a liberal black Democrat with corporate experience, promising an era of bipartisan cooperation and inclusion.

Work in Progress Patrick began his term with needless gaffes over his gas-guzzling Cadillac limo and $12,000 office drapes. But he soon won plaudits for working behind the scenes to achieve a decisive vote halting a gay marriage referendum and for the smooth implementation of the state's landmark health insurance law, requiring coverage for all.

freshman feud Grover Norquist, Patrick's Harvard classmate, recently accused him of " playing partisan politics" for refusing to name February 6 Ronald Reagan Day.

carl
levin

U.S. Senator, Michigan; Chairman, Senate Armed Services Committee
Age 73
HLS LL.B. 1959
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Bespectacled, grandfatherly chairman of the powerful Senate Armed Services Committee.

Work in Progress Having opposed the Iraq War from the start and long castigated its architects, Levin lately finds himself in an unusual position: resented by the antiwar crowd for his vote not to cut off funding for the conflict. He reasons that without the votes needed to override a Bush veto, it makes more sense to push the president with measures calling for the gradual withdrawal of troops, tied to hard benchmarks. Meanwhile, he's angered environmentalists by fighting higher fuel-efficiency standards in order to help the U.S. auto industry.

makeover candidate In an online poll, he was voted " worst hair in Congress, " beating Trent Lott by more than four to one.

the
office

Sitcom, NBC
Greg Daniels Director and Producer, A.B. 1985
B.J. Novak writer and Producer, A.B. 2001
Michael Schur (Mose) Writer and Producer, A.B. 1997
Ryan Koh Writer, A.B. 2000
Home Base Scranton, PA (Los Angeles, CA)
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis The genre-deconstructing sitcom has built on the satirical genius of the British original and propelled the concept into Offices around the world.

Work in Progress The show, which has been renewed for 30 episodes (far more than the norm) in its fourth season, has become a much needed ratings and demographic lynchpin for NBC. It accomplished that unlikely feat without a laugh track, using mockumentary-improvisational shooting style, and with an ensemble of characters that are variously clueless, creepy, and lovable.

awful truth Some of the cast members, such as co-exec producer and writer Paul Lieberstein, who plays the HR guy, aren't even actors.

david
souter

Associate Justice, Supreme Court of the United States
Age 68
College A.B. 1961; HLS LL.B. 1966
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Appointed by the first President Bush, Souter was expected to vote with the conservative wing but migrated to the left.

Work in Progress Souter is known for his modesty, respect for precedent, and staunch defense of the court as an institution. (He once said of televising court proceedings: " I can tell you, the day you see a camera come into our courtroom, it's going to roll over my dead body. ") Originally dubbed " the stealth justice, " he is still considered something of an enigma.

mi casa es mi casa When the mild-mannered Souter voted with the majority in a controversial 2005 case to uphold a broad view of eminent domain, residents of his New Hampshire hometown threatened to appropriate- his family's house.

jeffrey b.
kindler

Chairman and CEO, Pfizer
Age 52
HLS J.D. 1980
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis For the world's largest pharmaceutical company, the era of reliably massive profits may be coming to a close.

Work in Progress A court last year invalidated patent protection after 2010 for Lipitor, the world's best-selling drug. While searching for a replacement, Kindler has been forced to close factories and cut jobs. Uh-oh: News reports this summer have pointed out that a recent tax holiday on foreign profits was granted to pharmaceuticals in order to create jobs - not eliminate them. If Pfizer's arthritis medication Celebrex follows Vioxx into the realm of recalls and lawsuits, Kindler is going to have his hands full.

panacea Kindler has a long track record of making campaign contributions to Democrats, including senators Hillary Clinton (last April), Chris Dodd, Pat Leahy, and Joe Lieberman.

george q.
daley

Associate Professor of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, Harvard Medical School; Associate Professor of Pediatrics, Children's Hospital Boston
Age 46
College A.B. 1982; HMS M.D. 1991
Home Base Weston, MA
Rank Last Year 24

Précis Daley has been at the vanguard in the effort to coax embryonic stem cells to turn into virtually any tissue type.

Work in Progress As the newly elected president of the International Society for Stem Cell Research, Daley will prod Congress to reverse the Bush administration lim-its on public funding of the research. " Science certainly cannot define when - in the gradual - course of human development we deserve individual and autonomous rights, " Daley told the Senate in 2005.

slick click Daley's lab website (http://daley.med.harvard.edu/Members_Page.htm) features spinning DNA and a door that opens to Disco Daley: a scientist in a white suit straight out of Saturday Night Fever.

stephen g.
breyer

Associate Justice, Supreme Court of the United States
Age 69
HLS LL.B. 1964
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year Not Ranked

Précis Breyer's liberal pragmatism is considered a counterweight to Antonin Scalia's conservative textualism.

Work in Progress Along with Ginsburg, Breyer has recently raised his voice against the conservative majority, delivering a half-hour dissent from the bench in the Seattle and Kentucky school integration cases. Considered the most intellectually rigorous among the court's liberals, he defers to the wishes of Congress and defends the use of foreign judicial precedents.

the new guy Breyer came up 30 days short (at 4,199) of being the longest serving junior justice in Supreme Court history when Samuel Alito joined the court.

ban
ki-moon

Secretary-General of the United Nations
Age 63
KSG MPA 1985
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Determined to restore the U.N.'s diminishing effectiveness, the organization's eighth secretary-general took over in January.

Work in Progress In a push for greater transparency, Ban made his financial disclosure reports public, a move predecessor Kofi Annan had resisted. To prevent institutional stagnation, Ban called for the resignation of all Secretariat officials. Meanwhile, he has taken heat for alleged questionable campaign tactics. But there are promising signs: Peacekeepers have entered Darfur on his watch, he has appointed envoys to address global warming, and his experience in Korean diplomacy is likely to aid efforts to halt nuclear proliferation.

nickname In Korea, he was known as Ban-chusa, or " accompanist, " implying that he was deferential and bland.

jeffrey
d. sachs

Economist; Director, Earth Institute at Columbia University; Special Advisor to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon; President and Co-founder of Millennium Promise Alliance
Age 52
College A.B. 1976; GSAS Ph.D. 1980
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 19

Précis Known for his strategies for revamping the economies of Eastern Europe and Latin America and for eliminating poverty worldwide by 2015, Sachs advises governments around the globe.

Work in Progress Author of The End of Poverty, he writes a column in Scientific American and hangs out with Bono. He continues to plug away at poverty reduction, public health, hunger, and debt cancellation. Sachs' critics fault him for accepting payments from the U.N. Development Program, while proponents say he was concerned with Africa long before it was trendy.

clean water in every pot A Sachs for President draft committee is trying to persuade him to enter the 2008 election.

anne
sweeney

President, Disney-ABC Television Group; Co-chair, Disney Media Networks
Age 49
GSE Ed.M. 1980
Home Base Los Angeles, CA
Rank Last Year 34

Précis In the post - Michael Eisner renaissance at Disney, Sweeney has shepherded ABC and other media properties to new heights with young audiences.

Work in Progress Sweeney flies under the radar while more self-promoting colleagues present themselves as targets and take flak. (She was invisible during the controversial firing of Grey's Anatomy star Isaiah Washington for homophobic remarks.) Meanwhile, she has built on the creative successes achieved during her watch - Desperate Housewives, Lost - by embracing digital distribution platforms such as iTunes downloads of DisneyABC programming.

no business like show business Sweeney decided not to become an actress after seeing a pile of headshots in a casting agent's office.

frank
rich

Op-ed Columnist, the New York Times
Age 58
College A.B. 1971
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 41

Précis Rich excoriates the Bush administration and its conservative enablers from the most prominent soapbox in American journalism.

Work in Progress As the Times' theater critic Rich earned the sobriquet " Butcher of Broadway, " and he applies the same rigorous standards to candidates from both parties (mocking Kerry's diction in 2004) and to his colleagues in the press (sneering at this year's "embarrassing" annual White House Correspondents' Association dinner).Rich covers politics as a narrative with characters - and he doesn't hesitate to give nasty reviews.

his bark is his bite After Rich called The Passion of the Christ anti-Semitic, Mel Gibson threatened to kill his dog. " I don't have a dog, " Rich said.

david
javerbaum

Executive Producer, The Daily Show, Comedy Central
Age 34
College A.B. 1993
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 25

Précis The unseen hand behind the satirical television news show that suffers fools with pleasure - and that is a prime source (sometimes the only source) of political information for the YouTube generation.

Work in Progress After being The Daily Show's head writer since 2003, Javerbaum almost quit last December before longtime executive producer Ben Karlin stepped aside. In addition to taking Karlin's place, Javerbaum is working on the lyrics for a Broadway adaptation of John Waters' Cry-Baby.

all the news that's fit to mock "As I see it, we have no obligation to have any kind of journalistic integrity," Javerbaum said of The Daily Show to the Philadelphia Inquirer. "As comedians, we need to have comedic integrity."

kenneth i.
chenault

Chairman and CEO, American Express
Age 56
HLS J.D. 1976
Home Base New Rochelle, NY
Rank Last Year 17

Précis With rising profits and a record stock price, Amex has more than held its own in a fierce credit card marketplace.

Work in Progress He's a CEO with a conscience: When Don Imus self-destructed on the airwaves in April, Chenault was one of the first to pull the plug on ad dollars. Last year, American Express joined the Project Red effort, supporting AIDS funding in Africa by giving one percent of every U.K. cardholder's annual charges to charity. The company has also supported Al Gore's global-warming awareness camp-aign, creating ads with Martin Scorcese, Ellen DeGeneres, and others.

aprés le deluge During his commencement address this May at Xavier University of Louisiana, Chenault recalled how his father, a dentist, enlisted during World War II but "couldn't join the U.S. Army Dental Corps. It was segregated." He joined the French Dental Corps instead.

eliot l.
spitzer

Governor of New York
Age 48
HLS J.D. 1984
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 23

Précis The bluster that made New York's attorney general the sheriff of Wall Street have backfired in Albany.

Work in Progress Rarely has such a popular candidate gotten off to such a terrible start after being elected. The state Senate's Republican majority and its leader Ralph Bruno have dogged the Democratic governor from the start, forcing Spitzer to backpedal on issues such as education spending and campaign finance reform. His face-off with Bruno turned ugly, leading to an investigation accusing Spitzer staff members of ordering the state police to spy on Bruno. Should Democrats retake the state Senate in 2008, he'd be a lot closer to becoming the legislative " steamroller" he promised to be.

first impression Alan Dershowitz knew Spitzer as a student and once described him as - "the quiet one, the behind-the-scenes guy, the library guy. "

conan
o'brien

Host, Late Night With Conan O'Brien, NBC
Age 44
College A.B. 1985
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 39

Précis With his absurdist nerd jokes that are a staple of the national conversation, O'Brien is poised to inherit Jay Leno's Tonight Show throne in 2009.

Work in Progress A former Simpsons writer who had to buy out six months of his contract to leave Fox, O'Brien has become his generation's answer to Leno and Letterman. Whether it's helping break a new band or ripping into a politician's hypocrisy, O'Brien is watched - and trusted - by millions. The big question: Will he tone down his neo-Dadaist act to accommodate more mainstream 11:30 p.m. tastes?

class warfare His NBC boss Jeff Zucker was president of the Crimson when O'Brien ran the Lampoon, and had O'Brien arrested after a college prank.

L. john
doerr III

Partner, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers
Age 56
HBS MBA 1980
Home Base Woodside, CA
Rank Last Year 15

Précis The energetic Silicon Valley venture capitalist who made billions on high-tech hopefuls think: Google) now says that "clean tech is the biggest economic opportunity of this century. "

Work in Progress His firm, KPCB, has invested $200 million in a group of start-ups, called green-tech or clean-tech, that focus on waste remediation and alternate energy technologies. Some analysts are not convinced that clean-tech is all that Doerr dubbed " the Johnny Appleseed of Silicon Valley" by BusinessWeek) has built it up to be. " Green-focused websites are getting about as trendy as celebutante DUIs, " writes GigaOm editor Katie Fehrenbacher.

smoking the green " This is not just about making money, " Doerr has said of his infatuation with green-tech. " I think we're here on a higher mission. "

james
murdoch

CEO, British Sky Broadcasting
Age 34
College Class of 1996, no degree
Home Base London, England
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis With brother Lachlan taking a back seat, James Murdoch is now heir apparent to succeed his father, Rupert, as head of News Corp.

Work in Progress work in progress A controversial choice to head BSkyB in 2003, the Harvard dropout mollified investors by nearly doubling the company's share price. Murdoch reportedly encouraged his father's interest in the Internet (resulting in the purchase of MySpace) and sat in on discussions with the Bancroft family about News Corp.'s successful takeover bid for Dow Jones & Co.

terms of enrichment Murdoch calls his father " Pop" they talk twice a day).

jeff
zucker

President and CEO, NBC Universal
Age 42
College A.B. 1986
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 38

Précis The boy-wonder executive (who ran the Today show when he was only 26 has mostly) lived up to the hype -

Work in Progress - but must still prove himself, especially since he's presided over NBC's prime-time fall from number one to number four among broadcast networks. Zucker replaced programming chief Kevin Reilly with hot producer Ben Silverman and endured his share of flaps, (from yanking Don Imus off MSNBC, to offering to pay Paris Hilton $1 million for a post-jail interview then denying the offer). He now oversees Universal movie studio and theme parks, which remain profitable.

so sue him Zucker turned to television after he was rejected by Harvard Law School.

sumner m.
redstone

Founder and Executive Chairman of the Board, Viacom; Founder and Executive Chairman of the Board, CBS Corporation; Chairman and CEO, National Amusements
Age 84
College A.B. 1944; HLS LL.B. 1947
Home Base Dedham, MA
Rank Last Year 46

Précis Prone to deus ex machina decisions (ousting Viacom's Tom Freston), the media-maestro has had trouble navigating between old and new media.

Work in Progress The Viacom/CBS split has not boosted either company much: CBS has been considered a buyout target, MTV is floundering, and Viacom is suing YouTube for $1 billion for copyright infringement. Meanwhile, succession questions are more pressing than ever: If not daughter Shari, then who? Still, Paramount subsidiary DreamWorks had a good year, and Comedy Central is laughing all the way to the bank.

who's the boss? He was called the " Crypt Keeper" by Colbert Report anchor and Comedy Central employee) Stephen Colbert, who later apologized.

stan
o'neal

Chairman and CEO, Merrill Lynch
Age 56
HBS MBA 1978
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis The first African-Americans to lead a blue-chip Wall Street firm, O'Neal has turned around an ailing Merrill Lynch.

Work in Progress Making his way up the ranks at the financial-services giant since 1986, O'Neal took over the top job in 2002 and expanded Merrill Lynch in areas such as private equity, where it lagged behind competitors. More than half of its investment and trading income now comes from Europe and Asia, and it recently announced the start of new funds in global real estate. Last year, O'Neal's bonus package was worth $47.3 million, second only to that of Goldman Sachs' Lloyd Blankfein. O'Neal was a major fundraiser for President Bush in 2004.

green days As a boy growing up in Wedowee, Ala. - population 750 - O'Neal picked corn and cotton on his grandfather's farm.

bruce
wasserstein

Chairman and CEO, Lazard; Chairman, Wasserstein & Co.
Age 59
HLS J.D. 1970 HBS MBA 1971
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis The Wall Street wizard who took Lazard public has been dabbling profitably with influential media properties.

Work in Progress When Wasserstein bought New York magazine back in 2003 for $55 million, many deemed it a vanity acquisition with little payoff. But under the editorship of Adam Moss, it's been winning awards and making money. Wasserstein recently sold American Lawyer and its related media properties, pocketing $630 million on an original investment of $263 million, and made a $25 million gift to Harvard Law School to erect Wasserstein Hall, a new academic center.

progeny Son Ben left his associate editor job at New York in July to become online editor at the New Republic.

mark
zuckerberg

Founder and CEO, Facebook
Age 23
College Class of 2006, no degree
Home Base Palo Alto, CA
Rank Last Year 62

Précis With a rumored $6 billion offer on the table from Microsoft, 30 million registered users, and an estimated 150,000 joining Facebook every day, Zuckerberg's star is rising.

Work in Progress While Facebook recently opened up its service to outside net developers, the secret of Zuckerberg's success is how his social-networking site focuses on college and high school students while being less aggressively commercial than MySpace. Still, Facebook has its challenges, ranging from online sexual predators to workplace access bans to privacy concerns. On the plus side: potentially lucrative plans to allow users to hold individual auctions.

paper chase Zuckerberg can't seem to shake a suit brought by Harvard classmates alleging he stole the idea for Facebook from them.

antonin
scalia

Associate Justice, Supreme Court of the United States
Age 71
HLS LL.B. 1960
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis The court's conservative firebrand is so uncompromising, he'll even scorch an ally such as Chief Justice Roberts for lacking the courage of his convictions and not explicitly overturning precedent.

Work in Progress Though unable to bend the court to his will, Scalia has been able to change the terms of the debate on a number of issues (for example, pushing the court away from deferring to Congressional intent). He gets impatient with incremental change, and is seemingly uninterested in modifying his views to reach a consensus. A professed originalist and critic of judicial activism, Scalia will unapologetically legislate from the bench.

guilty pleasure Nino, as he is known, is a big fan of 24 agent Jack Bauer's interrogation techniques.

jill
abramson

Managing Editor for News, The New York Times
Age 53
HLS A.B. 1976
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 48

Précis A power player at the nation's most respected newspaper, Abramson is a strong candidate to replace Times executive editor Bill Keller when he retires.

Work in Progress Abramson is not only personally connected at the Times (she's part of the Alessandra Stanley - Maureen Dowd crowd), but a professional force, too - even when she isn't in the newsroom. She spearheaded an investigation of Rupert Murdoch from her home after breaking her leg in a midtown Manhattan traffic accident (she was hit by a garbage truck).

it's miller time Edie Falco is in talks to play Abramson in Nothing but the Truth, an upcoming movie about Times reporter Judith Miller going to jail to protect Plamegate source Lewis " Scooter" Libby.

edward m.
kennedy

U.S. Senator, Massachusetts; Chairman, Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
Age 75
College A.B. 1954 - 56
Home Base Hyannisport, MA
Rank Last Year 16

Précis The elder statesman of Senate liberals, Kennedy is all over recent legislation.

Work in Progress Among the Senate's - minences grises, only fellow Democrat Robert Byrd of West Virginia has Teddy beat for longevity. Since George Bush arrived, he's played bridge builder, pushing cross-aisle efforts like No Child Left Behind while plugging away at working-class essentials like the minimum-wage. His compromise immigration bill got fatally stalled, but any eventual border law will require his nod. Next project: to raise the minimum wage to $9.50 an hour.

ruffled feathers After calling the views of Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito on gender equity " troubling" Kennedy resigned his membership in Harvard's all-male Owl Club.

william a.
ackman

Founder, President, and Managing Member, Pershing Square Capital Management
Age 32
College A. B. 1988; HBS MBA 1992
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis As an activist investor, Ackman sees value where management doesn't and often gets his way.

Work in Progress Buying into Wendy's, he determined it had hidden assets to sell, and management eventually heeded his advice. The retailer Target is next on his radar. Ackman thinks Target's shares are undervalued and so purchased a near 10 percent interest in the company. As an incentive to follow Ackman's advice, Pershing Square announced it would donate a third of its after-tax profits on Target to its charitable foundation, which funds human-rights causes and inner-city development.

land unlocked Ackman often seeks to release the value tied up in real estate, which runs in his blood: His father runs a mortgage brokerage that's been in the family for 70 years.

charles e.
schumer

U.S. Senator, New York; Vice Chairman, Senate Democratic Conference
Age 56
College A.B. 1971; HLS J.D. 1974
Home Base Brooklyn, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Senate Dems owe Chuck Schumer favors - a lot of favors.

Work in Progress As co-architect of the Democrats' takeover of Congress, Schumer is the main reason so many of his Senate colleagues now chair committees. That debt is never far from his colleagues' minds, which comes in handy when he wants to pass a bill or procure federal dollars for New York. Schumer doesn't hesitate to look out for number one: He's said to be blocking a plan to raise taxes on Wall Street fat cats as a quid pro quo for campaign cash.

rival's respect t Gingrich's Amazon.com review of Schumer's new book, Positively American: Winning Back the Middle-Class Majority One Family at a Time, urges the GOP to co-opt the policy goals Schumer advocates

kenneth c.
griffin

Managing Director and CEO, Citadel Investment Group
Age 38
College A.B. 1989
Home Base Chicago, IL
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis With nearly $14 billion in assets, Griffin's Citadel accounts for about two percent of daily trading activity in New York, London, and Tokyo.

Work in Progress Griffin's wild-and-crazy trading ways began early - in his freshman year dorm room at Harvard, where he would make trades in between classes with a satellite hookup that fed real-time market data. Impressed by the college wunderkind, an investor gave Griffin $1 million with which to work miracles. He did. And he's been at Citadel ever since, running what one former employee (a happy one) referred to as "a dictatorship."

brush with fame Griffin, who made $1.4 billion last year, bought a $60 million Cézanne and an $80 million Jasper Johns.

bill
o'reilly

Host, The O'Reilly Factor, Fox News Channel; Host, The Radio Factor; Author; Syndicated Newspaper Columnist
Age 58
KSG MPA 1996
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 10

Précis O'Reilly rode - and helped propel - the country's conservative wave to become the most watched commentator on cable TV

Work in Progress Though his ratings have slipped as the country has retreated to the middle, O'Reilly still draws more than two million viewers. Fans love his feuds, notably with Al Franken; MSNBC commentator Keith Olbermann; and Media Matters, a liberal watchdog group. And they love his pious crusades - for stricter child abuse laws and against stores using the word " holiday" instead of " Christmas. "

sweet dreams His 1998 novel Those Who Trespass features an Irish-American television journalist who systematically murders his enemies.

ray
dalio

Founder, President, and CIO, Bridgewater Associates
Age 58
HBS MBA 1973
Home Base Westport, CT
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Earning $350 million last year, Dalio lucratively navigates a hedge-fund " sky" that, as he puts it, has 11,000 planes buzzing around and only 100 qualified pilots.

Work in Progress From his comfortable perch in Connecticut, Dalio manages investments for clients ranging from foreign governments to pension funds and endowments. Though Dalio has a long track record of significantly outperforming the market, he worries about the new kids on the block. " Hedge funds and private-equity firms today are like the dot-coms in 2000, " he told Barron's. " The amount of money flowing is almost out of control, and it's making everything overvalued. "

best defense Being fired as a young trader by his then boss, Sandy Weill (Citigroup's ex-chairman) gave Dalio the impetus to form Bridgewater in 1975.

ruth bader
ginsburg

Associate Justice, Supreme Court of the United States
Age 74
HLS Class of 1959, no degree
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis No longer sugarcoating her liberal dissents, the Supreme Court's only female justice is increasingly speaking her mind.

Work in Progress Ginsburg is pushing back against the conservative, post - Sandra Day O'Connor drift of the court, notably with the recent " partial-birth" abortion case in which the majority upheld a nationwide ban on the procedure; in her dissent, Ginsburg said the decision was " alarming. " She has been especially frustrated with Chief Justice Roberts, who is less conciliatory than his predecessor, William Rehnquist, and is concerned about the message her solitary status sends about women in the law.

no joke A 2005 study concluded that the (publicly sober but privately humorous) Ginsburg was 1/19 as funny as Antonin Scalia.

steve
ballmer

CEO, Microsoft
Age 51
College A.B. 1977
Home Base Hunts Point, WA
Rank Last Year 12

Précis Microsoft's software hegemony has made it a $240 billion colossus, but Ballmer can't promise a rosy future.

Work in Progress Widely criticized for having missed the software-over-the-Internet revolution, Ballmer outlined Microsoft's direction this year: Most revenue will come from software, with a gradual shift to the services model that is serving IBM well. And the company's making a major push into online advertising. Sounds promising - but the stock price has been flat for years, the Zune's a dud, that $1.15 billion repair bill on faulty Xbox 360s wasn't confidence - inspiring, Windows Vista hasn't exactly taken off, Google looms large, and Apple - once a mere pest - is quickly becoming a threat.

animal magic Famous for public presentations so enthusiastic they once led to surgery on his vocal cords, Ballmer is the star of a ubiquitous web video, known as Dance, Monkeyboy, in which he hops and screams like one of the monkeys from 28 Days Later.

w. james
mcnerney jr.

Chairman, President, and CEO, the Boeing Company
Age 57
HBS MBA 1975
Home Base Chicago, IL
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis The man who made Boeing fly again.

Work in Progress After McNerney spent 19 years at GE, Jeff Immelt beat him to Jack Welch's CEO seat. So he went to 3M and turned the rust-belt manufacturer into a cash cow. " I could pitch a tent anywhere, " he said, and in 2005, he jumped to Boeing, an aviation giant dogged by ethics scandals and humbled by European upstart Airbus. Then Airbus crashed and burned with its new " superjumbo" jet, the A-380, and McNerney shrewdly bet on the fuel-efficient 787 Dreamliner, made of carbon-fiber composites. With 677 orders placed for the $162 million Dreamliner, Boeing will once again be doing its part to help the U.S. balance of payments.

power hitters As an undergraduate at Yale, McNerney played on the same baseball team as future U.S. CEO George W. Bush.

bruce
kovner

Chairman and Founder, Caxton Associates; Chairman, American Enterprise Institute; Chairman, Juilliard
Age 62
College A.B. 1966; KSG Class of 1971, no degree
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 44

Précis The notoriously press-shy hedge fund manager made $715 million last year -

Work in Progress - but he's also public spirited, underwriting Lincoln Center's redevelopment and shaping the battle of public ideas - Kovner helps fund the conservative American Enterprise Institute and feisty New York Sun. While several self-described " Communist" relatives were called before the House Un-American Activities Committee, Kovner may have come to his politics by way of his father, Isidore " Moishe" Kovner, an engineer who crossed a picket line in World War II to go to his job at an aircraft factory.

spruce bruce In a Howard Hughes - like touch, Kovner outfitted his Fifth Avenue mansion with a lead-lined room as a defense against biological, chemical, or dirty-bomb attacks.

judah
folkman

Andrus Professor of Pediatric Surgery and Professor of Cell Biology, Harvard Medical School; Director, Vascular Biology Program, Children's Hospital Boston
Age 74
HMS M.D. 1957
Home Base Boston, MA
Rank Last Year 7

Précis Folkman's pioneering development of angiogenesis inhibitors - drugs that starve tumors of vital nourishment and oxygen - continues to revolutionize cancer treatment.

Work in Progress Several antiangiogenesis drugs, such as Avastin, Nexava, and Sutent are now FDA-approved, with many more soon to follow. A version of Folkman's own discovery, Endostatin, recently approved in China, may soon be picked up in clinical trials stateside. Doctors also see other potential applications for these drugs, including diabetic retinopathy, macular degeneration, rheumatoid arthritis, and cardiovascular disease.

bedside manner Folkman made house calls with C. Everett Koop when he was in surgical training with Koop in Philadelphia.

james
dimon

Chairman and CEO, JPMorgan Chase
Age 51
HBS MBA 1982
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 27

Précis Dimon aims to revitalize JPMorgan Chase into a one-stop-shop financial firm that's the model to beat.

Work in Progress The activist CEO ruffled more than a few feathers by cutting top managers' salaries, shutting down gyms, even nixing fresh flower arrangements. His aim: to tighten the focus of a bloated firm, pushing it ahead of rivals Citigroup and Bank of America. Woes like the subprime-mortgage sector and the leverage-lending market, however, may be his greatest short-term challenges. With the help of a reported $100-$200 million in subsidies, the firm is building a 1.3 million-square-foot office tower that will rise at the World Trade Center site.

nice work if you can get it Dimon's total compensation in 2006: $39,053,329.

meg
whitman

President and CEO, eBay
Age 51
HBS MBA 1979
Home Base San Jose, CA
Rank Last Year 8

Précis Whitman runs the world's most comprehensive marketplace and a constellation of websites that keeps on expanding.

Work in Progress As a $60 billion auction house, eBay's growth has slowed in recent months, so Whitman has gone on a spending spree. Within the past year, eBay has bought the online ticket seller Stubhub for $310 million and StumbleUpon, a browser " plug-in" that allows web surfers to rate sites. This summer, eBay launched the American version of its international Craigslist-style classified site, Kijiji, even though it owns a minority interest in Craigslist and will thus be competing with itself.

political web Whitman is financial co-chair of the presidential campaign of fellow HBSer Mitt Romney. (They met when both were working at Bain & Company.)

henry m.
paulson jr.

U.S. Secretary of the Treasury
Age 61
HBS MBA 1970
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year 11

Précis In office since June 2006, the former Goldman Sachs honcho provides the Bush administration with a strong hand at Treasury.

Work in Progress Like several Goldman bigwigs before him - John Corzine, Stephen Friedman, and Robert Rubin - Paulson left the investment bank for a far less remunerative government position. Bush is credited with convincing Paulson to jump ship, though the two openly disagree about environmental policies. (A former Nature Conservancy board member, Paulson has donated nearly $1 million to the anti-Bush enviro group.) The first Bush treasury secretary to come from the world of finance, Paulson has restored credibility to the post and used his podium to speak out against economic inequity and protectionism and for Social Security reform.

second time's a charm Paulson didn't contribute to the 2000 Bush campaign but helped raise more than $100,000 for him in 2004.

jeffrey r.
immelt

Chairman and CEO, General Electric
Age 51
HBS MBA 1982
Home Base New Canaan, CT
Rank Last Year 6

Précis He's not the celebrity CEO that his predecessor, Jack Welch, was, but Immelt has given industrial giant GE a touch of eco-consciousness.

Work in Progress In stark contrast to Welch's stiff-arm approach, Immelt supports plans to finally remove the PCBs that GE dumped into the Hudson River. It's one sign of how he's refashioning the company: GE is also developing energy-efficient products for its new Ecomagination line, already at $12 billion a year in sales. Immelt beefed up energy, aviation, water treatment, and health care with acquisitions. Investors would like to see the stock price, which is about 33% below its 2000 high of $60 per share, go higher, but all seem to agree that Immelt is the right man for this enormous job.

the soft sell " CEO celebrity in the nineties got way overblown, " Immelt has said. " The truth is, regular people do these jobs. "

stephen a.
schwarzman

Chairman, CEO, and Co-founder, the Blackstone Group
Age 60
HBS MBA 1972
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 22

Précis Though some saw the IPO as a bust, Blackstone made history by becoming one of the first private-equity firms to go public - with Schwarzman pocketing up to $677 million.

Work in Progress Fair or not, Schwarzman has become the avatar of the obscenely rich hedge fund mogul. His rivals may shun ostentation, but Schwarzman invited 500 guests to his 60th-birthday party, at which Rod Stewart performed. Wall Street would rather lay low while two Senate bills circulate that would close a capital-gains loophole - and knock billions off the value of Schwarzman's IPO. One of those Senate bills is known as Blackstone's Law.

pay pal George Bush, Schwarzman's Yale roommate, recently stopped by Schwarzman's 740 Park Avenue triplex - bought in 2000 for a then-record $35 million - for a fundraiser.

lou
dobbs

Anchor and Editor of Lou Dobbs Tonight, CNN; Columnist, Syndicated Radio Show Host
Age 62
College A.B. 1967
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year Not ranked

Précis Dobbs greatly expanded his reach as a business commentator by hammering away at populist issues such as outsourcing and immigration, immigration, and immigration.

Work in Progress Dobbs led the grassroots chorus railing against the immigration bill that went down in defeat in the Senate. Some see the midterm-election victories by economic populists as a referendum on his views: Dobbs' ratings are up 72 percent since 2003, and in April, CBS hired him to appear on the Early Show. He has engaged in running battles with critics of his nativism (Thomas Friedman called him a " blithering idiot"), and skinned his knee over erroneous claims that illegal immigrants were plaguing the country with leprosy.

secret admirer Dobbs has a note on his office wall from Kurt Vonnegut that reads: " You, as the only big-time television personality capable of not only feeling but experiencing sorrow for American working stiffs, are our hero. "

lloyd c.
blankfein

Chairman and CEO, Goldman Sachs
Age 53
College A.B. 1975; HLS J.D. 1978
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 36

Précis Has private-equity investment peaked? Blankfein, known for his intelligence and penchant for making gobs of money, assures that it isn't " going out of style. "

Work in Progress " All ants look the same to me, but to other ants, they probably look different, " Blankfein told the Financial Times, referring to the media's tendency to lump Goldman Sachs together with other firms. At the very least, Goldman is first among equals. It advises buyout firms and competes with them. In April, it raised close to $20 billion for its sixth private-equity fund and continues a streak of record quarterly profits. Still, hedge fund bailouts test Blankfein's resolve and Goldman's pocketbook.

a pasha's dacha In addition to his $27 million Upper West Side apartment, Blankfein is now the proud owner of the 15,000-square foot Old Trees Southampton estate. Price tag: $41 million.

felipe Calderón
Hinojosa

President of Mexico
Age 45
KSG MPA 2000
Home Base Mexico City
Rank Last Year 58

Précis After weathering months of protests led by defeated leftist Andres Manuel López Obrador, Calderón got down to leading the world's most populous Spanish-speaking country.

Work in Progress Calderón has introduced a flurry of programs, cracking down on drug trafficking and gang violence, boosting free trade, and emerging as a vocal critic of U.S. immigration policies. With tensions rising between the U.S. and Venezuela, he has been positioning himself as go-between for the two Americas. His efforts to exploit Mexico's vast oil reserves - Calderón is a former energy secretary, after all - could have profound implications worldwide.

in the genes Born into a political family, Calderón reportedly handed out leaflets and rode around in a truck with loudspeakers while other kids were playing ball.

ben s.
bernanke

Chairman, Federal Reserve Board
Age 53
College A.B. 1975
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year 3

Précis Though Bernanke has treaded lightly at the Fed, he now faces an enormous challenge: crises in housing and credit markets.

Work in Progress Over the past year, Bernanke has faced criticism for his record on protecting consumers from deceptive lending practices. Up next is a ruling on whether he has the authority to investigate mortgage units of financial institutions that the Federal Reserve oversees. If given the power, Bernanke is expected to use it. Meantime, the Fed's insistence on not cutting interest rates is unsettling Wall Street; on the Today show, CNBC's James Cramer called the Fed "heartless" and " clueless"

defcon 4 When the Wall Street Journal says of the subprime mortage crisis, " Investors are wondering when the next financial corpse will float to the surface, " Bernanke should be careful it's not his.

johN G.
roberts JR.

Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court
Age 52
College A.B. 1976; HLS J.D. 1979
Home Base Washington, DC
Rank Last Year 5

Précis As Chief Justice, Roberts sets the Supreme Court's agenda and, with Samuel Alito replacing Sandra Day O'Connor, has turned it unequivocally to the right.

Work in Progress His efforts to maintain a collegial atmosphere have fallen short, as the court has delivered a series of five-to-four decisions, and its members appear more polarized than they were under William Rehnquist. Though criticized especially by Antonin Scalia) for insufficient intellectual boldness, Roberts may be taking the long view, dismantling precedent on such issues as campaign finance and the consideration of race in education incrementally rather than overturning it all at once.

gender bender Played Peppermint Patty in his high school's all-male version of You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown.

michael
bloomberg

Mayor, New York City; Founder, Bloomberg L.P.
Age 65
HBS MBA 1966
Home Base New York, NY
Rank Last Year 83

Précis The mere thought of an independent run for president by this moderate billionaire is enough to give Democratic and Republican strategists an ulcer.

Work in Progress The former Democrat left his adopted Republican party in June, becoming an Independent. It's a logical step for a man who doesn't fit neatly into any ideological straightjacket.A latecomer to environmentalism, he's now pushing a 30-year plan, called PlaNYC, to address New York's eco-challenges. As his fight over congestion pricing showed, Bloomberg will face stiff resistance to making these proposals a reality. Despite the usual denials, he continues to travel the country like a White House hopeful. Whether he actually has a chance to win in 2008, his willingness to self-finance campaigns gives him credibility as a spoiler or kingmaker.

street cred not) Bloomberg's reputation as a subway-riding eco-populist took a hit when it was revealed that he hitched a ride to the subway - in an SUV.

mitt
romney

Republican Candidate for President
Age 60
HLS J.D. 1975; HBS MBA 1975
Home Base Belmont, MA
Rank Last Year 68

Précis After initial bumps, Romney is running a strong campaign based on management skills, deep pockets, and a call for a return to a simpler America.

Work in Progress Can Romney become president? Dogged by the two Ms - Mormonism and Massachusetts, where he served as governor - Romney has to convince the Republican base that he's a bona fide conservative. But while Fred Thompson meanders along, Romney is shaking hands across America. Some question his foreign-policy acumen, but polls suggest he's doing well. Helped by a family that would make the Brady Bunch jealous, he's also buffed his Mr. Clean image to a shine. The most damaging closet skeleton revealed so far: a curious incident in which he strapped the family dog to the top of their station wagon - for 12 hours.

self-inflicted woundRomney admitted that his favorite novel is Battlefield Earth, written by Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard.

bill
gates

Co-chair, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; Chairman, Microsoft
Age 52
College Class of 1977, no degree
Home Base Medina, WA
Rank Last Year 1

Précis Phasing out of Microsoft, Gates is channeling his billions into overlooked and underfunded health, education, and development programs.

Work in Progress After Warren Buffett added his $30 billion to Gates' pot, Buffett noted that it's easier to make money than to give it away responsibly. Perhaps with that in mind, Gates will retire in July 2008 and devote himself to his foundation. Its list of new grantees is long and growing daily - millions to reduce malaria deaths in Senegal, house the homeless in Oregon, and enhance eco-health approaches to communicable diseases in Latin America. Gates and Eli Broad are raising $60 million to compel presidential candidates to make an issue of education. They're calling it " Ed in '08. " Catchy.

second fiddle After years at #1, Gates lost his status as the world's richest man in August to Carlos Slim Helu, a Mexican telecom mogul worth $59 billion.

barack
obama

U.S. Senator, Illinois; Democratic Candidate for President
Age 46
HLS J.D. 1991
Home Base Chicago, IL
Rank Last Year 50

Précis What was once a pipe dream could now redefine America's sense of self and elevate its moral standing in the world: Obama, the son of an African immigrant, has a viable chance of being elected president.

Work in Progress After a February announcement, Obama began addressing his weak spot: inexperience. Cue a universal health care plan to prove that he's got the policy chops to match the smile. Obama pitches himself not just as anti-Bush, but as the anti-Bush, reminding voters of his original opposition to the Iraq War, promising greater transparency in the White House, and pledging to rein in lobbying abuses. Audacity and hope are a start, but a winning campaign requires endurance and cash, and Obama's doing extraordinarily well at raising the latter: a record $32.5 million in the second quarter of 2007, from a record 258,000 donors.

he'll drink to that His $1.6 million house in the city's South Side has four fireplaces and a 1,000-bottle wine cellar.

ANTHONY
M. KENNEDY

Associate Justice, Supreme Court of the United States
Age 71
HLS LL.B. 1961
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year 4

Précis The swing vote on a split court.

Work in Progress Kennedy holds the balance of power on the most contentious cases before the court and is keenly aware of how his colleagues will vote he can count to five, as the saying goes). He has voted with the conservative wing of the court on such issues as partial-birth abortion but will split from this majority even while voting with it (for example, his separate opinion on the recent school integration case criticizing Chief Justice Roberts' " all-too-unyielding insistence that race cannot be a factor"). Kennedy is open to liberal suasion; there is speculation that Justice John Paul Stevens lured him into providing the decisive vote in the court's surprise acceptance of a Guantánamo case.

not a swingerKennedy says he does not like being called the swing vote, because it sounds as if he's voting to accommodate one side or the other.

George w.
bush

43rd President of the United States
Age 61
HBS MBA 1975
Home Base Washington, D.C.
Rank Last Year 2

Précis The beleaguered president is sticking to his guns, but Bush's ability to transform his will into reality is diminishing.

Work in Progress Despite persistent scandals, both Reagan and Clinton reached the height of their popularity in their second term. Not Dubya: His popularity has sunk to lows that would make Richard Nixon smile. The 60-plus percent of Americans who don't approve of the job Bush is doing now includes hard-core conservatives - which is ironic, because this was to be the administration that cemented the Republican majority for decades to come. Bush alienated conservative supporters by pushing an immigration bill they considered " amnesty, " then lost political capital after congressional Republicans killed it. His legacy will be a quagmire in Iraq; faith-based ideology permeating the civil service; regulatory agencies, such as the FDA and the EPA, serving business interests first; less-progressive tax rates; environmental policies dictated by energy companies; executive branch power trumping constitutional rights; a Justice Department that has become a national joke; a right-wing Supreme Court; and an American reputation sorely in need of rehabilitation in every corner of the globe.

practicing what he doesn't preach His Crawford, Texas, ranch is eco-friendly: A 25,000-gallon underground cistern collects rainwater and purified water from sinks, showers, and toilets for irrigation.

Al
Gore

Chairman, Current TV; Environmental Activist; Author
Age 59
College 1969
Home Base Nashville, TN
Rank Last Year 20

Précis The self-proclaimed " recovering politician" is living proof that it's possible to do more to improve people's lives out of office than in it.

Work in Progress While the man who may or may not have beaten him in 2000 seems to lose worldwide influence with every passing day, Al Gore has become a figure whose second life's work is, literally, trying to save the world. Thanks to Gore, mentions of the climate crisis no longer require scare quotes. His Oscar-winning box-office hit An Inconvenient Truth altered the national consensus: No one credible now argues that global warming does not exist. Gore's ceaseless work on the issue has marginalized doubters such as President Bush, Michigan congressman John Dingell, and Oklahoma senator James Inhofe, forcing them to either moderate their positions or stand on the sidelines of policy making. This year, Gore has been busy testifying before both houses of Congress; piloting his cable network, Current TV; promoting his best-selling anti-Bush/Cheney manifesto, The Assault on Reason; and presiding over Live Earth, a not entirely successful benefit concert held simultaneously in eight cities around the world. In the wake of Live Earth, Gore announced a contest in which advertising agencies will compete to produce the best anti-global-warming ad. He still deflects rumors of a presidential run - perhaps because he might actually lose influence if he got in the race.

Knock, Knock Believe it or not, Gore occasionally did stand-up comedy in college.

Click here to read 02138's interview with this year's most influential alum.