Hillary Clinton's commanding lead over a crop of possible Republican presidential candidates is slipping, according to a new McClatchy-Marist poll. Her lead over former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, for example, has dropped to 7 percentage points, from 16 in April. She leads Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky 48 percent to 42 percent, down from a 14-point differential in April.

Here's why:

Lee Miringoff, the director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion in New York, which conducted the survey, attributed the slippage to Clinton's increased visibility in promoting her new book, Hard Choices, and some recent gaffes.

Clinton caused a stir in June when she said that she and former President Bill Clinton left the White House in 2001 "dead broke" and in debt, a statement many potential voters found hard to accept given that both Clintons received millions of dollars in book deal advances and commanded six figures on the speech circuit. [McClatchy]

Analysts have long predicted Clinton's support would begin to dip as she re-entered the political fray.

Actor Harrison Ford was seriously injured on Thursday when the World War II training plane he was flying crashed on a golf course in Mar Vista, California.

Sources tell NBC News he was stabilized on the scene before being taken to a hospital, and has lacerations to the head and possible fractures. It is not yet known what caused the plane to crash. Ford is believed to have been the only passenger onboard the vintage plane.

Syrian state media is reporting that the commander of the al-Nusra Front, Abu Homam al-Shami, was killed during a "unique operation" carried out by the Syrian army.

On social media, the militant group confirmed that al-Shami was killed in an air strike along with three other leaders. State media said they were targeted while meeting in northern Idlib province. Al-Nusra is considered an affiliate of al-Qaeda, and on Wednesday attacked the Air Force Intelligence headquarters in Aleppo. The militants detonated explosives in a tunnel under the building, the BBC reports, and then fighters launched a ground assault against government forces, who forced them back. Twenty soldiers and militiamen and 14 rebels are believed to have been killed.

The nation's largest banks are all financialy strong enough to weather an economic crisis, the Federal Reserve said Wednesday. Thirty-one banks in all passed the Fed's annual stress test, meaning they had enough available capital to withstand a theoretical depression in which unemployment soars to 10 percent amid collapses in the housing and stock markets.

However, it was only the first stage of stress testing. Next week, the Fed will announce whether banks pass a second test to determine if they are fit enough to buy back stock and distribute dividends to shareholders.

Cardinal Edward M. Egan, who led the Archdiocese of New York from 2000 to 2009, died Thursday of a heart attack. He was 82 years old.

In a statement, Cardinal Timothy Dolan praised Egan's "generous and faithful priesthood," adding, "Thank God he had a peaceful death."

Astronomers have discovered what is only the second known planet living in a family of four stars.

While still rare, the find means four-star systems with planets are much more common than previously believed. Discovery News notes that the discovery could have significant implications about how planets form in multi-star systems.

Scientists had previously identified the planet, but thought it was part of a three-star system. Only recently did astronomers discover a fourth star, a red dwarf, lurking there.

"Star systems come in myriad forms. There can be single stars, binary stars, triple stars, even quintuple star systems," Lewis Roberts from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory told Discovery News. "It's amazing the way nature puts these things together."

Scientists now believe that four percent of solar-type stars are part of four-star systems. The findings about the new four-star system, named 30 Ari, will be published in the Astronomical Journal.

Because of liability concerns, lots of cities across the U.S. have banned sled-riding in public places. And residents of our nation's capital are taking it lying down — literally.

The Hill reports that protesters upset over the sledding ban on the west lawn of the Capitol — prime sledding real estate — planned to stage a ''sled-in'' today. An online petition to get the Capitol Board Police to lift the ban had more than 800 signatures by noon on Thursday.

A police official told The Hill, ''For security reasons, the Capitol grounds are not your typical neighborhood hill or playground.''

Defiant sledders are reportedly being told to leave the premises ''brusquely'' by police.

As a former local news anchor and current executive vice president of Marriott International, Kathleen Matthews has a lot going for her besides a famous husband. And it looks like she'll try to add to that impressive resume. 

Politico reports that the wife of Chris Matthews, the firebrand host of MSNBC's Hardball, has begun "talking to Democratic activists and interviewing potential consultants'' about running for Rep. Chris Van Hollen's (D-Md.) seat, as he leaves to seek retiring Sen. Barbara Mikulski's seat.

According to Politico, Kathleen Matthews has worked to improve Marriott's sustainability and to make the company friendlier toward the LGBT community. She also earned kudos from former President Bill Clinton, who recently attended the opening of a Marriott in earthquake-damaged Haiti, an effort Matthews spearheaded.

Mark Lippert, the American ambassador to South Korea, said Thursday he was upbeat and on his way to recovery after an attacker slashed his face with a knife.

"Doing well & in great spirits," he wrote on Twitter.

On Wednesday, a knife-wielding attacker stabbed Lippert during a breakfast lecture in Seoul. South Korean authorities said the assailant, Kim Ki-jong, was a fringe nationalist who acted alone, and President Park Geun-hye condemned the incident as an "intolerable attack on the South Korean-United States alliance."

Moles might just be the unsung heroes of archaeology.

A team of moles previously unearthed Roman artifacts from an ancient fort in England, and the creatures' talents are helping archaeologists once again.

The Viborg Museum in northern Denmark is using moles to help look for a fort from the Middle Ages. Researchers from the museum analyze mole hills after the moles bring pottery fragments and other artifacts to the surface.

"The closer we get to a building, the higher the content of items per liter we find," Jesper Hjermind of the Viborg Museum told The Copenhagen Post. "It's simple, but it works."

Hjermind even gave the moles' work an adorable name, "moleology." 

Lawyers for Michael Brown's parents announced Thursday that they will file a wrongful death lawsuit against the city of Ferguson, Missouri, and former police officer Darren Wilson.

Wilson, who is white, fatally shot Brown, an unarmed, black 18-year-old, in Ferguson last year.

The announcement comes after the Justice Department said it would not bring charges against Wilson. The department also released a report Wednesday that charged Ferguson's police department with routine racial discrimination.

Daryl Parks, Brown's family's attorney, said the report documented "rampant, wholesale, systemic" problems in Ferguson's police department that must "change soon for the safety of the citizens."