Here's what I'd do...create a completely new head.tpl and just put this in it:
<div class="HeadLogo"><a href="{$http_location}/"><img src="{$ImagesDir}/xmarcalogo.gif" width="244" height="70" alt="" /></a></div>
If THAT doesn't left align, you know something is up. Oh and the image is also 67px high, not 70...causing a bit of degrading of the image because of scaling.