Robin Tyler and Diane Olson wed at 5:01 pm in Los Angeles.

Some responses to the news that the California Supreme Court has overturned the ban on gay marriage from the Los Angeles Times comments section:

• I hope that california will now fall in the ocean. There been have enough earthquakes that I think God was waiting for this decision. I now hope he sinks california with all its fags and mexicans.

• If you haven't been to California recently you're probably not aware of how much evil there is out there. You can feel it in the air--oppressive, satanic, demonic power. And not believing in it doesn't make it go away. Charles Manson was just the tip of the iceberg. Nobody there is willing to face up to how bad things have gotten, and how much worse they're going to become if things keep going the way they have been. If you live in California, your kids ARE NOT SAFE, period. Most of you probably know that already, though. The question is whether you'll ever do anything about it. I guess most of those who could have already left.

• The front page pic on the LA website says it all. Sick. Gays can do what the want in the privacy of their bedrooms, as far as I'm concerned, but when they bring it around children, as shown in the photo, then a crime has been committed. The only reason this crap has got this far is because of homosexual Hollywood sitcom script writers that present this behavior as normal and acceptable, and anyone against it as a toothless redneck bubba.

• Super, more queer BS thrust in our faces. Go away freaks. Just look at the photos of these people -what happened in their childhoods?

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Lorri L. Jean, chief executive of the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center, speak at a news conference at the center in Hollywood. In the background are Michael and Jon Galluccio and their children Adam and Madison.

Spy Agency Sought U.S. Call Records Before 9/11, Lawyers Say
By Andrew Harris
June 30, 2006
Bloomberg News

The U.S. National Security Agency asked AT&T Inc. to help it set up a domestic call monitoring site seven months before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, lawyers claimed June 23 in court papers filed in New York federal court.

The allegation is part of a court filing adding AT&T, the nation's largest telephone company, as a defendant in a breach of privacy case filed earlier this month on behalf of Verizon Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp. customers. The suit alleges that the three carriers, the NSA and President George W. Bush violated the Telecommunications Act of 1934 and the U.S. Constitution, and seeks money damages.

"The Bush Administration asserted this became necessary after 9/11,'' plaintiff's lawyer Carl Mayer said in a telephone interview. "This undermines that assertion.''

Al-Zarqawi's wife: Al-Qaida sold him out
July 3, 2006
Associated Press

Al-Qaida leaders sold out Abu Musab al-Zarqawi to the United States in exchange for a promise to let up in the search for Osama bin Laden, the slain militant's wife claimed in an interview with an Italian newspaper.

The woman, identified by La Repubblica as al-Zarqawi's first wife, said al-Qaida's top leadership reached a deal with U.S. intelligence because al-Zarqawi had become too powerful. She claimed Sunni tribes and Jordanian secret services mediated the deal.

[...]

"I think a secret pact was struck whose immediate goal was his death," she told the newspaper. "In return, the American troops promised to ease, at least momentarily, their hunt for bin Laden."

****

C.I.A. Closes Unit Focused on Capture of bin Laden
By Mark Mazzetti
July 4, 2006
The New York Times

The Central Intelligence Agency has closed a unit that for a decade had the mission of hunting Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants, intelligence officials confirmed Monday.

The unit, known as Alec Station, was disbanded late last year and its analysts reassigned within the C.I.A. Counterterrorist Center, the officials said.

Court's Ruling Is Likely to Force Negotiations Over Presidential Power
By David E. Sanger and Scott Shane
Friday 30 June 2006
The New York Times

The Supreme Court's Guantanamo ruling Thursday was the most significant setback yet for the administration's contention that the Sept. 11 attacks and their aftermath have justified one of the broadest expansions of presidential power in American history.

President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney spent much of their first term bypassing Congress in the service of what they labeled a "different kind of war."

Now they will almost certainly plunge into negotiations they previously spurned over the extent of the president's powers, this time in the midst of a midterm election in which Bush's wartime strategies and their consequences have emerged as a potent issue.

[...]

What the court's 5-3 decision declared, in essence, was that Bush and Cheney had overreached and must now either use the established rules of courts-martial or go back to Congress - this time with vastly diminished leverage - to win approval for the military commissions that Bush argues are the best way to keep the nation safe.

Bigotry Beneath the Fog
By Eugene Robinson
Friday, June 23, 2006; Page A25
The Washington Post

Once in a while the fog machine that's kept on "high" around here to obscure everyone's real intentions breaks down. There's always a mad rush to crank it up again, but for the briefest moment we can see our elected representatives for what they really are, not what they pretend to be. Wednesday we had one of those rare high-definition moments, when the House Republican caucus defied its leaders and refused to back renewal of the Voting Rights Act.

That tells you about all you need to know, doesn't it?

I love you with all my heart and I'll miss you terribly, Skippy.
xoxo

Bush Was Set on Path to War, Memo by British Adviser Says
By Don Van Natta Jr.
March 27, 2006
The New York Times

In the weeks before the United States-led invasion of Iraq, as the United States and Britain pressed for a second United Nations resolution condemning Iraq, President Bush's public ultimatum to Saddam Hussein was blunt: Disarm or face war.

But behind closed doors, the president was certain that war was inevitable. During a private two-hour meeting in the Oval Office on Jan. 31, 2003, he made clear to Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain that he was determined to invade Iraq without the second resolution, or even if international arms inspectors failed to find unconventional weapons, said a confidential memo about the meeting written by Mr. Blair's top foreign policy adviser and reviewed by The New York Times.

"Our diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning," David Manning, Mr. Blair's chief foreign policy adviser at the time, wrote in the memo that summarized the discussion between Mr. Bush, Mr. Blair and six of their top aides.

"The start date for the military campaign was now penciled in for 10 March," Mr. Manning wrote, paraphrasing the president. "This was when the bombing would begin."

[...]

The memo indicates the two leaders envisioned a quick victory and a transition to a new Iraqi government that would be complicated, but manageable. Mr. Bush predicted that it was "unlikely there would be internecine warfare between the different religious and ethnic groups." Mr. Blair agreed with that assessment.

The memo also shows that the president and the prime minister acknowledged that no unconventional weapons had been found inside Iraq. Faced with the possibility of not finding any before the planned invasion, Mr. Bush talked about several ways to provoke a confrontation, including a proposal to paint a United States surveillance plane in the colors of the United Nations in hopes of drawing fire, or assassinating Mr. Hussein.

Gulf War Veteran Gets Placebos Instead Of Real Medicine
February 23, 2006
WSOC-TV, Charlotte, NC

A Gulf War veteran undergoing medical treatment said he was given placebos -- or sugar pills -- instead of real medicine.

Like thousands of other soldiers, Army veteran Mike Woods said he developed bizarre symptoms after serving in the first Gulf War -- blackouts, chest pain and numbness in the extremities.

Woods looked to the Veterans Administration for help. He said his VA doctor prescribed him a drug called Obecalp.

"She told me there was this new drug out that would really help me with all of my physical conditions, and my pain. She really wanted me to try it," said Woods.

But when the pill provided no relief, Woods did some research and learned that Obecalp isn't a medicine at all, but a sugar pill. He was shocked to learn the word "obecalp" is placebo spelled backward.

An Update on President Bush's NSA Program: The Historical Context, Specter's Recent Bill, and Feingold's Censure Motion
By John W. Dean
Friday, Mar. 24, 2006
FindLaw.com

President George Bush continues to openly and defiantly ignore the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) -- the 1978 statute prohibiting electronic inspection of Americans' telephone and email communications with people outside the United States without a court-authorized warrant. (According to U.S. News & World Report, the President may also have authorized warrantless break-ins and other physical surveillance, such as opening regular mail, in violation of the Fourth Amendment.)

Bush's position is that he does not need Congressional approval for his measures. Even he does not claim that Congress gave him express power to undertake them, but he does claim that Congress indirectly approved such measures when it authorized the use of force to go after those involved in the 9/11 terror attacks on the United States. He also argues that, in any event, approval was not necessary - for he argues that he has such authority under Article II of the Constitution, as the chief executive, and Commander in Chief, charged with faithfully executing the laws of the land and protecting the Constitution.

These arguments are hauntingly familiar to this observer.

[...]

In the end, this issue is going to be resolved by the 2006 midterm election. If Republicans lose control of either the House or Senate, the investigations of the Bush/Cheney White House will begin. It won't be pretty. It will make dealing with lying about sex look like High School hazing. It will even make Richard Nixon look like a piker when it comes to staying within the law.