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DENVER — Even with President Obama "evolving" his way to support of gay marriage, the politics of the issue are playing out in complex and contradictory ways in the states, with potentially large consequences for the vote in November.

The 2012 state legislative session began with gay-rights advocates opposing an ...

BISMARCK, N.D. — North Dakota has passed Alaska to become the second-leading oil-producing state in the nation, trailing only Texas, state officials said Tuesday.

North Dakota oil drillers pumped 17.8 million barrels in March, with a daily average of 575,490 barrels, Assistant State Mineral Resources Director Bruce Hicks said. That ...

NEW YORK — Cheaper gas won't be enough to get many more Americans on the road this summer. They're still too worried about their jobs and the economy.

Economists and tourism experts are expecting only a small uptick in summer travelers. Gas prices are lower, but still high enough to ...

SMITHTOWN — An athletics committee on Long Island has ruled that a 13-year-old boy can keep playing field hockey on the girls' team at Southampton High School.

The ruling is a reversal of fortune for the student, Keeling Pilaro.

Keeling had played on the girls' team at Southampton High this ...

The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee wants Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. to investigate whether the office of Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio used federal grant money to illegally detain Hispanics, whom the government alleges were the victims of racial profiling.

If so, Sen. Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, ...

VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Legion of Christ religious order has been hit by a second scandal in a week with the admission that its most well-known priest had fathered a child.

The Rev. Thomas Williams, an American television commentator, author and moral theologian at the legion's Rome university, ...

PORT ST. JOHN, Fla. (AP) — A Florida mother who fatally shot her four children before killing herself Tuesday called three of the kids who had sought help from a neighbor back to the house before firing the fatal shots, authorities said.

Thirty-three-year-old Tonya Thomas fatally shot her four children, ...

WASHINGTON — Unseasonable weather pushed last month to the fifth warmest April on record worldwide, federal weather statistics show.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Climatic Data Center calculated that April's average temperature of 57.9 degrees (14.4 degrees Celsius) was nearly 1.2 degrees (0.7 degrees Celsius) above the 20th ...

NEW YORK (AP) — Dominique Strauss-Kahn is suing the hotel housekeeper who accused him of sexually assaulting her, saying she seriously damaged his reputation with what he calls a bogus allegation.

The former International Monetary Fund leader and French presidential hopeful struck back at maid Nafissatou Diallo's lawsuit against him ...

Half of Americans think Facebook is a passing fad, according to the results of a new Associated Press-CNBC poll. And, in the run-up to the social network's initial public offering of stock, half of Americans also say the social network's expected asking price is too high.

The company Mark Zuckerberg ...

CARROLLTON, Ga. — A blood drive is being held at University of West Georgia for a student fighting a flesh-eating bacteria that threatens her life.

Aimee Copeland's left leg has been amputated, and her parents say she will likely lose her fingers as well after the infection spread rapidly through ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The $2 billion trading loss at JPMorgan Chase has renewed calls for stricter oversight of Wall Street banks. Two years after Congress passed an overhaul of financial rules, many of those changes have yet to be finalized.

JPMorgan's misstep gives advocates of stronger regulation an opening to ...

NEW YORK (AP) — Facebook is raising the price range at which it plans to sell stock to the public.

The social networking company said in a regulatory filing Tuesday that it expects to sell its stock for between $34 and $38 per share. That's higher than a previous range ...

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

This is not what Barack Obama expected for a coming-out party. The "historic" revelation that he is now fully evolved, as from tadpole to frog, and now grooves on same-sex marriage, was meant to be marked with quiet ceremony. No music, no flowers, no kiss, no dancing, not even ...

Bradley I. Abelow, a key figure in the collapse of brokerage house MF Global Holdings Ltd., has left his post as chairman of an outside board providing financial advice to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

The move comes months after Mr. Abelow, chief operating officer at MF Global, appeared before ...

In the wake of President Obama's shift last week in support for gay marriage, a Senate panel announced plans to mark up a bill Wednesday that would extend marital and retirement benefits to federal employees in same-sex domestic partnerships.

This bill is "the next step to achieving equality for the ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Rhode Island's governor declared Monday that the state will recognize same-sex marriages performed elsewhere, giving gay couples the same rights as heterosexual ones when it comes to health insurance and a slew of other benefits.

The order signed by Gov. Lincoln Chafee in a Statehouse ceremony directs ...

MAINE

Man who cared for famed old tree dies at 103

PORTLAND | Frank Knight's decades-long battle to save New England's tallest elm served as an inspiring tale of devotion, so it is fitting that he will be laid to rest in a coffin made from the tree he made ...

TRENTON, N.J. — Several hundred protesters gathered Monday at the New Jersey Statehouse to show support for a former Rutgers student convicted of bias intimidation and to call attention to what they see as injustices in New Jersey's hate-crime laws.

The rally was in support of Dharun Ravi, a 20-year-old ...

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California Gov. Jerry Brown on Monday proposed more than $8 billion in cuts to close a widening California budget deficit but also said public schools will receive more money if voters approve his tax-increase initiative in November.

The governor wants public employees to take a 5 percent ...