September 12th, 2013
04:56 PM ET
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Pennsylvania judge orders clerk to obey same-sex marriage ban

A Pennsylvania judge on Thursday ordered a suburban Philadelphia county clerk to comply with the state's same-sex marriage ban and stop issuing marriage licenses to gay couples.

Since July, D. Bruce Hanes, the elected Montgomery County register of wills, has given out 174 licenses to same-sex couples, ignoring a 1996 state law that defines marriage as "between one man and one woman."

The state Department of Health sued to stop Hanes, saying he is in "direct defiance" of the ban and "risks causing serious and limitless harm to the public."

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Filed under: Gay and lesbian • Pennsylvania • Same-sex marriage
September 12th, 2013
02:50 PM ET
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Voyager 1 becomes first human-made object to leave solar system

At the edge of the heliosphere, you wouldn't know by looking whether you left the cradle of humanity behind and floated out into interstellar space. You would just see unfathomably empty space, no matter which side of the invisible line you were on.

But scientists now have strong evidence that NASA's Voyager 1 probe has crossed this important border, making history as the first human-made object to leave the heliosphere, the magnetic boundary separating the solar system's sun, planets and solar wind from the rest of the galaxy.

"In leaving the heliosphere and setting sail on the cosmic seas between the stars, Voyager has joined other historic journeys of exploration: The first circumnavigation of the Earth, the first steps on the Moon," said Ed Stone, chief scientist on the Voyager mission. "That's the kind of event this is, as we leave behind our solar bubble."

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Filed under: NASA
September 12th, 2013
09:51 AM ET
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Colorado flash floods kill 2

More than half a foot of rain deluged Boulder County, Colorado, overnight, setting off flooding and rock slides that collapsed homes, put dams at risk and killed at least two people.

One person died after being trapped in a collapsed building, in Jamestown, Boulder County spokeswoman Gabbie Boerkircher said.

The circumstances surrounding the other death weren't clear early Thursday, but the Colorado Springs Fire Department said on Twitter that the body had been recovered by a "heavy rescue team."

Numerous other buildings had collapsed, but it was unclear how many or if there were any other injuries, Boerkircher said. A rockslide was hampering access to the site.

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Filed under: Colorado
September 12th, 2013
04:17 AM ET
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Syria civil war: 5 things to watch today

The United States isn't leaving anything to chance.

While it pursues a diplomatic solution to the Syria crisis by sending U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to meet with his Russian counterpart in Geneva on Thursday, it has also started arming the rebels. The rebels, though, say the arms have yet to reach them.

Meanwhile, a Vladimir Putin-penned editorial in the New York Times has at least one White House official saying it's an indication the Russian President is "now fully invested in Syria's chemical disarmament." And a U.N. report says that both sides - the regime and the rebels - have committed war crimes in the bloody two-year-long civil war in Syria.

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Filed under: Barack Obama • U.S. • World
September 12th, 2013
02:56 AM ET
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CIA-funded weapons reach Syrian rebels

CIA-funded weapons have begun flowing to Syrian rebels, a U.S. official told CNN late Wednesday night.

The official confirmed details first reported by the Washington Post but would not speak publicly.

"That is something we are not going to dispute, but we are not going to publicly speak to it," the official said.

The weapons are not American-made, but are funded and organized by the CIA. They started to reach rebels about two weeks ago, the official said.

The artillery provided were described as light weapons, some anti-tank weapons and ammunition.

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Filed under: Politics • U.S. • World