AP - California's Supreme Court declared gay couples in the nation's biggest state can marry — a monumental but perhaps short-lived victory for the gay rights movement Thursday that was greeted with tears, hugs, kisses and at least one instant proposal of matrimony.

AP - Troops dug burial pits in this quake-shattered town and black smoke poured from crematorium chimneys elsewhere in central China as priorities began shifting Thursday from the hunt for survivors to dealing with the dead. Officials said the final toll could more than double to 50,000.

AP - Republican John McCain declared for the first time Thursday he believes the Iraq war can be won by 2013, although he rejected suggestions that his talk of a timetable put him on the same side as Democrats clamoring for full-scale troop withdrawals.

AP - Hillary Rodham Clinton scolded John McCain Thursday for opposing the farm bill, attempting to maintain the sense that she is already competing against the certain Republican presidential nominee even as her chances for winning the Democratic nomination dim.

AP - A Missouri woman was indicted Thursday for her alleged role in perpetrating a hoax on the online social network MySpace against a 13-year-old neighbor who committed suicide.

AP - Fernando Meirelles did boys with guns in "City of God" and murderous corporations in "The Constant Gardener."

AP - Jury selection was completed at R. Kelly's child pornography trial Thursday amid contentious exchanges between prosecutors and defense attorneys, who accused each other of trying to stack the panel along racial lines.

AP - Rodney Atkins is still surprised when people recognize him in the grocery store nowadays. But give it time.

AP - Warren Cowan, one of the last of the super publicists who helped make Hollywood the glamour capital of the world, has died. He was 87.