In case you haven't seen this

Paid users are entitled to an extra two weeks as compensation for the outage.

Thanks to baylorsr for the heads up.

One question, for clarification's sake:

Gacked from wicked_wish:

To those of you who voted to pass legislation outlawing gay marriage -- on the grounds that we had to "protect" all those heteros and their sacred institutions, and for the good of humanity, for the peace of the land, so that justice may prevail for straight people everywhere ... are you happy now?

[more].

In the comments to wicked_wish's entry on this, howeird asked:

Someone please educate me. I am strongly in favor of gay marriage, but I don't see how this news article is important. As far as I know, in all 50 states it is illegal to assault someone, and it doesn't matter if it's a spouse or a total stranger.

During my reporter days, I saw the police be much more lenient in cases of spousal abuse than they were with friend-abuse or stranger-abuse. It makes me wonder if gays who are not married would possibly have more protection, not less, than married couples.

What am I missing?

and gigglingwizard replied:

A gay person's partner could still be charged with assault/battery. You're right about that. But the charge "Domestic Violence" carries an enhanced penalty. The sentences are longer, you get strikes that add up against you, and if you're convicted of DV, you cannot legally own a firearm (federal law).

And what you said about police leniency was also true. Often this was less about police tolerance for domestic abuse and more about lazy cops not wanting to do a lot of paperwork. If they could just get the couple to kiss and make up, their work was done. Also, it was frustrating for a lot of officers to get called in by the victim, then have the victim refuse to press charges.

Legislators in some states--Ohio being one of them--passed laws to circumvent these problems. Now if the police go on a domestic violence call, they have a set amount of paperwork they have to do whether they arrest anyone or not. If they don't arrest, they have to do a report explaining why not. More often than not, they arrest someone. If they can't determine which one was the primary aggressor, they'll run both of 'em in. Also, it's no longer necessary for the victim to testify or even press charges. The police press charges in DV cases. Not so for assault. If the police don't witness the assault, the victim typically has to work through the prosecutor's office to get anything done about it.

Private to Mom: You remember that e-mail I sent to a family member on this topic? Could you please make absolutely sure he reads this entry, including all the links? Thanks.