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When Abu Mohammed walks down the flight line at a base outside this northern Iraqi city, there's a swagger in his stride. Engineers too young to remember Iraq's storied dogfights against Iran rush up to shake his hand. For years, the pilot lived in hiding as a taxi driver. It feels good to take the controls of a plane again, he says. But the single-engine, turboprop aircraft in which he putters around in the sky are nothing like the fighter jets he commanded during the 1980s war with Iran.

Mitt Romney's selection of Rep. Paul Ryan as his vice presidential running mate has raised a lot of conversation and questions. Your Politics Now team at the L.A. Times -- including Maeve Reston and Robin Abcarian -- will clear aside some of the clutter with a chat today at noon PDT. Among the topics to be discussed: -- How has the candidacy of the 42-year-old congressman played in its first 48 hours? -- Should Team Romney worry about an initial poll showing a plurality of voters unimpressed with his No. 2?

The Taliban's reclusive leader said the U.S. and NATO should study Afghanistan's long history in a reminder that foreign forces have had limited military success in the country. The message from Mullah Mohammed Omar comes less than a month before the eighth anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion. Omar said the U.S. and NATO should recall Alexander the Great, whose forces were defeated by Pashtun tribesmen, and Afghan resistance to British troops in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa was among a group of 80 mayors in Washington on Friday who pledged their support for gay marriage and announced an initiative aimed at expanding marriage rights for same-sex couples. The initiative, called Mayors for the Freedom to Marry, was announced during a press conference held at the U.S. Conference of Mayors' winter meeting. Villaraigosa will co-chair the group. The mayors have pledged to push their cities to pass laws allowing same-sex marriage and urge Congress to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, which defines marriage as a legal union between one man and one woman.

Re "Iraq to Block U.S.-Led Arms Inspections," Jan. 13: Now, tell me again, who won the Gulf War? JERRY COWLE Pacific Palisades

Instead of being called Operation Desert Storm, the surprise U.S.-led attack on Iraq should more aptly be called Operation Am-Bush. KENNETH L. ZIMMERMAN Cypress

Iraqi orchestra: An article in Thursday's Section A about a concert the previous day in Baghdad said Oliver Gilmour was the first international guest conductor to perform with the Iraqi National Symphony Orchestra since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. Two international guest conductors had performed with the orchestra in the northern city of Irbil in July 2007.

SAN DIEGO - In the ocean off Coronado, a Navy team has discovered a relic worthy of display in a military museum: a torpedo of the kind deployed in the late 19th century, considered a technological marvel in its day. But don't look for the primary discoverers to get a promotion or an invitation to meet the admirals at the Pentagon - although they might get an extra fish for dinner or maybe a pat on the snout. The so-called Howell torpedo was discovered by bottlenose dolphins being trained by the Navy to find undersea objects, including mines, that not even billion-dollar technology can detect.

Are Zoloft and Lexapro the best antidepressants? A recent study from Europe says so. The study, published online last month in the medical journal Lancet, compared 12 newer generation antidepressant drugs using data from 117 published clinical studies with nearly 26,000 subjects.

I never thought I'd go to Hawaii to climb trees and pet a giraffe on the island of Molokai. But having braved the cliffs of Kalaupapa by mule the day before, I was primed for the promise of another Hawaiian adventure. The road was rough, and dry earth spiraled in red dust clouds about the wheels of the van as we made our way toward Molokai Ranch Wildlife Park.

The Taliban's reclusive leader said the U.S. and NATO should study Afghanistan's long history in a reminder that foreign forces have had limited military success in the country. The message from Mullah Mohammed Omar comes less than a month before the eighth anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion. Omar said the U.S. and NATO should recall Alexander the Great, whose forces were defeated by Pashtun tribesmen, and Afghan resistance to British troops in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

When Abu Mohammed walks down the flight line at a base outside this northern Iraqi city, there's a swagger in his stride. Engineers too young to remember Iraq's storied dogfights against Iran rush up to shake his hand. For years, the pilot lived in hiding as a taxi driver. It feels good to take the controls of a plane again, he says. But the single-engine, turboprop aircraft in which he putters around in the sky are nothing like the fighter jets he commanded during the 1980s war with Iran.

Iraqi orchestra: An article in Thursday's Section A about a concert the previous day in Baghdad said Oliver Gilmour was the first international guest conductor to perform with the Iraqi National Symphony Orchestra since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. Two international guest conductors had performed with the orchestra in the northern city of Irbil in July 2007.

U.S.-led soldiers and Afghan forces killed 25 Taliban insurgents in this country's volatile south, and NATO-led Canadian troops narrowly escaped a suicide bombing Friday near the site of fighting a day earlier that killed four comrades. Acting on a tip from tribal elders, police in the southern province of Helmand raided an orchard Thursday night where Taliban fighters were camping and called in airstrikes, said provincial police chief Ghulam Nabi Malakhail. The U.S.

Three Marines brutalized Iraqi prisoners out of anger because they were suspected of participating in the deadly ambush of an Army convoy that included the capture of Pfc. Jessica Lynch, a military prosecutor told a court hearing Monday. The three -- Maj. Clark Paulus, Lance Cpl. Christian Hernandez and Sgt. Gary Pittman -- are accused of kicking and beating prisoners of war at the Whitehorse detention facility outside Nasiriyah in central Iraq.

The sudden collapse of the Taliban and its Al Qaeda terrorist guests in Afghanistan stunned Pakistani military analysts, who now say the groups' leaders made enormous tactical blunders. In the end, they say, the Taliban's vaunted courage and military mastery proved a myth.

Mitt Romney's selection of Rep. Paul Ryan as his vice presidential running mate has raised a lot of conversation and questions. Your Politics Now team at the L.A. Times -- including Maeve Reston and Robin Abcarian -- will clear aside some of the clutter with a chat today at noon PDT. Among the topics to be discussed: -- How has the candidacy of the 42-year-old congressman played in its first 48 hours? -- Should Team Romney worry about an initial poll showing a plurality of voters unimpressed with his No. 2?

"Tutu and Franklin: A Journey Towards Peace," a new two-hour documentary premiering tonight on KCET-TV, chronicles the historic first encounter between South Africa's Nobel Peace Prize winner, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and U.S. historian and Presidential Medal of Freedom winner Dr. John Hope Franklin. For a week in December 1998, they met on Goree Island, the infamous former slave port off the coast of Senegal, to discuss their nations' struggle for racial equality.

"Tutu and Franklin: A Journey Towards Peace," a new two-hour documentary premiering tonight on KCET-TV, chronicles the historic first encounter between South Africa's Nobel Peace Prize winner, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and U.S. historian and Presidential Medal of Freedom winner Dr. John Hope Franklin. For a week in December 1998, they met on Goree Island, the infamous former slave port off the coast of Senegal, to discuss their nations' struggle for racial equality.

Re "Iraq to Block U.S.-Led Arms Inspections," Jan. 13: Now, tell me again, who won the Gulf War? JERRY COWLE Pacific Palisades