In the Nation

WASHINGTON - A baby-product maker yesterday recalled about 447,000 of its infant car seat carriers after dozens of reports of the carrier's handle coming loose.

There have been at least three injuries to babies, including a head injury. Dorel Juvenile Group Inc., of Columbus, Ind., received 77 reports of the child-restraint handle fully or partly coming off.

The recall involves Safety 1st, Cosco, Eddie Bauer, and Disney branded infant car seat carriers with certain model numbers. They were sold nationwide from January 2008 through this month.

The government said consumers should immediately stop using the seat's carrying handle - the bolts that attach it to the seat can loosen - until a repair kit has been installed. Consumers can order the free repair kits by calling Dorel at 866-762-3316. - AP

MINNEAPOLIS - The National Institute on Media and the Family, a group that has issued an annual report each holiday season since 1996 to help parents decide on video games for their children, is shutting its doors because of the poor economy.

Founder David Walsh said his group, which has eight full-time employees, plans to close down Wednesday. Raising money has become more difficult, he said, and a founding sponsor withdrew its support last summer. He said his group was talking to three nonprofits about taking on its work.

It was Walsh's group that announced in 2005 that best-selling video game "Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas" contained graphic sexual images that could be unlocked using an Internet download. That led major retailers to pull the game from their shelves. - AP

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - Justice Sonia Sotomayor said yesterday that she was touched by the outpouring of public support as the first Hispanic member of the U.S. Supreme Court but disappointed with the commercialization of her image and, at times, startled by her own celebrity.

Sotomayor told journalists in Puerto Rico, while visiting her parents' homeland, that she would rather not see so many T-shirts, buttons, and coffee cups with her picture or her famous quote describing herself as a "wise Latina."

"I can't tell you the number of people who come up to me and hug and kiss me and touch me, and some of them in tears," she said. "I wish there was a way of keeping that without the commercialization of me. Because when I spoke my words I spoke them freely, and I never intended for people to make money off them, because that seems wrong to me." - AP

Washington Mayor Adrian M. Fenty signed a bill yesterday legalizing same-sex marriage, but that doesn't mean the bill becomes law immediately. It must pass a 30-day period of review by Congress, which has final say over D.C.'s laws.

The Milwaukee School Board has voted to make condoms available at many of the city's high schools, what the district calls the communicable disease prevention program.

A high-speed seasonal ferry that has run between Maine and Nova Scotia for more than a decade is discontinuing service for financial reasons.