signs the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro-Soviet regime in Afghanistan. July 5 – Queen Elizabeth II attends the millennium celebrations of the Isle of Man's Parliament, Tynwald. July 8 – Los Angeles passes its gay and lesbian civil rights bill. July 9 – A car bomb destroys a Renault owned by Nazi hunters Serge and Beate Klarsfeld at their home in France. A note purportedly from ODESSA claims responsibility. July 11 – NASA's first orbiting space station, Skylab, begins falling back Earth as its orbit decays after more than six years. July 12 The Gilbert Islands become fully independent of the United Kingdom as Kiribati. A Disco Demolition Night publicity stunt goes awry at Comiskey Park, forcing the Chicago White Sox to forfeit their game against the Detroit Tigers. Carmine Galante, boss of the Bonanno crime family, is assassinated in Brooklyn. A fire at a hotel in Zaragoza, Spain, leaves 72 dead, the worst hotel fire in Europe in decades. July 15 – President Jimmy Carter addresses the nation in a televised speech talking about the "crisis of confidence in America today"; it would go on to be known as his "national malaise" speech. July 16 – Iraqi President Hasan al-Bakr resigns and Vice President Saddam al-Tikriti, more commonly referred to in the Western press as "Saddam Hussein", replaces him. July 17 – Nicaraguan president General Anastasio Somoza Debayle resigns and flees to Miami. July 21 The Sandinista National Liberation Front concludes a successful revolutionary campaign against the Somoza dynasty and assumes power in Nicaragua. Maria de Lourdes Pintasilgo becomes prime minister of Portugal. Maritza Sayalero of Venezuela wins the Miss Universe pageant; the stage collapses after contestants and news photographers rush to her throne. The disco music genre dominates and peaks on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, with the first six spots (beginning with Donna Summer's Bad Girls), and seven of the chart's top ten songs ending that week. July 22 – 1979 Ba'ath Party Purge: Iraqi president Saddam Hussein arranges the arrest and later execution of nearly seventy members of his ruling Ba'ath Party. July 28 – Morarji Desai resigns as India's prime minister and Charan Singh succeeds him. August August 3 – Dictator Francisco Macías Nguema of Equatorial Guinea is overthrown in a bloody coup d'état led by Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo. August 4 – Opening game of the American Football