First Door on the Left

Priscilla Owen Confirmed As Federal Judge, and it only took four years.

This lady:

A) Really, really wanted this job.
B) Was not able to find other employment.
C) Does not have the class to know when she is not wanted.

Top Psychiatric Group Urges Making Gay Marriage Legal

ATLANTA, May 22 — Representatives of the nation’s top psychiatric group approved a statement Sunday urging legal recognition of same-sex marriage.

If approved by the association’s directors in July, the measure would make the American Psychiatric Association the first major medical group to take such a stance.

The statement supports same-sex marriage “in the interest of maintaining and promoting mental health.”

It follows a similar measure by the American Psychological Association last year, little more than three decades after that group removed homosexuality from its list of mental disorders.

The psychiatric association’s statement was approved by voice vote on the first day of its weeklong annual meeting in Atlanta. It cites the “positive influence of a stable, adult partnership on the health of all family members.”

The resolution recognizes “that gay men and lesbians are full human beings who should be afforded the same human and civil rights,” said Margery Sved, a Raleigh, N.C., psychiatrist and member of the assembly’s committee on gay and lesbian issues.

See the words I bolded in the last paragraph? What a concept!

To me and mine, it has never been about “marriage.” We could care less about standing in front of someone and saying “I do.” We already did. This coming December will mark 30 years that we’ve been together. We have all the legal documents… the wills, the deeds, the powers of attorney. To us, the issue is civil rights. We pay the same taxes as anybody else, probably more in many cases. We are bound by the same laws. We are entitled to the same rights.

Pure and simple.

Link.

Meanwhile, 14 U.S. Soldiers Killed in 3 Days in Iraq.

Billy Frist does not control the Senate.

Deal averts filibuster showdown

WASHINGTON – Averting a showdown, 14 centrists from both parties in the Senate reached agreement Monday night on a compromise that clears the way for confirmation votes on many of President Bush’s stalled judicial nominees, leaves others in limbo and preserves venerable Senate filibuster rules.

“In a Senate that is increasingly polarized, the bipartisan center held,” said Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn.

?The Senate is back in business,? echoed Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.

?We have reached an agreement … to pull the institution back from a precipice ? that would have had damaging impact on the institution,? said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., at a news conference where the agreement was announced.

Officials from both parties said the agreement would clear the way for yes or no votes on some of Bush?s nominees but make no guarantee.

Under the agreement, Democrats would pledge not to filibuster any of Bush?s future appeals court or Supreme Court nominees except in ?extraordinary circumstances.?

For their part, Republicans agreed not to support an attempt to strip Democrats of their right to block votes.

Big, big disappointment for the right-wing theocrats. Perhaps this will end all that silly talk of Frist running for president in 2008.

Update: Hindrocket thinks he’s going to be sick. Chris Bowers has a roundup of the reactions of others on the dark side. Nice evening, all in all.

Frank Rich shoots down the right’s spin on the Newsweek article and the riots in Afghanistan…

It’s All Newsweek’s Fault

In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, Fareed Zakaria wrote a 6,791-word cover story for Newsweek titled “Why Do They Hate Us?” Think how much effort he could have saved if he’d waited a few years. As we learned last week, the question of why they hate us can now be answered in just one word: Newsweek.

“Our United States military personnel go out of their way to make sure that the Holy Koran is treated with care,” said the White House press secretary, Scott McClellan, as he eagerly made the magazine the scapegoat for lethal anti-American riots in Afghanistan. Indeed, Mr. McClellan was so fixated on destroying Newsweek – and on mouthing his own phony P.C. pieties about the Koran – that by omission he whitewashed the rioters themselves, Islamic extremists who routinely misuse that holy book as a pretext for murder.

That’s how absurdly over-the-top the assault on Newsweek has been. The administration has been so successful at bullying the news media in order to cover up its own fictions and failings in Iraq that it now believes it can get away with pinning some 17 deaths on an errant single sentence in a 10-sentence Periscope item that few noticed until days after its publication. Coming just as the latest CNN/Gallup/USA Today poll finds that only 41 percent of Americans think the war in Iraq is “worth fighting” and only 42 percent think it’s going well, this smells like desperation. In its war on the press, this hubristic administration may finally have crossed a bridge too far.

Click on the headline to continue reading.

Will there ever again come a time when we can trust our leaders to tell us the truth? As long as the right wing of the Republican party remains in control, the answer will be no.

Baby, it’s hot outside…

Bottom right is the current temperature outdoors. Current indoor temperature is to the left of that. Continue to the left and you’ll find the current day and date. Time is on the top. (Chances are that you probably could have figured all that out for yourself, but one never knows… you might be a right-wing Republican.)

One hundred degrees already. Looks like a long, hot summer.

Ehrlich Vetoes Bill Extending Rights to Gay Couples

Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. vetoed a bill yesterday [Friday] that would have granted rights to gay partners who register with the state, concluding after weeks of intense deliberations that the legislation threatened “the sanctity of traditional marriage.”

Editor and Publisher…

McClellan Says No Need to Notify Bush in D.C. Scare

On the day after more than 30,000 people — including the vice president, the first lady, and a former first lady — were evacuated from their offices or homes in Washington, D.C., but the president, who was biking in Maryland was not notified until the threat passed, reporters grilled Press Secretary Scott McClellan at his daily briefing.

For those who might have missed it on TV — that is, nearly everyone — here are some choice excerpts, as McClellan continually refers to “protocols” and reporters essentially ask, “Wouldn’t most men like to know when their home is evacuated and their wife is hustled to a secure bunker?” They also wonder about the small matter of the president being commander in chief and the capital, theoretically, coming under attack.

Some reporters also suggested that the off-kilter Cessna had come much closer to the White House than McClellan’s claim yesterday of three miles.

Click on the headline to continue reading.

AMERICAblog has more.