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After a five-day standoff, Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) conceded defeat, and the Senate last night approved a short term measure extending COBRA benefits, funding

Via Andrew Sullivan, who insightfully notes that we’re the only country whose prestige is on the rise in the eyes of our international fellows.

As the battle over legalizing same-sex marriage wages on in New York, new details have surfaced about the defeat of a simliar measure in Maryland: A coalition of African-American conservative groups formed to sway religious Marylanders to appeal to lawmakers to vote against same-sex marriage. The coalition developed an effective narrative, appealing to the black community’s perceived ownership of civil rights. Calls were made. E-mails were sent. Conservative lawmakers joined in, some going so far as to enlist parishes to pressure gay-marriage-supporting delegates in their churches to change their votes. And it worked.

Some of the least convincing score-settling in Courage and Consequences comes when Karl Rove attempts to rebut the charge that he politicized the appointment

Today, more than 300 economists and policy experts released a letter warning that the still-fragile economic recovery will be undercut by austerity economics

Echoing sentiments expressed to the Colorado Independent by U.S. House Leader Nancy Pelosi , D-Calif., more than 49 percent of the shareholders of an oil and gas company in the Permian Basin of West Texas recently asked for more transparency in hydraulic fracturing operations. Nancy Pelosi Pelosi last week told the Independent that oil and gas operators should want to publicly disclose all the chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” as protection against future litigation.

After State Department spokesperson Ian Kelly told reporters yesterday that an interagency process led by the National Counterterrorism Center was responsible

As to my can-there-be-a-decent-right question about torture, Philip Zelikow, the counselor to former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and the executive

We weren’t the only folks curious about the morning’s claim from Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) that the GOP’s health reform bill covers more uninsured Americans

President Barack Obama (Pic by The White House, via Flickr) A Twitter campaign launched by the ADAP Advocacy Association is calling on President Obama to end the AIDS Drug Assistance Program waiting lists. Brandon Macsata, CEO of the ADAP Advocacy Association, tells The Florida Independent that his organization “asked people to start at 7 a.m. today and continue through 7 p.m. tonight and to target the campaign toward President Obama and ask him to step up and begin to lead on this crisis.” “We feel that to this point he’s been pretty quiet,” Macsata says, “and when we’re approaching 10,000 people on the waiting list for the medication we know will keep them healthy productive members of their communities, it’s just unacceptable.” The AIDS Drug Assistance Programs (known as ADAP) provide medications for the treatment of HIV and AIDS for people who cannot afford to pay because they are unemployed, uninsured or underinsured.

Foreclosures jumped again in April, setting another record and providing more evidence that the housing crisis shows little sign of slowing down. RealtyTrac,

Seeking to stop the Pentagon from using taxpayer funds to sponsor NASCAR — and earning a death threat along the way — Rep. Betty McCollum sponsored an amendment to ban such funding.

The Associated Press releases a brutal report on Gov. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.) and his use of state resources. The most damaging items: $1,265 for a flight from

While most of us were still reading or recovering from the latest batch of gruesome torture memos released by the Justice Department last week, bmaz at

Via Roll Call, here’s Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) telling reporters Wednesday that President Obama’s looming heath reform address to Congress

Mine Safety and Health Administration head Joseph Main countered, “MSHA did not run the Upper Big Branch Mine -- Massey Energy did.”

If this came in any other context except the aftermath of a dispiriting, fraud-filled election, this statement from Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton

Something else from Attorney General Eric Holder’s apparent decision to seek prosecutions for low-level CIA interrogators (Argh!) over torture: Newsweek reports

Citizens United’s David Bossie reacted to his massive win in the Supreme Court: Today’s U.S. Supreme Court decision allowing Citizens United to air its