The Pioneer HARVEY MILK

After Harvey Milk became the first openly gay man elected to any substantial political office in the history of the planet, thousands of astounded people wrote to him. “I thank God,” wrote a 68-year-old lesbian, “I have lived long enough to see my kind emerge from the shadows and join the human race.” Sputtered another writer: “Maybe, just maybe, some of the more hostile in the district may take some potshots at you–we hope!!!” There was a time when it was impossible for people–straight or gay–even to imagine a Harvey Milk

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Obama’s Reagan Bromance: Admiring the Gipper’s Vision

In May 2010, Barack Obama invited a small group of presidential historians to the White House for a working supper in the Family Dining Room. It was the second time he’d had the group in since taking office, and as he sat down across the table from his wife Michelle, the President pressed his guests for lessons from his predecessors.

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A Tale of Two Priests

The leaders of the Roman Catholic Church traditionally couch even the harshest disagreements in decorous, ecclesiastical language. But it didn’t take a decoder ring to figure out what Rome-based Archbishop Raymond Burke meant in a late-September address when he charged Boston Cardinal Sen O’Malley with being under the influence of Satan, “the father of lies.” Burke’s broadside at O’Malley was inspired by the Cardinal’s decision to permit and preside over a funeral Mass for the late Senator Ted Kennedy.

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Reid Signals Delay in Passing Health Bill This Year

Still struggling to line up the 60 votes that are needed to overcome a potential filibuster of health care reform, Senate majority leader Harry Reid sent a strong signal on Tuesday that President Obama is unlikely to be signing his top domestic priority into law this year, as Democrats had hoped. “We’re not going to be bound by timelines,” Reid told reporters as he emerged from a weekly lunch with Democratic Senators.

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Top Mexican cartel leader arrested, military says

Mexican soldiers have captured the second in command of one of the nation’s most ruthless drug cartels, the military said. “We must have a second round,” said Hamid Karzai, speaking in a taped and exclusive interview for the Fareed Zakaria GPS show that airs Sunday on CNN.

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The White House Readies a Stealth Stimulus

White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett was adamant Sunday, when asked if President Obama was considering a so-called “second stimulus” to deal with the rising unemployment rate. “I think it’s too soon, it’s premature to say is a second stimulus needed,” she told David Gregory, the host of NBC’s Meet the Press

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