Mary Landrieu just signaled that she could support a health care bill moving through the budget reconciliation process. Meanwhile, Debbie Stabenow and Tim Johnson signed on to the Bennet letter on passing the public option through reconciliation, bringing the total number to 24. And then there’s Jay Rockefeller, nominally a supporter of the public option, saying that it should not pass through the reconciliation process.

Only in our broken “democracy” could the opinion of a handful of lobbyists representing one of the most unpopular industries in American have more sway than the opinion of roughly 65% of Americans. The American people have spoken loud and clear about what they want from health care reform, and it is a public option.

California queer history is storied rich and before there was Stonewall there was the Black Cat riot in Silver Lake. On These Shoulders We Stand explores Los Angeles’ place in LGBT history from the mid-1960s through the 1980s, right before the AIDS crisis.

Using archival footage and interviews with pioneering activists, director/producer Glenne McElhinney takes us through One and the Mattachine Society, the lesbian controversy that disrupted the National Organization for Women.

Yesterday, Gen. David Petraeus became the latest military leader to downplay the significance of the military’s Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy on unit cohesion or military effectiveness, suggesting that he too has no problem with repealing it. Of course Sen. Lieberman must stick his nose in this, as if trying to redeem himself to his party — but realistically, he’s just drumming up more troops for his military adventures.

Over the past few weeks, House and Senate Democratic leaders have been working to craft a compromise between their two health care bills that were passed over the last few months. Today, President Obama has released what Dan Pfeiffer, Communications Director at the White House, is calling the administration’s “best shot” at bridging the differences between the House and Senate.

The vote to move to consideration of this bill has passed, 62-30. Ben Nelson voted “no.” Blanche Lincoln voted “yes,” but only after an amusing/pathetic dance. Both senators from Maine, along with the retiring Voinovich and the newly elected Scott Brown were the GOP senators joining Dems in the “aye” column.

We have seen this before during the health care debate. The House says it’s up to the Senate to determine what can pass. The Senate says it’s up to the White House to expend the political capital to get it across the line. And the White House punts it right back to Congress. Nobody wants to actually be responsible for the demise of the popular measure, but everyone wants to be on its side. Therefore you get the preposterous claim from Dan Pfeiffer today that the President didn’t include a public option in his proposal, but he supports it.

Practically the first thing Pat Roberts did after he became Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee was to back down off nascent efforts Bob Graham had made as SSCI Chair to exercise real oversight over the torture program. That’s one of the most important details revealed in the Memo for the Record of the briefing Pat Roberts received on the torture program on February 4, 2003.

The White House finally made official what we have known for a long time: President Obama is against the public option. How do we know this? Because Obama, for the first time ever, released his own official health care reform proposal — and it does not contain a public option.

The latest Ghost Detainee FOIA materials prove that Michael Hayden lied to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on April 12, 2007.