Why can’t we preserve the sanctity of marriage?

Sen. Al Franken got to live out what the rest of us can only dream of: he got to make Lieberman shut the hell up.

Franken was presiding over the Senate Thursday afternoon as Lieberman spoke about amendments he planned to offer to the bill. Lieberman asked for an additional moment to finish — a routine request — but Franken refused to grant the time.

“In my capacity as the senator from Minnesota, I object,” Franken said.

“Really?” said Lieberman. “OK.”

Lieberman then said he’d submit the rest of his statement in writing.

Read on.

Edit: or watch it.

News flash: the GOP launches its own URL-shortening site for links of conservative interest.

News flash: they take it down right away after it’s overwhelmed with pranksters making links to the Communist Party and porn.

BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

I saw this (NSFW) a few weeks back, and decided it was a little too ribald and inflammatory for Bray New World.

Joe’s actions over the last four weeks have changed my mind. Let slip the dogs of snark.

You will be shocked, shocked to learn that an independent report by former Massachusetts Attorney General Scott Harshbarger, now of the law firm Proskauer Rose, has found that

While some of the advice and counsel given by ACORN employees and volunteers was clearly inappropriate and unprofessional, we did not find a pattern of intentional, illegal conduct by ACORN staff; in fact, there is no evidence that action, illegal or otherwise, was taken by any ACORN employee on behalf of the videographers.

Furthermore, it appears that the videos may not exactly be the most perfect representations of ACORN, either.

The videos that have been released appear to have been edited, in some cases substantially, including the insertion of a substitute voiceover for significant portions of Mr. O’Keefe’s and Ms. Giles’s comments, which makes it difficult to determine the questions to which ACORN employees are responding. A comparison of the publicly available transcripts to the released videos confirms that large portions of the original video have been omitted from the released versions.

As one comment on MetaFilter put it: “Can we expect the entire staff of Fox News to resign, like Dan Rather did?”

December 5, 1933:

After a campaigning for President on a promise to repeal the 18th Amendment (against a Republican who pledged to support it), a Democrat drives the new amendment that re-introduces the production and sale of alcoholic beverages.

So if you’re a Democrat, have a drink and toast FDR! If you’re a Republican, go sip some tap water and stew in the fact that your party has not gotten any more fun in the intervening 76 years.

First Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs explains why he parted ways with the Right:

The American right wing has gone off the rails, into the bushes, and off the cliff.

I won’t be going over the cliff with them.

And now Andrew Sullivan follows suit:

I cannot support a movement that claims to believe in limited government but backed an unlimited domestic and foreign policy presidency that assumed illegal, extra-constitutional dictatorial powers until forced by the system to return to the rule of law.

I cannot support a movement that exploded spending and borrowing and blames its successor for the debt…

I cannot support a movement that holds torture as a core value…

I cannot support a movement that is deeply homophobic, cynically deploys fear of homosexuals to win votes, and gives off such a racist vibe that its share of the minority vote remains pitiful.

As resident of the fine Commonwealth of Massachusetts, you don’t need to convince me that Boston is better than New York. Boston wins again:

The State Senate defeated a bill on Wednesday that would legalize same-sex marriage, after an emotional debate that touched on civil rights, family and history. The vote means that the bill, pushed by Gov. David A. Paterson, is effectively dead for the year and destroys the optimism of gay advocates.

The bill was defeated by a decisive margin of 38 to 24. The Democrats, who have a bare, one-seat majority, did not have enough votes to pass the bill without some Republican support, but not a single Republican senator voted for the measure.

Read on at the NY Times.

A woman showed up at the campus of Syracuse University holding a sign reading, “Homosexuality Is Sin”. One student decided he needed to respond:

I decided that because this woman thought it was okay to make me feel uncomfortable in my home, I would retaliate and make her feel just as uncomfortable, if not more.

This woman was wearing a ankle-length corduroy skirt, which, as we all know, is a fashion nono. So, in order to make her feel uncomfortable, I stood next to her and held a sign that said Corduroy skirts are a sin! …I started to draw a crowd that stood with me in support. Before I knew it I had 100+ people holding signs for gay rights asking people to honk their horns to support.

As the child (twice over), grandchild and nephew of Syracuse University graduates, my only comment is: Go Orange!