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Technically, this is an ad for the San Francisco AIDS Foundation. Interesting, nonetheless.

(Via - David Mixner)

On June 3rd, the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History will launch an exhibit and website devoted to examining the 30-year history of the AIDS pandemic.

“HIV and AIDS Thirty Years Ago” will look at the public health, scientific and political responses in the early phase (1981-87) of the global pandemic. This showcase will be located in the museum’s “Science in American Life” exhibition, which focuses on the connections among science, culture and society in American history. The display will feature photographs, magazine covers and other graphics plus equipment that Dr. Jay Levy used to isolate the virus in his lab at the University of California, San Francisco, a copy of the Surgeon General’s 1986 report presenting the government’s position, samples of the drugs AZT and Retrovir and public health information pamphlets from AIDS service organizations. The website will be available at here.

In “Archiving the History of an Epidemic: HIV and AIDS, 1985-2009,” the museum’s Archives Center will show how individuals and society were affected by the epidemic through a selection of archival materials from its collections, including posters for the 1993 movie Philadelphia with Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington and the 1989 film Longtime Companion; brochures, photographs and other popular culture materials; and quotes from oral histories of people affected by the epidemic.

Quilt panels from the Names Project will be part of the exhibit.

After enduring ugly anti-gay attacks from Christianists during her nomination hearing, open lesbian Barbara Lenk has won confirmation to the Massachusetts Supreme Court.

The Governor’s Council confirmed Lenk on a 5-3 vote. She is Governor Deval Patrick’s fourth appointment to the seven-member SJC, which issued the landmark 2003 ruling that made Massachusetts the first state to legalize same-sex marriage. Lenk, who married her partner, Debra Krupp, after the ruling, has 18 years’ experience on the bench, a degree from Harvard Law School, and a doctorate in political philosophy from Yale. Patrick nominated her to replace Justice Judith A. Cowin, who is retiring. Lenk's confirmation hearing last week lasted more than seven hours, and was often contentious.

Lenk is the first openly gay justice to be seated on the state's highest court.