CNN 2009-05-31

In Pakistan after some fierce fighting for about a month, that raged from street to street literally 1, Pakistani forces say they have reclaimed 2 several areas of the city of Mingora from the Taliban. Mingora the largest city in Pakistan's Swat Valley, that's a disputed area. According to the UN, more than two million people have fled that area from the violence, many of them hold up in refugee camps. President Obama says that he is certain he made the right choice. Yeah, He's talking about his Supreme 3 Court pick in his weekly Internet and radio released this morning, the president called for swift Senate confirmation 4 for his Supreme Court nominee 5 Sonia Sotomayor. The president said pointing to Sotomayor's 17 years of experience as a federal judge as one reason he picked her.

She was appointed to the U.S. District Court, serving six years as a trial judge where she presided over hundreds of cases. And most recently, she has spent eleven years on the U.S. Court of Appeals, our nation s second highest court, grappling with some of the most difficult constitutional and legal issues we face as a nation. She has more experience on the federal bench than any incoming Supreme Court Justice in the past 100 years. Quite simply, Judge Sotomayor has a deep familiarity with our judicial 6 system from almost every angle.
Well, a major decision in California this week to tell you about with the state Supreme Court leaving in place a same-sex marriage ban. But, the debate is not over, right now at least two other states are considering legalizing same-sex marriages. Our Josh Levs has a way that you can keep up with all of these changes.

Well, the events in California certainly are a reminder 7 of how quickly laws about same sex marriage can change all over the country. And we now have an interactive 8 way that you can follow those changing laws in literally any state, Let's zoom 9 in on the board , I want to show you a spread that's been set up here at CNN.com. It's an interactive map and you can click on any state and see what the laws are. This continues to be updated as the laws change. You got over here in the northeast section, you got New York, Maine, you can click on literally any state. Now while we are here, take a look at this, you can see the vast majority of states in the country do not recognize same sex unions. When you also look at this map, it's a reminder of why Iowa is so significant . Over here when Iowa made the decision to start allowing same sex marriage. On this one issue, it kind of punctured 10 this whole section of the United States.