Washington, D.C.

Controversial judge wins confirmation

The Senate on Tuesday confirmed J. Leon Holmes to the U.S. District Court in Arkansas, after an emotional debate over the nominee’s positions on abortion, women’s rights, race and separation of church and state.

Holmes, whose appointment was approved 51-46, faced intense criticism from Democrats and quiet disapproval from some Republicans for his views. He has said that “the wife is to subordinate herself to the husband” and asserted, when arguing against abortion, that conceptions from rapes were as rare as “snowfall in Miami.”

Six Democrats joined most Republicans in supporting Holmes’ nomination and five Republicans joined most Democrats in opposing it. Holmes is the first of President Bush’s most controversial judicial nominees to come to a floor vote in the Senate.

Louisiana

Golf club restaurant ordered to allow women

The Louisiana Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered a country club to open its men-only restaurant to women, rejecting claims that members sometimes dine in the nude.

“In the twenty-first century, it is simply archaic to cite protection of women from the sights and sounds of a locker room environment as an excuse for excluding them from the public dining area as it exists in this country club,” Justice John L. Weimer wrote for the unanimous court.

The decision upheld an appeals court ruling against Southern Trace Country Club in Shreveport. The club has three restaurants; only The Men’s Grille is open Sundays.

According to the high court, the club failed to prove its claim that allowing women into the restaurant would violate men’s privacy.

Milwaukee

Indian casinos show biggest jump in growth

Indian gambling grew more than eight times faster than non-Indian casino gambling in 2003, bringing in about $16.2 billion nationwide, according to a study released today.

Non-Indian casinos still brought in more revenue, $26.5 billion, but that represents an increase of just 1.4 percent from the year before, the study found. Tribal gambling revenue grew 12 percent over the same period.

The study, done by Alan Meister, an economist with the Los Angeles-based Analysis Group, found that Indian gambling provides 460,000 jobs, $16.3 billion in wages and $5.3 billion in taxes nationwide.

States cannot tax tribes because tribes are sovereign governments. But as tribal gambling has exploded, tribes that want to sign deals with states to establish casinos are increasingly agreeing to share their revenue.

New Orleans

Pilot reprimanded for Afghan bombing

A U.S. fighter pilot who mistakenly bombed Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan in 2002, killing four, was found guilty Tuesday of dereliction of duty and was reprimanded and docked a month’s pay, or nearly $5,700.

Maj. Harry Schmidt, 38, “acted shamefully” during the episode, “exhibiting arrogance and a lack of flight discipline,” Air Force Lt. Gen. Bruce Carlson wrote in the reprimand.

Schmidt, a former instructor at the Navy’s “Top Gun” fighter pilot school, had blamed the bombing on the “fog of war,” saying he mistook the Canadians’ gunfire for an attack by Taliban forces. He said his superiors never told him that the Canadians would be conducting live-fire exercises near Kandahar Airport that night.

He was originally charged with manslaughter and aggravated assault, but the charges were reduced last year to dereliction of duty.