Harvey Milk awarded presidential medal

The late San Francisco supervisor Harvey Milk received the presidential Medal of Freedom award today with 15 other recipients ranging across the professional and ideological spectrum, from the late supply sider Jack Kemp to tennis star Billy Jean King to Sen. Edward Kennedy, whose absence from the health care debate due to brain cancer treatments has weighed heavily on the White House.

The medal is the country's highest civilian honor. President Obama said all the
recipients "share one overarching trait: Each has been an agent of change. Each saw an imperfect world and set about improving it, often overcoming
great obstacles along the way. Their relentless devotion to breaking down barriers
and lifting up their fellow citizens sets a standard to which we all should strive."

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