The White House issued a statement today as First Lady Melania Trump was hospitalized for treatment of a kidney condition.
This morning, First Lady Melania Trump underwent an embolization procedure to treat a benign kidney condition. The procedure was successful and there were no complications. Mrs. Trump is at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and will likely remain there for the duration of the week. The First Lady looks forward to a full recovery so she can continue her work on behalf of children everywhere.
As reporter Amy Siskind points out, Donald Trump was unable to attend to Melania due to “his busy Monday schedule.”
Melania Trump undergoes “an embolization procedure to treat a benign kidney condition,” White House says. “The procedure was successful and there were no complications.”
Best known for her portrayal of strong-willed reporter “Lois Lane” in the 1978 hit film Superman: The Movie, actress Margot Kidder has died at the age of 69.
People Magazinereports Kidder passed away on Sunday at her home in Livingston, Montana, of unknown causes.
Although she began her career in the 1960s, Kidder saw her star skyrocket after her turn as “Lois Lane” in Superman: The Movie opposite Christopher Reeve. She would go on to reprise the part of the intrepid Ms. Lane in three film sequels.
Other credits include 1974’s Black Christmas, 1979’s The Amityville Horror and Heartaches in 1981.
She also served as producer and starred as Eliza Doolittle in a 1983 adaptation of Pygmalion opposite Peter O’Toole for Showtime.
However, amid all that success, Kidder quietly waged war with mental health demons that eventually left her homeless.
From People:
After being reported missing for days in 1996, police took her away in handcuffs to Olive View-UCLA Medical Center.
“The woman we saw was in obvious mental distress,” Officer Rick Young of the Glendale police told PEOPLE at the time. “She didn’t think one person was following her. She thought a whole group of people were after her.”
Kidder told PEOPLE five months later that the root of most of her problems — which include “mood swings that could knock over a building” — was manic depression. She was first diagnosed with the condition by an L.A. psychiatrist eight years prior, but she refused to take the recommended prescription of lithium, the recommended treatment.
“It’s very hard to convince a manic person that there is anything wrong with them,” said Kidder, who was working on a memoir at the time. “You have no desire to sleep. You are full of ideas.”
She is survived by her daughter.
Watch the famous flying sequence from Superman: The Movie below:
A former FDNY firefighter in Queens, New York, has filed a lawsuit alleging mental and emotional stress during his probationary period that included “hazing rituals” and homophobic slurs.
Michael Troina is seeking unspecified damages for being “singled out time and time again on account of his race and national origin as a Hispanic American male as well as perceived homosexuality . . . and was further threatened with physical violence if he dared to report any incident of battery, harassment or discrimination to the FDNY’s Equal Employment Opportunity Office,” according to the New York Post.
Troina says during his probation period he was called a “closet homo;” was told being Hispanic made him bad at his job; and was forced to eat orange juice with a fork from 12 different plates.
He claims co-workers “coerced” him into going to a strip club where he was encouraged to have sex with a stripper to prove his manhood. When he refused, he says he was called “faggot” and “loser.”
Troina also says he was excluded from a firehouse volleyball outing where he was later informed he was rundown with homophobic insults.
Last year, the Post reported on the aspiring firefighter’s story saying, “firefighters covered his car in peanut butter, toilet paper and nails; challenged him to fight; shoved him; called him a ‘bitch,’ ‘loser’ and ‘fa—t’; put up mocking photos of him, and stomped on his bunker gear.”
Troina says when he reported incidents to his superiors he was told to “not take it too hard.”
His lawsuit names New York City, the New York City Fire Department, 14 firefighters and fire commissioner Daniel Nigro as defendants.
Troina was fired one week before the end of his probation period. The FDNY says he was dismissed after a “failed evaluation.”
We always knew Ryan Reynold was the rainbow unicorn we’ve been waiting for all our lives.
And now we have proof.
The Deadpool star recently appeared on the South Korean reality competition King of Mask Singer which challenges contestants wearing silly, absurd costumes (like a rainbow unicorn for example) to try and win the judges votes.
As part of his promo tour for the upcoming Deadpool 2, Reynolds belted out his rendition of “Tomorrow” from the Broadway classic musical Annie while the judges and audience were stupefied over who could possibly be the man-behind-the-mask.
UK contestant SuRie interrupted mid-performance by protester
The Grand Finals of the 2018 Eurovision Song Contest were held last night in Lisbon, Portugal, and there were definitely memorable over-the-top moments of different kinds.
The annual music competition is viewed by over 200 million people in the world and often features high-camp concepts.
Winning doesn’t guarantee world fame although there have been a couple of champions who went on to amazing success.
You know, folks like Celine Dion (represented Switzerland in 1988) and Abba (represented Sweden in 1974).
During last night’s performance by the UK’s entry, SuRie singing “Storm,” a man ran onstage, grabbed her microphone and started yelling something along the line of: “Nazis of the UK media, we demand freedom?”
What?
SuRie’s composure was incredible. Her head definitely present, she stepped back allowing security to do it’s job.
Within seconds security had the man in custody and handed the microphone back to SuRie just in time for the lyrics, “Don’t give up!”
And the crowd goes wild!
Watch the performance, stage invasion (1:40 mark) and amazing recovery below.
SuRie was been given the chance to sing again as the show’s final performance but declined. In a statement, Team SuRie said they were “extremely proud of her performance and have decided that there is absolutely no reason to perform the song again.”
Surprisingly, Team UK placed near the bottom of the results. Which just goes to show – who knows?
I thought she was pretty terrific.
Also part of the drama this year was a Chinese broadcaster censoring the performance by Ireland’s Ryan O’Shaughnessy which featured two men dancing together.
The European Broadcasting Union banned the channel, Mango TV, from broadcasting saying in a statement that the censorship was “not in line” with its “values of universality and inclusivity.”
In the end, the winner of the mega-competition was Netta Barzilai of Israel whose performance of pop anthem “Toy” included beatboxing, chicken noises and arm flaps.
That decision caused it’s own drama as supporters and opponents decried political frictions between Israel and other countries in the Middle East.
Here’s the winning performance (complete with chicken dance):
In this new, ever-changing world of social media we have new behaviors to adopt.
The tweet above comes from the account “Dave Old Vietnam Veteran.”
He described himself as a disabled Vietnam Vet – “Agent Orange Got me 1967/68, Retired International Telecom Consultant Married to HS sweetheart for 53 years. I have guns & hate the NRA.”
As the tweet makes self-evident, Dave suffered a fatal heart attack last night.
“This is Dave’s wife. Yesterday evening Dave had a massive heart attack and did not survive. I am so sorry to have to tell you this. This will be his final tweet. He appreciated you, keep up the good fight.”
His widow felt it important to share the news with his thousands of followers on Twitter because clearly Dave made an impact. Dave apparently raised what social media voice he had to call out Donald Trump and his administration.
Something was done. Something occurred.
I never knew Dave, but seeing this message resonated with me.
People we’ve never met but may have interacted with hundreds of times on social media become a real thread in the tapestry of our lives.
America, America, America – 2018 was doing pretty well so far when it comes to new legislation and the LGBTQ community. No new state bills attacking the community had been signed into law this year.
Until now.
In Oklahoma, Gov. Mary Fallin has put her signature on Senate Bill 1140 which effectively legalizes LGBTQ discrimination by faith-based adoption and foster care agencies which receive public funds.
This is the first new anti-LGBTQ law in the United States in 2018. What a dubious achievement.
The new law makes it legal to deny placing children in LGBTQ homes based on “religious objections.” Simply declaring a religious or moral opposition to same-sex marriage would allow a faith-based agency the legal right to refuse to place a child in same-sex homes.
The legislation could also withhold child placement with single or divorced people if their social status were to offend an adoption agency’s religious beliefs.
LGBTQ advocates quickly criticized the new law.
“It is shameful that Gov. Mary Fallin has signed into law a patently discriminatory law that targets children,” said JoDee Winterhof, Senior Vice President of Policy and Political Affairs at the Human Rights Campaign. “Gov. Fallin has cemented her legacy, siding with discrimination and the legislature in throwing kids under the bus to create a ‘license to discriminate’ against LGBTQ Oklahomans.”
And Troy Stevenson, Executive Director of Freedom Oklahoma, issued a statement which read, in part: “While we are deeply disappointed that Governor Fallin choose to sign discrimination into law, we are more concerned about the children – desperately looking for homes – that will be harmed by this disgraceful legislation.”
“Our message to Governor Fallin, and the lawmakers who championed this travesty is simple: we’ll see you in court!” added Stevenson.
Supporters of the new law say these faith-based agencies will have to shut their doors if forced to place children into LGBT homes.
Currently, five states – Mississippi, Michigan, Virginia, Texas, Alabama, South Dakota and North Dakota — have similar laws on the books, although Michigan’s law is being challenged in the federal courts thanks to the ACLU.
Kansas’s governor has a similar anti-LGBTQ adoption bill waiting on his desk.
