LGBTQ news and entertainment
Serious best birthday wishes to the glorious Betty White, who turns 95 today.
How could we even begin to count the ways we love Miss Betty?
Check out some of her best moments as “Sue Ann Nivens” from The Mary Tyler Moore Show below:
From the New York Times:
President Obama on Tuesday largely commuted the remaining prison sentence of Chelsea Manning, the army intelligence analyst convicted of an enormous 2010 leak that revealed American military and diplomatic activities across the world, disrupted the administration, and made WikiLeaks, the recipient of those disclosures, famous.
The decision by Mr. Obama rescued Ms. Manning, who twice tried to commit suicide last year, from an uncertain future as a transgender woman incarcerated at the male military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kan. She has been jailed for nearly seven years, and her 35-year sentence was by far the longest punishment ever imposed in the United States for a leak conviction.
Now, under the terms of Mr. Obama’s commutation announced by the White House on Tuesday, Ms. Manning is set to be freed in five months, on May 17 of this year, rather than in 2045.
The commutation also relieved the Department of Defense of the difficult responsibility of her incarceration as she pushes for treatment for her gender dysphoria — including sex reassignment surgery — that the military has no experience providing.
Chelsea Manning has served about 7 years of a 35-year sentence. She’ll be released in May https://t.co/N1lzTUSB3v https://t.co/WkzSUKj3ka— CNN (@CNN) January 17, 2017
In that there have only been a handful of leak cases, most receiving a one to three year sentence, the original 35 year sentence was considered severe in light of Manning pleading guilty.
Of great interest now: Wikileaks recently tweeted that should Obama grant Manning clemency Julian Assange would agree to US extradition:
If Obama grants Manning clemency Assange will agree to US extradition despite clear unconstitutionality of DoJ case https://t.co/MZU30SlfGK— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) January 12, 2017
From that other “big leaker:”
In five more months, you will be free. Thank you for what you did for everyone, Chelsea. Stay strong a while longer! https://t.co/PaLvJDvDbl— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) January 17, 2017
(tipped by Aaron Baldwin)
More “swampity-swamp-swamp” regarding Donald Trump’s nominee for Health & Human Services Secretary, Rep. Tom Price.
According to Salon, Price introduced legislation last year that helped a biotech company he had just bought shares of stock in.
From Salon:
Less than a week after buying between $1,001 and $15,000 of shares in Zimmer Biomet, Price introduced a bill known as the HIP Act. Its objective was to delay until 2018 a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services regulation that would have impacted payments for the knee and hip implants in which the corporation specializes, CNN reported on Monday. Zimmer Biomet’s political action committee subsequently made a donation to Price’s reelection campaign.
This isn’t the first time that Price has been criticized for pushing legislation that could financially benefit medical companies in which he had invested stock. Last month, it was reported that over the last four years Price had traded roughly $300,000 in shares in health companies that would directly benefit from legislation he was pursuing.
In 2012, Congress passed The Stock Act which was designed to prevent lawmakers from profiting from stock trading based on any knowledge they could have from the legislative process.
President-elect Donald Trump’s bestie, Russian President Vladimir Putin, has no problem defending him against the recent unsubstantiated rumors floated in an “intelligence dossier” recently.
Putin says he doubts Trump ever utilized Russian prostitutes, “although ours are undoubtedly the best in the world.”
Via Bloomberg:
Russian President Vladimir Putin said he doesn’t believe that U.S. President-elect Donald Trump met with prostitutes in Russia, calling the accusations part of a campaign to undermine the election result.
Unsubstantiated allegations made against Trump are “obvious fabrications,” Putin told reporters in the Kremlin on Tuesday. “People who order fakes of the type now circulating against the U.S. president-elect, who concoct them and use them in a political battle, are worse than prostitutes because they don’t have any moral boundaries at all,” he said.
Putin said that Trump wasn’t a politician when he visited Moscow in the past and Russian officials weren’t aware that he held any political ambitions. It’s “complete nonsense” to believe that Russian security services “chase after every American billionaire,” he said.
Trump is “a grown man, and secondly he’s someone who has been involved with beauty contests for many years and has met the most beautiful women in the world,” Putin said. “I find it hard to believe that he rushed to some hotel to meet girls of loose morals, although ours are undoubtedly the best in the world.”
Bolding is mine. Here’s video of the statement. The issue of “girls of loose morals” comes up at the 3:45 mark.
President-elect did not like what he saw in the latest CNN/ORC poll which showed the Trumpster will be taking office as president with by far the lowest approval ratings of a newly-elected president in decades.
According to the survey’s results, Trump’s approval numbers stand at 40%, with 52% disapproving.
That’s a long ways behind that of President Barack Obama (84% approval) as he took office 8 years ago. President George W. Bush had 61% approval, and Bill Clinton took the oath of office with 67% approval.
Additionally, 53% of those surveyed say they have less confidence in Trump’s ability to serve as president since election day.
Of course, he couldn’t let that go untweeted:
You’ll note that Mr. Trump loves citing any poll that shows him in a positive light.
His tweet must be referencing the pre-election polls that correctly predicted that Hillary Clinton would get more votes than he did.
More than 2.8 million more votes, to be precise.
The sexy men of 2CELLOS dropped their first music video for their upcoming album, SCORE – which features their versions of some of the most beautiful film music played with the London Symphony Orchestra!
The video, set to the theme from Game of Thrones, has received almost 2 million views in two days.
Release date – 17th March, pre-order now on iTunes.
I love these guys, especially “floppy hair” cellist Stjepan Hauser. Although his slightly more subdued comrade, Luka Sulic, is no slouch either 🙂
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| Kadu Giacobini via Instagram |
Some news items you may have missed:
• Ok, I may have a new Instahunk crush – Brazilian dentist-turned-model, Kadu Giacomini
• President-elect Donald Trump accuses CIA chief of leaking 35 page Russian dossier.
• Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announces transgender inmates will be housed according to gender identity.
• Donald Trump cabinet pick bought stock in company days before introducing a bill to help it.
• Rob Schneider, that guy from “The Waterboy,” decided he needed to explain Martin Luther King Jr. – on Martin Luther King Jr. Day – to Rep. John Lewis, who was standing next to Martin Luther King Jr. on the day of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963.
• And the next time you think you’ve had a bad day just remember: this young lady is aware that “the internet is forever.”
Funny, but ridiculously accurate at the same time.
Wanna play Candy Crush?
Jonny McGovern is back with his first music video in quite some time.
This little ditty from the comedian/satirist is titled “Gay Questions,” because enquiring minds want to know…
Warning: Lyrics NSFW.
