Don’t you hate it when folks come up to you in public, immediately jump into conversation like they know you, but you have NO IDEA who they are? The latest episode from Matt Wilkas and Daniel Vincent Gordh’s self-titled web series, Matt & Dan, takes the ‘where do I know you from?’ scenario and ramps up the socially awkward score to Level 10. In ‘Best Friends For Never,’ Matt (above) is grabbing some java on his way to CrossFit class when Dan spots him from across the coffee shop. Dan: “Oh, my god…Ben!” Matt: (draws total blank) “So fun…”(not) Amid weird hugs and kisses, Matt tries to decipher where he knows Dan from, but…nothing. Every question is met with a dodge even though Dan clearly knows a LOT about Matt’s life – his recent birthday party, his gym workout schedule… When Matt’s friend ‘Sarah’ (guest star Julia Cho) gets dragged into the increasingly weird meet-up, she tries to divine some background (“Are you in Jill’s Pilates class? Northwestern?”), but only finds herself further and further in the Twilight Zone. We won’t give away where it all goes, but props to the duo for the deliciously off-kilter encounter. Plus – bonus points for Matt Wilkas in a tank top 🙂 Check out the new episode below, and you can find past episodes on their YouTube channel here.
The U.S. budget gap widened to more than $1 trillion in the first 11 months of the fiscal year, according to the Treasury Department, the first time deficits have topped that amount in seven years. Remember how the Trump tax cuts were going to ‘pay for themselves?’ From The Hill:
The U.S. government deficit surpassed $1 trillion in the first 11 months of the current fiscal year, over $100 billion more than the same period last year, according to official Treasury figures released Thursday.
Last week, data from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) found that the 11-month deficit had surpassed $1 trillion, but it was expected to fall back under that threshold after an expected spike in tax payments in September.
The Treasury data, however, offered no such assurances, estimating that the fiscal year would close $69 billion above the $1 trillion mark.
The growing deficit, which adds to the nation’s debt burden, raises concerns about the nation’s fiscal health. Interest on the debt has cost the U.S. $379 billion this year, more than spending on veterans benefits, education and transportation.
For months now, the LGBTQ media has reported on totally-not-gay former Congressman Aaron Schock as he’s turned up in photos and video clips making out with gay men at Coachella, tipping go-go dancers at gay clubs in Mexico and posing on the beach with gay social media mavens. The interest in Mr. Schock is borne out of the fact that while in office he openly opposed LGBTQ rights. His public positions and anti-gay votes included supporting aconstitutional ban on same-sex marriage and voting against the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. He has never apologized or addressed his reasons for such policy positions while continually denying he is gay. He’s never publicly come out. His most recent foray into LGBTQ social life was a visit to the popular West Hollywood bar Revolver when he attended a karaoke night hosted by local drag queen Jonnie Reinhart. When word got back to Reinhart that Schock was in the audience, Reinhart felt a responsibility to do or say something.
Well friends- I spoke to one Aaron Schock tonight. I’ll be making a video and sharing some of what we discussed. Thanks @ira for the paparazzi shot pic.twitter.com/fsXG93TgHt
In a video post to his Facebook page, Reinhart admits that he’s not “a confrontational person,” but in light of Schock’s well-documented hypocrisy, couldn’t shake a sense of obligation to address Schock. In his video, Reinhart says he knows there are folks who would have loved to have seen Schock thrown out of the bar or had a drink thrown in his face. “My job is to literally make people feel comfortable and in comes this situation, where clearly other people were aware he was there,” Reinhart recently told Insider.com. “There was a general elephant in the room.” https://www.facebook.com/JonnieReinhart/videos/2482800321758244/ Instead of calling Schock out on the microphone, Reinhart decided to perform “F*ck You” by Lily Allen. As the song began, Reinhart told the crowd, “This song goes out to someone in the audience. And it goes out to anybody who votes against gay rights.” Reinhart figured that would send a subtle message, and expected Schock to leave. But after the song, a friend of Schock’s approached Reinhart to chat, which inspired the drag queen to speak to the former congressman directly. Like many, Reinhart believes Schock still owes the LGBTQ community a public apology for his anti-gay positions. “Keep in mind, my blood was boiling, my heart was pounding,” shares Reinhart in his video. “So I went up and shook his hand and I explained to him why I was upset that he was there, why other people were upset that he was there, and I basically told him that he wasn’t going to be welcomed in gay spaces until he began the process of apologizing and healing the harm that his actions have caused.” According to Reinhart, Schock listened and expressed appreciation for addressing him directly. Addressing his political record, Schock apparently told Reinhart “that he did not identify as gay at that time, and it wasn’t until years later that he began to explore and understand his sexuality.” Then, Schock shared with Reinhart “his experience of being publicly outed” and how his family had reacted to the news of him being gay. “Basically, he told me his family’s reaction was not positive, it was very bad,” shares Reinhart. “And he insisted that he wasn’t looking for sympathy, and he said that he was working on putting out a statement.” Reinhart didn’t go into Schock’s personal details that were shared in the conversation that night since “he’s actually no longer a public official.” Schock apparently asked about Reinhart’s own coming out experience and the drag performer shared that he was publicly outed when he was 13, so he grasps how difficult it is to be outed. But, says Reinhart, “It doesn’t excuse his [Schock’s] behavior.” “I told him that he can’t have his cake and eat it too, and I told him that I’ll be waiting for his statement,” added Reinhart. “He told me that he hoped that he could talk to me again, we shook hands, and that was that.” Reinhart concludes by telling the viewer his goal in the conversation was to “extend an olive branch,” adding “I believe you can have a respectful conversation with somebody while still telling them that they have f*cked up and they need to do better.” While I find Reinhart’s civility in his encounter with Schock admirable, it’s worth noting that Schock has now been out and about with his openly gay forays for several months. If he’s planning to address his anti-LGBTQ past, how long does it take to pen a statement? As I have previously reported, Schock left office in public disgrace in 2015 amid corruption charges including mail fraud, filing false tax returns, theft of government funds, and more. In March, he was offered and accepted a sweetheart deal by federal prosecutors who agreed to drop all charges if he repaid $68k to his campaign fund and $42k to the IRS. (source: Insider – images via Facebook, Instagram)
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited an art installation by Kenneth Goldsmith at the Venice Biennale and posed for a photo with a replica of the Oval Office’s Resolute Desk and 62,000 pages of paper containing every single email sent from her private email server. After spending about an hour flipping through pages and pages of her own emails, she told reporters, “It was and is still one of the strangest most absurd events in American political history. Anyone can go in and look at them, there’s nothing there. “ “The exhibition is further proof that nothing wrong or controversial can be found on these emails,” she added. “It makes them accessible to everyone and allows everyone to read them. … They are just a bunch of boring emails.” As we all remember, Donald Trump spent much of the 2016 presidential campaign lambasting Clinton for using a private email server, which at the time, was not illegal. Since being elected to office, it’s been widely reported that Trump’s daughter Ivanka has used private email herself in violation of federal records rules. Because irony is dead.
Hillary Clinton’s statement after seeing my show, given during an interview to Italian TV, Part 1 (credit: Giuseppe Cordioli) pic.twitter.com/ykwQvrl94q
Hillary Clinton’s statement after seeing my show, given during an interview to Italian TV, Part 2 (credit: Giuseppe Cordioli) pic.twitter.com/f8tWOyWHVp
Because children already living with ‘less’ need to be humiliated in front of their friends? From CNN:
A boy from Ohio had the “worst birthday ever” after his school lunch was taken away because of an unpaid balance on his account.
Jefferson Sharpnack told his grandmother, Diane Bailey, that he was denied his lunch tray when he went to check out. Instead of getting the cheesy breadsticks he had picked out, he was given a piece of cheese and bread by the lunch staff at Green Primary School in Uniontown, Ohio.
It all happened on his ninth birthday, in front of other students in the lunch line, because of a $9 debt, according to Bailey.
Green Local Schools confirmed to CNN the incident occurred and that Jefferson received an alternative lunch that is given to students with deficit accounts. The lunch consisted of a cheese sandwich, side item and milk.
In the report below, Jefferson explains, “I got my cheesy breadsticks and put in my number, and when I was going to check out, the lunch lady didn’t say anything, took away my cheesy breadsticks and sauce, put them over there, and took out bread on cheese from the fridge and put it on my tray.” Seriously?
Some news items you might have missed: • InstaHunks: Some days you just want to ride a big pink thing. Just ask Eliad Cohen (above)…LOL • Bloomberg: The state of Michigan has approved a charter for the first-ever LGBTQ credit union set to open in 2020. • KIT212: Happy Hump Day! You know what that means over at kenneth-in-the-212… Wrestle Wednesday! • HuffPost: Talk about underhanded politics… After promising there would be no votes until Wednesday afternoon out of respect for 9/11, North Carolina GOP lawmakers in the state House took advantage of Democrats attending memorial ceremonies to push through an override of Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of the state budget.
Rep. Deb Butler of North Carolina slammed Republicans for overturning a veto while Democrats were at a 9/11 ceremony.
• Washington Post: The Supreme Court has ruled the Trump administration’s policy to bar many Central American migrants from seeking asylum in the United States may go into effect while legal challenges move forward. Since 1980, the U.S. has said those who say they are fleeing persecution and violence in their home countries have the right to at least apply for asylum. • NY Times: The White House was directly involved in pressing the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to denounce the weather forecasters who contradicted Donald Trump’s claim that Hurricane Dorian would probably strike Alabama. Mick Mulvaney, acting White House chief of staff, told Wilbur Ross, the commerce secretary, to have NOAA publicly disavow the forecasters’ position that Alabama was not at risk. • New Music: Tony Award winner drops his newest music video, the uptempo, pulsating “Rain,” from his album Sing To Me Instead. Platt’s upcoming September 29 concert at Radio City Music Hall is not only sold-out (huge place, don’t you know?) but it will be filmed for a future Netflix music special. And of course, there’s the upcoming Netflix series The Politician, by Ryan Murphy, which he stars in alongside Jessica Lange, Gwenyth Paltrow, and his Dear Evan Hansen co-star Laura Dreyfuss.
ReVae Arnaud-Jensen, who has been deaf since birth, attempted to order a meal at the drive-through window of a Jack in the Box restaurant. Since she was unable to hear the employee ask for her order through the drive-through speaker, she drove up to the window where she explained she is deaf. What happened next is hideous. The employee refused to take her order telling her she had to go back to the speaker and place the order there. Instead of simply taking her order, the employee began to argue with her and eventually laughed at her and mocked her use of sign language. When Arnaud-Jensen insists that she be served, the employee shuts the window and leaves. Arnaud-Jensen shared the video of the encounter on her Facebook and explained she “sat there for two hours,” but never received her food. “This is common for deaf people to experience this including me,” wrote Arnaud-Jensen. “This is not my first time. It had this happen to me several times, however, this one was the worst I have experienced.” According to local news reports, the employee has been fired but Arnaud-Jensen intends on suing the company anyway to bring further awareness of the day-to-day struggles of the Deaf community.
This woman who is deaf was refused service and mocked by a drive-thru employee, and her son caught the whole thing on camera pic.twitter.com/bWd7vbit1E
Los Angeles-based singer/songwriter FAZE releases his new single “Magic” from his upcoming EP. The chill mid-tempo was the last song recorded on for the EP, to be titled Eclipse. “Stylistically I wanted to go for something that was influenced by my Persian background – which was outside of the norm for me and also different from mainstream music” says FAZE. The handsome artist says the song captures “falling for someone or something in a way that you’ve never felt before.” “Spirits talking heavens watching” is the voice in our head that reminds us the world is always watching, judging and ridding yourself of those perspectives,” explains FAZE. “Whether it’s the initial spark in a relationship or on a more personal level, the underlying message behind Magic is about stepping outside of your comfort zone and embracing it. It’s about feeling good, feeling sexy and feeling magical”.
A member of the LGBTQ community, FAZE has spent years working to find his most authentic creative voice, with the intent on making his art as inclusive as possible. The San Diego native spent years grappling with not only his sexual orientation but with a diagnosis of Tourette Syndrome at the age of seven. But music would prove to be his emotional salvation, and by the age of nine he’d learned to play both piano and cello. “My idea of fun when I was a kid was just sitting in my garden, listening to classical music and playing my cello,” he recalls. By his early 20s, he’d begun joining in songwriting sessions for leading artists, which went a long way in sharpening his songcraft and refining his vision for his own work. “Even when I was writing for other people, I was always pulling from my own experiences—I can only write what’s real to me,” says FAZE. “But now with Eclipse, I feel like it’s the first time I’m stepping out into the world, and fully showing who I am as an artist.”
It’s been months since a Trump press secretary addressed reporters from the podium of the White House briefing room (March 11), and it appears that’s the way things will remain. From ABC News:
Wednesday marks six months since a White House press secretary last came to the podium in the briefing room to field questions from reporters in a traditional format and the Trump administration has no plans to resume the daily and sometimes combative encounters with the White House press corps.
“President Trump communicates directly with the American people more than any President in history. The fact that the White House Press Corps can no longer grandstand on TV is of no concern to us,” White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said in a statement to ABC News.
In previous administrations, regular press briefings have been a centerpiece of the White House communications operation by which the White House both advances their public messaging and engages in a a regular exchange of information with the media on the pressing issues of the day.
Today marks six months since the last White House briefing by the press secretary. In the past year, only 6 briefings were held by the White House press secretary. (h/t @AlliemalCNN)
In response to the recent kerfuffle regarding New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees filming a video PSA for the virulently anti-LGBTQ group Focus on the Family, New Orleans sports radio host Seth Dunlap penned a thoughtful, candid open letter to the Super Bowl MVP. In the essay, posted to Dunlap’s personal Facebook page, he took time to express his sympathy for Brees’s position after catching blowback for the “Bring Your Bible to School Day” video. Dunlap noted Brees’ public position of his personal Christian faith and acknowledged the quarterback most probably had no idea of the ugly policies promoting by Focus on the Family which include battling marriage equality, the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, any anti-bullying programs and enacting hate crime laws. But the open letter also addressed Brees’ response to the backlash he received wherein the quarterback clapped back “negativity spread about” him by folks who pointed out the uncomfortable connection between a football hero and a group certified by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a hate group. I won’t dissect Dunlap’s full essay here, but I encourage you to read it here.
Thoughtful, pensive, and very non-adversarial, the radio host picks up on a word used by Brees in his response – ‘shame’ – and connects it to shame he’s experienced at times being an openly gay man. At every turn in the letter, Dunlap is respectful in his attempt to perhaps educate Brees on who and what Focus on the Family represents to the LGBTQ community. So it must have come as a shock to the sports radio show host when the Twitter account for his own station tweeted an ugly response to him. After posting a topic to listeners on his Twitter account asking “Which of these 5 ‘overreactions’ isn’t actually an overreaction?’ in the sports world, Dunlap received a response (that was quickly deleted) reading, “That you’re a f*g.” It would take about five hours for the station to address the homophobic tweet. This was the statement issued via tweet – please note that there is no apology to Mr. Dunlap included. “We are aware of a tweet that went out today from the WWL account,” read the statement. “The content of the tweet is categorically offensive and abhorrent to the station. We are actively investigating this incident and will take swift and appropriate action once we determine how this occurred.”
We are aware of a tweet that went out today from the WWL account. The content of the tweet is categorically offensive and abhorrent to the station. We are actively investigating this incident and will take swift and appropriate action once we determine how this occurred.
Big Easy Magazine notes that when Dunlap opened his show on Tuesday night, he focused on how Monday night’s Saints game brought everyone together. “White, Black, Latinx, men, women, straight, gay – nobody caring,” said the veteran radio host. “If you’ve ever been fortunate enough to be a part of something like that, it could be a truly religious experience. And that camaraderie, that togetherness, is what makes sports so special. We can set everything aside and just be ourselves.” Bravo, Mr. Dunlap, bravo. (source: BigEasyMagazine)
Don’t you hate it when folks come up to you in public, immediately jump into conversation like they know you, but you have NO IDEA who they are? The latest episode from Matt Wilkas and Daniel Vincent Gordh’s self-titled web series, Matt & Dan, takes the ‘where do I know you from?’ scenario and ramps up the socially awkward score to Level 10. In ‘Best Friends For Never,’ Matt (above) is grabbing some java on his way to CrossFit class when Dan spots him from across the coffee shop. Dan: “Oh, my god…Ben!” Matt: (draws total blank) “So fun…”(not) Amid weird hugs and kisses, Matt tries to decipher where he knows Dan from, but…nothing. Every question is met with a dodge even though Dan clearly knows a LOT about Matt’s life – his recent birthday party, his gym workout schedule… When Matt’s friend ‘Sarah’ (guest star Julia Cho) gets dragged into the increasingly weird meet-up, she tries to divine some background (“Are you in Jill’s Pilates class? Northwestern?”), but only finds herself further and further in the Twilight Zone. We won’t give away where it all goes, but props to the duo for the deliciously off-kilter encounter. Plus – bonus points for Matt Wilkas in a tank top 🙂 Check out the new episode below, and you can find past episodes on their YouTube channel here. 
It would take about five hours for the station to address the homophobic tweet. This was the statement issued via tweet – please note that there is no apology to Mr. Dunlap included. “We are aware of a tweet that went out today from the WWL account,” read the statement.