LGBTQ news and entertainment
Living in Las Vegas, I’m accustomed to hotter summer temperatures than most of the U.S., but July totally felt off the charts.
Turns out the lower 48 states set a record for the hottest month on record (1895–present) in July, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Continue reading “July Broke Records For Hottest Month In U.S.”
The latest in a litany of Donald Trump’s rollback of climate and environmental safeguards — the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has repealed the bedrock scientific finding that greenhouse gas emissions threaten human life.
The EPA has decided the endangerment finding, a 2009 scientific conclusion that greenhouse gas emissions pose a danger to Americans’ health, “overstated” the risks of those emissions.
Note – The endangerment finding was based on more than 200 pages of research and evidence.
This effectively ends the federal government’s legal authority to control the pollution that is dangerously heating the planet. Continue reading “Trump Admin Rolls Back Greenhouse Gas/Environmental Safeguards”
Some news items you might have missed: • Bloomberg News: Meta Platforms Inc.’s new social media app Threads has garnered 70 million users in just two days after its launch. Continue reading “News Round-Up: Threads Signs Up 70 Million Users In 2 Days + More”
Out pro hockey player Luke Prokop (photo: Candice Ward)
Producer Ryan Murphy at the Golden Globe Awards (screen cap)
(image via TheOUTfront.com)
Today the Blue Planet marks not only the 50th anniversary of Earth Day, but even during a global pandemic and social distancing, the world is coming together in one common goal, Climate Action. The vision is straightforward and simple. From the website:
“Our world needs transformational change… As an individual, you yield real power and influence as a consumer, a voter, and a member of a community that can unite for change… When your voice and your actions are united with thousands or millions of others around the world, we create a movement that is inclusive, impactful, and impossible to ignore… The time is long overdue for a global outpouring of energy, enthusiasm, and commitment to create a new plan of action for our planet. Earth Day 2020 can be the catalyst that galvanizes an unparalleled global collaboration.”
How can you help S.A.V.E. our planet? 
For 24 hours “Earth Day Network” will be inspiring change with streaming content bringing viewers together for performances, teach-ins, calls to action, and global conversations meant to empower people to make a better environmental future for our planet. 
“We must build the largest, most diverse online mobilization in history in defense of the environment. Our world needs a united response for bold action. On Earth Day 2020, we say enough is enough. We say we believe in science. We say that everyone can make a difference. We say that the protection of our planet and the wellbeing of the people who live upon it are the top priorities. On Earth Day 2020, we say that we’re committing to vote, we’re registering to vote and we’re showing up to vote. Human health and planetary health are inextricably linked. Learn more about Earth Day activities, Climate Change information, and joining forces with others around the world making a difference in their future at EarthDay.org 
Our Planet Our Home credit: Ernesto Yerena Montejano)
Lawrence Pfeil, Jr., is a freelance writer/playwright who has reviewed film and theatre, both on and off-Broadway, for media outlets including The Randy Report, the New York Blade, and Edge Publications. You can follow him at TheOUTfront.com.
That time when a cast member of MTV’s Jersey Shore schooled Donald Trump on climate change/global warming…
Earlier this week, far-right radio blowhard Rush Limbaugh told his listeners that Hurricane Irma was part of a huge “liberal media” climate change hoax and that Irma would not make landfall in the U.S.
Yesterday he announced he would not be doing his show, broadcast from South Florida because he would be busy evacuating the state.
Via ThinkProgress:
“So there is a desire to advance this climate change agenda, and hurricanes are one of the fastest and best ways to do it. You can accomplish a lot just by creating fear and panic. You don’t need a hurricane to hit anywhere,” Limbaugh said on his show Tuesday. “All you need is to create the fear and panic accompanied by talk that climate change is causing hurricanes to become more frequent and bigger and more dangerous, and you create the panic, and it’s mission accomplished, agenda advanced.”
But on the show Thursday, Limbaugh said he would be off the air for the next few days.
“May as well… announce this. I’m not going to get into details because of the security nature of things, but it turns out that we will not be able to do the program here tomorrow,” Limbaugh said Thursday. “We’ll be on the air next week, folks, from parts unknown.”
Limbaugh said the show will be back on the air Monday, but to be on the air Friday would be “legally impossible” for them do to the show out of South Florida.
Listen to him admit he’s evacuating below:
Rush Limbaugh on Tuesday: #Irma an attempt to push “climate agenda.”
RL on Thursday: I’m evacuating South Florida.https://t.co/iPeZwhviyZ— Bill McKibben (@billmckibben) September 8, 2017
Earlier this wk, Rush Limbaugh claimed Irma was a liberal hoax to push climate agenda. Today, he’s fleeing south FL.https://t.co/hkYtnikd26— Facts Do Matter (@WilDonnelly) September 8, 2017
Rush Limbaugh, after calling Hurricane Irma a lie to push a climate agenda, now looks to be evacuating south FL. https://t.co/26EiwhZ5uF— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) September 8, 2017
President Donald Trump tweeted Saturday he will make a decision next week on whether the United States will withdraw from the landmark Paris climate accord.
At the G7 Summit in Sicily this week, several world leaders attempted to sway Trump into staying committed to the climate agreement.
An official dispatch from the G7 read, the U.S. “is in the process of reviewing its policies on climate change and on the Paris Agreement and thus is not in a position to join the consensus on these topics.”
Speaking to reporters after the G7 meeting, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said, “The whole discussion about climate has been difficult, or rather very unsatisfactory. Here we have the situation that six members, or even seven if you want to add the EU, stand against one.”
Running for president in 2016, Trump often threatened to tear up the climate agreement that President Obama signed. But, aides to Trump say the president listened carefully to his counterparts, and is “evolving” on the issue.
News site Axios reports that Trump has already told several close advisers he plans to leave the accord.
I will make my final decision on the Paris Accord next week!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 27, 2017
President Trump signed an executive order today meant to reverse many of President Obama’s climate change regulations.
Trump says the EO will move the U.S. towards energy independence, while environmentalists say the action will do serious damage to ecological interests.
Via Reuters:
The decree, dubbed the “Energy Independence” order, will seek to undo former President Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan requiring states to slash carbon emissions from power plants – a critical element in helping the United States meet its commitments to a global climate change accord agreed by nearly 200 countries in Paris in December 2015.
It will also rescind a ban on coal leasing on federal lands, reverse rules to curb methane emissions from oil and gas production, and reduce the weight of climate change in federal agencies’ assessments of new regulations.
“We’re going to go in a different direction,” a senior White House official told reporters ahead of Tuesday’s order. “The previous administration devalued workers with their policies. We can protect the environment while providing people with work.”
“I cannot tell you how many jobs the executive order is going to create but I can tell you that it provides confidence in this administration’s commitment to the coal industry,” said Kentucky Coal Association president Tyler White.
So, when Trump claims this EO will create jobs, no one actually knows if that’s true?
And while we’re talking “energy independence,” why doesn’t Trump ever mention solar or wind?
During the 2016 campaign, Trump made clear he doesn’t believe in “global warming:”
The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 6, 2012