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Published by Reuters By James Oliphant WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Democrats are in jeopardy of losing their long-time firewall against new voting restrictions in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin should Republicans who support such curbs win competitive governors’ races in those states in November. Republican victories in the three states could have profound implications for the 2024 presidential election. Nicknamed the “blue wall” after helping President Joe Biden defeat Donald Trump in 2020, they also were home to challenges from Republican officials trying to overturn the election’s results. Doug Mastriano, a state senator running for governor in Pennsylvania, worked with Trump’s lawyers to challenge the 2020 outcome. James Craig, a leading Republican gubernatorial candidate in Michigan, has called for an audit of the election results. Rebecca Kleefisch, the top Republican contender for Wisconsin’s governor, filed a lawsuit seeking to prevent the use of drop boxes in upcoming elections. “They say every election is the most important of our lifetime. Well, this one is,” said Kadida Kenner, executive director of the non-partisan New Pennsylvania Project, a group that works to register new voters. The governors’ contests, like lower-ticket races involving everything from secretaries of state to county clerks, have taken on increased significance given Republican efforts to roll back voting rights and oversee election administration ahead of 2024. Since Trump’s defeat, the three states’ Republican-controlled legislatures have been dedicated to passing limits on absentee and mail-in voting, among other things. Democratic governors Tony Evers of Wisconsin, Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan and Tom Wolf of Pennsylvania stood in their way. With Evers and Whitmer now facing tough re-election fights and Wolf unable to run again due to term limits, voting rights advocates are scrambling to warn voters of the stakes. Political analysts consider all three races to be toss-ups. A Democratic super PAC, American Bridge, said on Wednesday it would spend $10 million in a new effort to target Republican candidates in races for governor, secretary of state and other local offices who it believes will undermine the fair administration of elections. The “blue wall” states will be part of the push. Kenner’s group is advocating to keep the widespread mail-in voting Pennsylvanians enjoyed during the pandemic, as well as seeking to register 50,000 new voters this year. A voting-rights group in Michigan, Voters Not Politicians, is recruiting volunteers to go into their communities to argue that the election system is not broken, that the 2020 election was free of fraud and that the sweeping measures advocated by Republicans in the state aren’t necessary. Election analysts say it may be difficult to craft a resonant voting-rights message in a year where Americans likely are preoccupied with other issues such as inflation and education. “It really has to be articulated to the electorate that we are at extraordinary time,” said Rachel Bitecofer, co-founder of StrikePAC, a Democratic voting-rights super PAC. Her message to voters: “A Democratic governor is the only thing standing between a free and fair 2024 election.” VOTING RIGHTS FIGHT On Tuesday, days after launching a bid for Wisconsin’s governorship, Republican state Representative Timothy Ramthun staged a rally at the state capitol that called for the 2020 election to be overturned. Some in the crowd carried banners that said, “Trump Won.” That evening, Evers, who analysts say may be most at risk in the three governor’s races, warned in an address to the state that “we must not take for granted” the right to vote. Like other governors, Evers has dealt with a surfeit of challenges, including the COVID-19 pandemic, economic upheaval, supply chain woes, school closings and a spike in violent crime, all of which have taken a toll on his popularity. Biden’s sinking approval rating has also become a drag on Democratic governors. Last year, Evers vetoed a Republican package that included provisions that would make it more difficult to cast absentee ballots. Republicans in the state Senate last week introduced a new version of the measure. The lead sponsor, Senator Duey Stroebel, said the legislature’s review of the 2020 election justified the changes. “These elections bills are necessary to fix loopholes, ambiguities and weaknesses in Wisconsin’s election law,” said Stroebel, a Republican. “It is highly unlikely these problems altered the outcome of the 2020 election, but improved election procedures would greatly increase public confidence in the results.” The nominal favorite in the Republican primary for governor, former lieutenant governor Kleefisch, recently asked the state Supreme Court to invalidate the use of ballot drop boxes. Another gubernatorial candidate, businessman Kevin Nicholson, has said they are illegal. In an environment where Democrats are vulnerable, analysts said too tight a focus on claims of election irregularities could alienate swing voters in the general election. “This is something Republicans care about,” Jacob Rubashkin, an analyst in Washington who tracks governor’s races. “This is not a winning issue writ large.” Pennsylvania’s governor’s race holds extra consequence for future elections. The state’s governor appoints the secretary of state, who oversees election administration. Attorney General Josh Shapiro is replacing Wolf on the Democratic ticket. A poll conducted this month by the Trafalgar Group showed former U.S. Representative Lou Barletta, an ardent Trump supporter, leading the pack of more than a dozen Republican gubernatorial candidates, followed by Mastriano. After the November 2020 election, Mastriano convened what he called a field hearing featuring Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani to examine whether there was widespread fraud. Later, he traveled to Washington for the Jan. 6 rally and took part in protests outside the U.S Capitol. This week, the select congressional committee investigating the Capitol siege subpoenaed Mastriano, asking for details about a plan to submit an alternate slate of electors from his home state. (Reporting by James Oliphant; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Alistair Bell) View the full article

Published by Reuters By Steve Scherer and David Ljunggren OTTAWA (Reuters) -Canadian police on Friday started arresting protesters as part of an operation to end a three-week blockade of Ottawa by hundreds of truck drivers that crippled the capital and prompted Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to assume emergency powers. Live television footage showed police making at least eight arrests, without using any force. Officers had detained two of the protest leaders late on Thursday. “Some protesters are surrendering and are being arrested. We ask protesters to remain peaceful and lawful,” the Ottawa police said in a tweet. Hundreds of police could be seen in central Ottawa, which received more than 8 inches (20 cm) of snow overnight, as temperatures with wind chill hovered around -23 Celsius (-9.4 Fahrenheit). At least one BearCat, a military-style armored vehicle, could be seen. Police say the operation will take days. The drivers, joined by thousands of demonstrators and some 400 vehicles, turned the streets around Parliament into a party zone since first arriving on Jan. 28, in what has become one of the worst crises to hit Trudeau since he took power in 2015. The protesters initially wanted an end to cross-border COVID-19 vaccine mandates for truck drivers but the blockade gradually turned into an anti-government and anti-Trudeau demonstration. Some want Trudeau to be ousted. Police have sealed off the center of the city, setting up 100 checkpoints to prevent any more people joining the demonstration on Parliament Hill. Police had said on Thursday that they would take imminent action to end the protest amid increasing resident anger at the previous failure of authorities to intervene. The Canadian Broadcasting Corp., citing security sources, said authorities had set up a number of temporary detention centers around the city. The House of Commons suspended its Friday sitting due to the expected police action, it said in a notice. “If you are not in the House of Commons precinct, stay away from the downtown core until further notice,” the notice said. Legislators had been due to debate Trudeau’s decision on Monday to invoke the Emergencies Act for the first time in 50 years, granting the government temporary additional widespread powers to deal with what he called a threat to democracy. Protesters blocked several land crossings with the United States, including the busiest, the Ambassador Bridge, which connects to Detroit, for six days, hurting both countries’ economies. Many protesters on Parliament Hill said they would not leave until their demands were met. “End the mandates, give us our rights and this is over,” said Chris Dacey on Thursday. “We’ll all go back to our families.” (Reporting by David Ljunggren, Steve Scherer and Julie GordonEditing by Leslie Adler, Chizu Nomiyama and Mark Porter) View the full article

Published by Reuters (Reuters) – British researchers led by Oxford University said on Friday that the current understanding of long COVID and options to treat it is emerging as a major long-term issue for global healthcare systems after reviewing the illness’ effects on patients. The review, published in the European Heart Journal, looked at direct impacts of a coronavirus infection such as myocardial infarction or inflammatory myocarditis – severe heart conditions – and long-term effects such as fatigue and mental wellbeing. “Long COVID is, besides its huge impact for the affected individual, of great societal and economic importance as it leads to leave of absence from work, reduced work performance and hence unforeseen costs,” said Thomas Lüscher from the Royal Brompton and Harefield Clinical Group. (Reporting by Pushkala Aripaka in Bengaluru; Editing by Ramakrishnan M.) View the full article

Published by AFP Erika Turner (R) and Jennifer Melsop (2nd R) of Centreville, Virginia, rejoice as they becomes the first same sex marriage couple in Arlington County as they speak to members of the media outside Arlington County Courthouse Washington (AFP) – The proportion of US adults identifying as LGBT has increased to a high of 7.1 percent, double the figure from 2012 when Gallup first started measuring it, reflecting a generational shift, the polling firm said Thursday. “Young adults are coming of age, including coming to terms with their sexuality or gender identity, at a time when Americans increasingly accept gays, lesbians and transgender people, and LGBT individuals enjoy increasing legal protection,” it said in a statement. Gallup asks Americans whether they personally identified as straight, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or something other than heterosexual, as part of the demographic information it collects on all its phone surveys. Respondents can also volunteer any other orientation or gender identity. Among 12,000 people surveyed in the 2021 data, 86.3 percent said they were straight or heterosexual, while 6.6 percent did not offer an answer. The survey began in 2012, when the percentage identifying as LGBT was 3.5 percent, and it has been steadily rising since. A breakdown reveals the higher prevalence of LGBT identities among the youngest adults compared with the older generations they are replacing. Overall, 20.8 percent or one-in-five Generation Z Americans who have reached adulthood — those born between 1997 and 2003 — identified as LGBT. That is roughly double the figure for millennials — defined here as born between 1981 to 1996 — at 10.5 percent. Among Generation X (1965-1980) the percentage was 4.2, for Baby Boomers (1946-1964) it was 2.6, and for Traditionalists — defined as those born before 1946 and sometimes called the Silent Generation — it was 0.8. Gen Z adults made up seven percent of the 2017 data, but by 2021 accounted for 12 percent as more attained adulthood. Since the survey began, the percentage of Traditionalists, Boomers, and Gen X identifying as LGBT had held steady, with a modest uptick seen among millennials. But the percentage of Gen Z who are LGBT nearly doubled since 2017, when only a small slice of that generation were adults. “Should that trend within Gen Z continue, the proportion of US adults in that generation who say they are LGBT will grow even higher once all members of the generation reach adulthood,” Gallup said in a statement. For the first time, the firm recorded how many identified with each LGBT category. More than half of LGBT Americans, or 57 percent, said they were bisexual — equivalent to four percent of all US adults. The next leading LGBT identity was gay, at 21 percent, lesbian at 14 percent, 10 percent transgender, and four percent something else such as queer or same-gender-loving. View the full article

Inside the Gay Prison Experiment is a Free Audible Podcast Original from Australia. This 5 hour podcast free and downloadable all at once on parent company Amazon’s site. We are through just the first chapter and we are hooked. Listen with us. [This post contains video, click to play] “Tucked away amongst snow-covered mountains is a tiny Australian town with a dark secret. Journalist Patrick Abboud hears whispers that it was once home to the world’s only ‘gay prison’. A prison that specifically incarcerated gay men. His investigation into what happened inside reveals the full story for the first time. This queer true-crime journey takes you from underground nightclubs to hidden sex haunts, to remote parts of New Zealand and England. You’ll find yourself entangled in a police cover up, a case of wrongful conviction and a human experiment that didn’t go to plan. At the centre of it all was a covert government operation to eradicate ‘the greatest menace to society’: homosexuality. “ FROM INTRO ABBOUD: By the night of my work Christmas party, I really just wanted to switch off. But a few drinks in a colleague came up to me and said he needed to talk. About a story tip. ABBOUD: “In a quiet corner. He told me what he heard from a friend. Who’d heard it from an acquaintance. That Australia used to be home. To a gay prison. Supposedly a prison was built in the 50s specifically to incarcerate gay men… some sort of experiment. And that was it no more detail. SUBJECT: “I didn’t know it was the only place in the world doing this. It’s a f****** scandal.” ABBOUD: “When I started looking into the story of a gay prison, I had no idea what I’d stumbled into, revealing…” SUBJECT: “…what the system didn’t want to be reviewed. ANOTHER SUBJECT: “You have to expect that There’s a jail full of homosexuals” ABBOUD: …and I had no idea that it would set me off on an investigation. That would take over years of my life. SUBJECT : It’s a mystery. ABBOUD: No, but nobody can find anything. If I keep digging and find this report… SUBJECT: “I’ll kiss you.” ANOTHER SUBJECT: At some point it was clearly buried. ABBOUD: Hey, Mom. MOM: Still Are you looking for? ABBOUD: The report’s like it’s like the Holy Grail, Mum. MOM: I don’t think it’s a bad thing to find out if you can hear(?) it. ABBOUD: Trying to unlock the story of the gay prison would find me entangled in a police cover up. So you were placed in the public toilets as an undercover operative to catch these gay men out? SUBJECT: “Yes” ABBOUD: …with case of wrongful conviction. SUBJECT: I just decided that if I stayed in Australia, I’d spend the rest of my life in jail or I’d be dead… ABBOUD: …and a human experiment that didn’t go to plan SUBJECT: …treating people like rats in a lab. You had to take your pants off and then push your penis through the rubber thing. The worst part was waiting for the shock. ANOTHER SUBJECT: His treatment of patients was criminal. Bizarre. Indiscriminate. Careless. ABBOUD: …at the center of this story, a secretive government operation, to eradicate a menace. ABBOUD: This was something. Nasty. It was something dirty. This was the covid-19 of those years and epidemic oof homosexuality. cruelty. No difference. And it all happened in a tiny Australian town … with a big secret. SUBJECT: It seems like it’s something I’m watching on it. Netflix series. Not something that’s happened in my town. This is The Greatest Menace, an audible original by Simon Punik and me Patrick Abboud Audible Australia has made this 5 hour podcast free and downloadable all at once on parent company Amazon’s site. We are through just the first chapter and we are hooked. Listen with us. Note: While we do make a very small commission on purchases using our links to Amazon, as do most sites, they pay zero commission on this one. We never take these pennies into account in recommendations. But in this case there aren’t even the pennies so base your thoughts on our recommendation on the quality of it. View the full article

IOC HeadquartersDoping “Double Standard” Out sprinter Sha’Carri Richardson and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) are at odds over discrepancies in the handling of Olympics doping cases after the 2020 Summer Olympics hopeful expressed frustration over the handling of Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva’s failed drug test. Richardson’s complaint centers on how the reporting of Valieva’s offense by anti-doping agencies and global sports governing bodies compared to her own violation last summer. Richardson was a medal favorite in track and field following the 2021 U.S. Olympic Trials, but she never got the chance to compete in Tokyo due to a one month suspension for using marijuana, whose status as a performance-enhancing drug has been called into question in recent years. Richardson stated at the time that she used marijuana as a way to deal with the recent passing of her mother. She was suspended by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) shortly after testing positive on June 19. Valieva Cleared To Compete Valieva’s case has dominated recent conversations at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing. After helping the Russian Olympic Committee win gold in team figure skating, it was revealed that a urine sample taken from Valieva in December 2021 tested positive for trimetazidine, a drug found in angina medication that increases blood flow to the heart and is classified as a performance-enhancing drug by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). The results of Valieva’s drug test weren’t revealed until examined by a WADA-approved laboratory on Feb. 8. The decision hasn’t sat well with prominent figures in the figure skating community. “It’s not just about her skating or not skating,” said NBC commentator and Olympic gold medalist Tara Lipinski during the women’s figure skating broadcast. “It’s affecting everyone at these Olympic Games to think that there’s going to be no medal ceremony if she’s on the podium. … I can’t even comprehend that. Imagine how it’s affecting so many other skaters’ lives and their experiences.” “To have that experience and that feeling … diminished because of a positive drug test on one of your competitors when everyone else adheres to the rules … it’s a slap in the face to every other skater,” added Olympian Johnny Weir. The medal ceremony went on as planned after Valieva finished fourth. There are multiple circumstances present in Valieva’s case that do distinguish it from Richardson’s despite the list of similarities. One is the handling of each athlete’s positive test and punishment by their respective anti-doping bodies. While USADA took swift action with Richardson, the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) drug its feet in processing and reporting Valieva’s positive test until the Beijing Games were already underway. “According to information received by WADA, the sample in this case was not flagged by RUSADA as being a priority sample when it was received by the anti-doping laboratory in Stockholm, Sweden. This meant the laboratory did not know to fast-track the analysis of this sample,” WADA said in a statement following the Cas ruling. “Protected Person” Valieva’s status as a “protected person” under WADA guidelines due to her age also allows for a less strict punishment to be administered to athletes under the age of 16. Richardson was 21 at the time of her suspension. A doping violation by an athlete classified as a “protected person” also triggers an automatic investigation of the athlete’s support personnel. WADA announced that both RUSADA and WADA have launched investigations into Valieva’s entourage. Russian athletes have been banned from competing under their nation’s name at the last three Olympics after the nation’s state-sponsored doping program was exposed following the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. “They shouldn’t be at the Olympic Games,” former Olympian Adam Rippon told Time Magazine. “I do feel for the 15-year-old, but at the end of the day if she did cheat, it’s very simple to me – she shouldn’t be competing. I do put the blame for that on the people around her, and not so much on her. But this is a big hit to the Olympic movement.” Olympics Doping: Previously on Towleroad Olympics Doping ‘Double Standard:’ U.S. Sprinter Sha’Carri Richardson Calls Out Olympics For Allowing Russian Skater To Compete After Positive Drug Test, IOC Responds Brian Bell February 17, 2022 Read More Leslie Jones’ Live Olympic Tweets Are Hilarious, Convert Viewers, Are Driven by Passion, and May Soon Be Done. Why’s NBC Sports Not More Welcoming? Brian Bell February 7, 2022 Read More Michael Phelps’ Trans Ex-Girlfriend Taylor Lianne Chandler Believes Gold Medalist Is To Blame For Influencing UPenn Swimmers To Demand Lia Thomas Be Banned From Competing Towleroad February 5, 2022 Read More Winter Olympics 2022 Start With LGBTQ Athletes Primed For The Medal Podium; Preview This Weekend’s Action In Figure Skating, Curling and Gayest Team Ever Brian Bell February 4, 2022 Read More 2022 Winter Olympics Features More Than 30 Out LGBTQ Olympians, Including First Out Nonbinary Athlete Brian Bell January 30, 2022 Read More Queen Honors Olympian Tom Daley for His Athletics and Advocacy; Diver, Knitting Entrepreneur Now ‘Officer of the Order of the British Empire’ Brian Bell January 4, 2022 Read More Photo courtesy of Gzzz/Creative Commons View the full article

Published by Reuters By Karen Freifeld (Reuters) – New York’s attorney general on Wednesday pounced on former President Donald Trump’s defense of company’s financial statements, saying the five-page statement Trump issued a day earlier contradicted a court filing by his attorneys. “It is not unusual for parties to a legal proceeding to disagree about the facts,” the attorney general’s office wrote in a letter filed in New York state court. “But it is truly rare for a party to publicly disagree with statements submitted by his own attorneys in a signed pleading — let alone one day after the pleading was filed.” Attorney General Letitia James is conducting a probe into whether the Trumps inflated real estate values to obtain bank loans, and reduced values to lower tax bills. Trump’s attorneys repeatedly stated that he did not know enough to respond to allegations of inaccurate valuations. But the former president’s five-page statement got into detail about possible discrepancies, implying that he had more knowledge than his lawyers said. On Monday, the attorney general’s office made public a Feb. 9 letter from Trump’s longtime accountant, Mazars, which said the Trump Organization’s financial statements for 2011 through 2020 should no longer be relied on and that it would no longer do work for the former president’s New York-based real estate business. On Tuesday, Trump issued a five-page statement disparaging the attorney general and other New York officials, calling the investigation a political and racist attack, claiming Mazars had essentially been forced to resign, and defending the financial statements. “Remember when the attorney general and or District Attorney say they think my financial statements may be high, I don’t even include these branding numbers in them, which is far more than any discrepancy they may have,” Trump wrote. Instead of the “sham investigation” of his business, Trump said in another part of the five-page diatribe, law enforcement and the “fake news media” should look into former U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton as well as “murderers, drug dealers and rapists.” In a court filing on Monday in response to the attorney general’s allegations of misleading financial statements, Trump, through his attorneys, repeatedly denied he had knowledge or information to form a belief as to the claims. The attorney general is seeking testimony from Trump and two of his adult children, Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump, as part of her civil probe of the company’s business practices. Justice Arthur Engoron in New York state court in Manhattan will hear arguments on Thursday on whether subpoenas for the testimony should be enforced. A separate but overlapping criminal case involving the company’s business practices is being conducted by the Manhattan District Attorney, which the attorney general joined in May. (Reporting by Karen Freifeld; Editing by Noeleen Walder and David Gregorio) View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Cynthia Nixon thinks some of the criticism of ‘And Just Like That…’ was “bizarre”. The 55-year-old actress reprised the role of Miranda Hobbes in the ‘Sex and the City’ revival series, and she can’t understand why some fans have been so critical of her character’s evolution. Cynthia said: “I think that’s a bizarre reaction. “First of all, I think Miranda is brave, and I think Miranda is charging forward. She doesn’t know where she’s going exactly, but she knows she has to go somewhere. And I think that’s always been true of Miranda, right? “Miranda’s very smart, and she’s very tenacious, but the idea that she’s levelheaded – she’s never been levelheaded! She’s a loose cannon, a very opinionated loose cannon. She’s always been a bull in a china shop and losing her temper and blowing things up then having to backtrack when she calms down.” Cynthia thinks fans need to recognise that ‘And Just Like That…’ is a “new show for this moment”. The actress told Vogue: “If I could do anything differently, I would have made sure we said to people in letters 10 feet tall: This is not ‘Sex and the City’. If you’re looking for ‘Sex and the City’, you should watch the reruns. “This is a new show for this moment and for the moment in these original characters’ lives.” Cynthia also pointed out that ‘Sex and the City’ was previously criticised for its sex-positive portrayal of women. She said: “It’s so funny – when you’ve gotten used to something, it seems tame. “And we were anything but tame. We got a lot of hate in the first few years, you know, and even beyond that. A lot of [people saying], ‘Women don’t act like this, this is disgusting. These aren’t real women, these are men in drag.'” View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Laverne Cox is looking forward to turning 50. The 49-year-old actress is set to celebrate her landmark birthday on May 29, and Laverne is now happy to be open and honest about her real age, having spent years “lying” about it. She shared: “My birthday is May 29, and I will be turning 50 years old. And I’m still on the fence about whether I want to do a big party, but the thing is, this would be the first … because I started lying, being elusive about my age in the year 2000.” Laverne decided to lie about her real age after a 21-year-old guy ended their relationship because she was “too old”. During an appearance on ‘The Ellen DeGeneres Show’, Laverne confessed: “The first time I said my real age out loud was at a speaking engagement in Texas in 2019, and I thought the sky was gonna fall.” Meanwhile, Laverne recently admitted fame “did not feel how [she] expected it to feel”. The actress – who played Sophia Burset in ‘Orange Is the New Black’ – initially felt the need to “milk” her fame, as she came to terms with her new reality. She shared: “I was like, ‘I don’t know how long this is going to last, so I need to milk it.'” Laverne also explained that there are “many overdue conversations that need to be had with and about trans people”. The actress – who was the first transgender person to be nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award in any acting category – ultimately accepted every work opportunity that came her way. She said: “I was just like, there are no guarantees in this business, so I need to hustle.” View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Channing Tatum wants ‘Magic Mike’s Last Dance’ to be the “Super Bowl of stripping”. The 41-year-old actor is preparing for what is likely his final bow as Magic Mike, and he’s promised to hold nothing back in the third film in the franchise. He said: “I want it to be the Super Bowl of stripping. “I want dancing like we’ve never been able to do in the other two movies, because we had to be honest to what the reality of that world is, which isn’t great dancing.” The Hollywood star explained that his final dance sequence with Stephen ‘tWitch’ Boss in ‘Magic Mike XXL’ is a hint at what’s to come in the next movie. Channing – who actually worked as a stripper before finding success as an actor – told People: “There was never anything in the real world that I actually stripped in that was even nearly as good as that [last dance]. “We’re already breaking the rules of that, the reality of that world. I want to have professional dancers [from all over], Russian ballet dancers, I want to go for it and create a completely new genre of this form.” Despite this, Channing is determined to have a well-written female lead in the new film. He explained: “I want to have an equal, if not even more centralised female character for Mike to really play off of and almost to. “I don’t want to say, [to have her] take the baton, but really let the movie be about a female’s experience and not Mike’s experience, because it has been so much about Mike and the guys’ experiences. These movies are very, very female-forward. At least that is our intention.” View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Kate McKinnon is set to join the cast of the ‘Barbie’ movie. Margot Robbie has been lined up to play the titular character in the motion picture, and the ‘Ghostbusters’ actress looks set to be part of the movie. Sources have told Deadline that while McKinnon is line to join the cast, it’s not yet known who she will play. This comes just days after Simu Liu joined the star-studded cast, which will feature Ryan Gosling as Ken, but news of the ‘Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings’ actor’s role is being kept quiet. It was also recently revealed America Ferreira has signed up to a part in the film, but the ‘Superstore’ actress’ character details are also under wraps. Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach have written the script for the Warner Bros movie, with the former set to direct. Robbie will produce the motion picture via her LuckyChap production company alongside her husband, LuckyChap’s Tom Ackerley. Mattel Films’ Robbie Brenner and Paddington’s David Heyman will also produce. Gosling was offered the role during the summer, but he had to reject the opportunity due to a scheduling conflict. However, due to a delay in filming, he is now able to take on the part. Robbie previously insisted audiences will be dealt “something totally different” to what they will be expecting from a film centring around the famous doll. She said: “Something like Barbie where the IP, the name itself, people immediately have an idea of, ‘Oh Margot is playing Barbie, I know what that is’, but our goal is to be like, ‘Whatever you’re thinking, we’re going to give you something totally different – the thing you didn’t know you wanted.’ “ View the full article

Published by OK Magazine MEGA Nick Cannon opened up about his large family. The 41-year-old is currently expecting his eighth child with model Bre Tiesi.He is already a dad to 10-year-old twins, Monroe and Moroccan, with Mariah Carey. He welcomed another set of twins, Zion Mixolydian and Zillion Heir, in June 2021 with Abby De La Rosa. He also has a four-year-old son, Golden, and a one-year-old daughter, Powerful Queen, with Brittany Bell. Sadly, his seventh child, Zen, whom he shared with Alyssa Scott, passed away in November. The Nick Cannon Show host appeared on the “The Language of Love” podcast with Dr. Laura Berman on Wednesday, February 16. Berman asked him if all of the pregnancies were planned. MEGA NICK CANNON SHARES SWEET SNAP WITH DAUGHTER MONROE ON VALENTINE’S DAY AFTER WRITING HEARTFELT SONGFOR HER MOM MARIAH CAREY The comedian said he knows if he has unprotected sex with a woman, there is a chance she could get pregnant. “So I feel like if I have unprotected sex with anyone I know — because one, I value everything about me so much, if I’ve gotten to that point where I say, ‘I can take off this condom,’ I’m gonna say, ‘She could be the mother of my child,'” he explained. The Wild ‘n Out alum clarified that he does not have unprotected sex with everyone because he is a “germaphobe.” He said he had a conversation with the women he has children with about “how amazing” it would be to have a child beforehand. “I feel like every woman I have a child with are amazing mothers, and there was a thought process going into like, ‘Man, she would be an amazing mother, she’s desired children, I can’t wait to see what type of mother she would be,'” he shared. “So, in saying that, I would say that they’re all planned,” he added. MEGA Cannon also shared his thoughts on monogamy. He does not see himself as someone in a polyamorous relationship. “To define me is to confine me,” he explained. The comedian said he considers people who are married to be “not single.” “You can still make covenants without getting the government involved, where two people say, ‘We choose to be monogamous because we value this so much, we don’t want anyone to be a part of this energy we have,'” he continued, but he does not think that is a healthy dynamic. “I feel like that gets into the space of selfishness and ownership,” he shared. MARIAH CAREY ‘SUPPORTIVE’ OF EX-HUSBAND NICK CANNON PLANNING TO WELCOME 8TH CHILD WITH NEW BABY MAMA: SOURCE He said he and Carey coparent their children well, but he admitted he struggles to define relationships or love. He said all of his baby mamas are very confident and secure in themselves to be able to deal with his dynamic. He admitted it is difficult to get all his baby mamas together for family gatherings or the holidays. “They probably have their guards up,” he said. “Why can’t I have a companionship or a friendship with this person, this person, and this person and we all coexist?” However, he would love the mothers of his children to be friends. They do not have a problem with each other, but they are not friends, he explained. MEGA NICK CANNON SHARES VIDEO OF HIS BABY GIRL POWERFUL QUEEN SHOWING OFF HER READING SKILLS AFTER LOSING HIS YOUNG SON ZEN His goal is to be the “best father I can be.” However, given the nature of his relationships and the number of children, he does expect a lot of women to leave him eventually. He stressed that women know he is not going to be monogamous with them. “I am a better friend and companion than I am a boyfriend,” he explained. View the full article

Published by Reuters By Gabriella Borter (Reuters) -Florida’s House of Representatives passed a bill to ban abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy late on Wednesday, a measure several Republican-led states are pushing as the U.S. Supreme Court weighs the constitutionality of such limits. The approval on a party-line 78-39 vote moments before midnight sent consideration of the legislation to the state Senate, which is expected to pass the measure in the near future. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican, has likewise signaled his support for the bill. Enactment in the Tallahassee statehouse would significantly reduce access to late-term abortions for women across the U.S. Southeast, many of whom travel hundreds of miles to end pregnancies in Florida because of stricter abortion laws in surrounding states. Republican lawmakers around the country have introduced bills mirroring a 15-week abortion ban enacted by Mississippi in 2018 and now under review by the Supreme Court on appeal, after lower courts blocked the measure as unconstitutional. Arizona’s Senate and West Virginia’s House passed similar 15-week abortion bans on Tuesday. The Supreme Court has indicated its willingness to allow Mississippi’s law to stand, even though it conflicts with the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision establishing a woman’s right to end her pregnancy before a fetus is viable, typically around 24 weeks. Besides seeking reinstatement of its abortion law, the state of Mississippi has asked the high court to overturn Roe v. Wade altogether. Florida’s measure makes exceptions to the 15-week rule only in cases when the mother is at risk of death or “irreversible physical impairment,” or if the fetus has a fatal abnormality. No exceptions for rape or incest are included. Final action on the measure followed several hours of passionate debate between opponents and supporters of the bill. Representative Robin Bartelman, a Democrat and self-described “Catholic for choice,” said the bill inserts the will of legislators into the most private of healthcare decisions, adding: “I feel as a woman it is my right to make choices about my body.” Republican David Borrero countered that Roe v. Wade was a fundamentally flawed ruling that should be overturned because it “failed to recognize the humanity and the personhood of the unborn.” The state currently permits abortions up to 24 weeks without a mandatory waiting period, meaning a woman can terminate her pregnancy the day she arrives at a clinic. A 2017 survey by the Guttmacher Institute, an abortion rights advocacy research group, counted 65 abortion-providing sites in Florida that year, more than triple the number of any other state in the South. “So a 15-week abortion ban would have a very big impact on access to care for Floridians and those in the South,” Elizabeth Nash, a Guttmacher state policy expert, told Reuters. Anti-abortion legislators hope the 15-week bans would withstand legal challenges as Mississippi’s case is pending. The Supreme Court’s ruling in that case is expected this spring. Florida’s bill would take effect July 1 if enacted. (Reporting by Gabriella Borter in New York; Additional reporting by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Editing by Colleen Jenkins, Cynthia Osterman and Raju Gopalakrishnan) View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Kristen Stewart was hesitant to collaborate with her fiancee Dylan Meyer. The ‘Twilight’ actress – who revealed in November she is set to marry the screenwriter – is working on a new TV show with her partner, but she was undecided before they ended up writing the first episode in just over a week. She told Vanity Fair magazine’s annual Hollywood issue: “You don’t what to affect this beautiful relationship you have. “Like we discovered a superbrain. She’s a really genuinely brilliant f****** screenwriter.” Kristen revealed she is so grateful to be with someone she truly loves. She added: “I love being engaged. It’s different… I just feel so happy and lucky.” Meanwhile, the ‘Spencer’ star has been praised for her portrayal of the late Princess Diana and she explained that she wanted to explore all of her turmoil – including her battle with bulimia. She said: “I wanted to make sure that was not glossed over. I’ll do f****** anything.” Kristen revealed how she struggled to throw up during the scene as director Pablo Larrain captured her agonised face and admitted she couldn’t wrap her her head around the idea of being sick on camera. She recalled: “I couldn’t throw up on this movie, even when I really should have. I felt like absolute s*** and I could not get it up, and I know it was because my body was just like, the idea of that was so untouchable.” Kristen also revealed that she was delighted to work with the director as she praised his passion. She said: “He just loves this movie and me so much, and the purity of that is the sweetest and coolest thing. We had such a great f****** time. There’s no way around that.” Read the full interview with Kristen Stewart in Vanity Fair magazine’s annual Hollywood issue, and on VanityFair.com. View the full article

Published by Reuters By Joel Schectman and Christopher Bing WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A single activist helped turn the tide against NSO Group, one of the world’s most sophisticated spyware companies now facing a cascade of legal action and scrutiny in Washington over damaging new allegations that its software was used to hack government officials and dissidents around the world. It all started with a software glitch on her iPhone. An unusual error in NSO’s spyware allowed Saudi women’s rights activist Loujain al-Hathloul and privacy researchers to discover a trove of evidence suggesting the Israeli spyware maker had helped hack her iPhone, according to six people involved in the incident. A mysterious fake image file within her phone, mistakenly left behind by the spyware, tipped off security researchers. The discovery on al-Hathloul’s phone last year ignited a storm of legal and government action that has put NSO on the defensive. How the hack was initially uncovered is reported here for the first time. Al-Hathloul, one of Saudi Arabia’s most prominent activists, is known for helping lead a campaign to end the ban on women drivers in Saudi Arabia. She was released from jail in February 2021 on charges of harming national security. Soon after her release from jail, the activist received an email from Google warning her that state-backed hackers had tried to penetrate her Gmail account. Fearful that her iPhone had been hacked as well, al-Hathloul contacted the Canadian privacy rights group Citizen Lab and asked them to probe her device for evidence, three people close to al-Hathloul told Reuters. After six months of digging through her iPhone records, Citizen Lab researcher Bill Marczak made what he described as an unprecedented discovery: a malfunction in the surveillance software implanted on her phone had left a copy of the malicious image file, rather than deleting itself, after stealing the messages of its target. He said the finding, computer code left by the attack, provided direct evidence NSO built the espionage tool. “It was a game changer,” said Marczak “We caught something that the company thought was uncatchable.” The discovery amounted to a hacking blueprint and led Apple Inc to notify thousands of other state-backed hacking victims around the world, according to four people with direct knowledge of the incident. Citizen Lab and al-Hathloul’s find provided the basis for Apple’s November 2021 lawsuit against NSO and it also reverberated in Washington, where U.S. officials learned that NSO’s cyberweapon was used to spy on American diplomats. In recent years, the spyware industry has enjoyed explosive growth as governments around the world buy phone hacking software that allows the kind of digital surveillance once the purview of just a few elite intelligence agencies. Over the past year, a series of revelations from journalists and activists, including the international journalism collaboration Pegasus Project, has tied the spyware industry to human rights violations, fueling greater scrutiny of NSO and its peers. But security researchers say the al-Hathloul discovery was the first to provide a blueprint of a powerful new form of cyberespionage, a hacking tool that penetrates devices without any interaction from the user, providing the most concrete evidence to date of the scope of the weapon. In a statement, an NSO spokesperson said the company does not operate the hacking tools it sells – “government, law enforcement and intelligence agencies do.” The spokesperson did not answer questions on whether its software was used to target al-Hathloul or other activists. But the spokesperson said the organizations making those claims were “political opponents of cyber intelligence,” and suggested some of the allegations were “contractually and technologically impossible.” The spokesperson declined to provide specifics, citing client confidentiality agreements. Without elaborating on specifics, the company said it had an established procedure to investigate alleged misuse of its products and had cut off clients over human rights issues. DISCOVERING THE BLUEPRINT Al-Hathloul had good reason to be suspicious – it was not the first time she was being watched. A 2019 Reuters investigation revealed that she was targeted in 2017 by a team of U.S. mercenaries who surveilled dissidents on behalf of the United Arab Emirates under a secret program called Project Raven, which categorized her as a “national security threat” and hacked into her iPhone. She was arrested and jailed in Saudi Arabia for almost three years, where her family says she was tortured and interrogated utilizing information stolen from her device. Al-Hathloul was released in February 2021 and is currently banned from leaving the country. Reuters has no evidence NSO was involved in that earlier hack. Al-Hathloul’s experience of surveillance and imprisonment made her determined to gather evidence that could be used against those who wield these tools, said her sister Lina al-Hathloul. “She feels she has a responsibility to continue this fight because she knows she can change things.” The type of spyware Citizen Lab discovered on al-Hathloul’s iPhone is known as a “zero click,” meaning the user can be infected without ever clicking on a malicious link. Zero-click malware usually deletes itself upon infecting a user, leaving researchers and tech companies without a sample of the weapon to study. That can make gathering hard evidence of iPhone hacks almost impossible, security researchers say. But this time was different. The software glitch left a copy of the spyware hidden on al-Hathloul’s iPhone, allowing Marczak and his team to obtain a virtual blueprint of the attack and evidence of who had built it. “Here we had the shell casing from the crime scene,” he said. Marczak and his team found that the spyware worked in part by sending picture files to al-Hathloul through an invisible text message. The image files tricked the iPhone into giving access to its entire memory, bypassing security and allowing the installation of spyware that would steal a user’s messages. The Citizen Lab discovery provided solid evidence the cyberweapon was built by NSO, said Marczak, whose analysis was confirmed by researchers from Amnesty International and Apple, according to three people with direct knowledge of the situation. The spyware found on al-Hathloul’s device contained code that showed it was communicating with servers Citizen Lab previously identified as controlled by NSO, Marczak said. Citizen Lab named this new iPhone hacking method “ForcedEntry.” The researchers then provided the sample to Apple last September. Having a blueprint of the attack in hand allowed Apple to fix the critical vulnerability and led them to notify thousands of other iPhone users who were targeted by NSO software, warning them they had been targeted by “state-sponsored attackers.” It was the first time Apple had taken this step. While Apple determined the vast majority were targeted through NSO’s tool, security researchers also discovered spy software from a second Israeli vendor QuaDream leveraged the same iPhone vulnerability, Reuters reported earlier this month. QuaDream has not responded to repeated requests for comment. The victims ranged from dissidents critical of Thailand’s government to human rights activists in El Salvador. Citing the findings obtained from al-Hathloul’s phone, Apple sued NSO in November in federal court alleging the spyware maker had violated U.S. laws by building products designed “to target, attack, and harm Apple users, Apple products, and Apple.” Apple credited Citizen Lab with providing “technical information” used as evidence for the lawsuit, but did not reveal that it was originally obtained from al-Hathloul’s iPhone. NSO said its tools have assisted law enforcement and have saved “thousands of lives.” The company said some of the allegations attributed to NSO software were not credible, but declined to elaborate on specific claims citing confidentiality agreements with its clients. Among those Apple warned were at least nine U.S. State Department employees in Uganda who were targeted with NSO software, according to people familiar with the matter, igniting a fresh wave of criticism against the company in Washington. In November, the U.S. Commerce Department placed NSO on a trade blacklist, restricting American companies from selling the Israeli firm software products, threatening its supply chain. The Commerce Department said the action was based on evidence that NSO’s spyware was used to target “journalists, businesspeople, activists, academics, and embassy workers.” In December, Democratic Senator Ron Wyden and 17 other lawmakers called for the Treasury Department to sanction NSO Group and three other foreign surveillance companies they say helped authoritarian governments commit human rights abuses. “When the public saw you had U.S. government figures getting hacked, that quite clearly moved the needle,” Wyden told Reuters in an interview, referring to the targeting of U.S. officials in Uganda. Lina al-Hathloul, Loujain’s sister, said the financial blows to NSO might be the only thing that can deter the spyware industry. “It hit them where it hurts,” she said. (Reporting by Joel Schectman and Christopher Bing; editing by Kieran Murray and Edward Tobin) View the full article

Published by Sports Illustrated By Alex Prewitt Competing in his third and final Olympics, this time for his birth country of Great Britain, the 30-year-old freestyle skier is going for gold, but even if he goes home without a medal, he’s already triumphed by helping change the culture for LGBTQ athletes. View the original article to see embedded media. BEIJING — Two years ago, when Gus Kenworthy decided to capitalize on his dual citizenship and join Team Great Britain, the freestyle skier figured that the switch would offer a much easier path to the 2022 Beijing Games than if he had stuck with the United States. He looked f… Read More View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English George Takei insists “issues still remain” for LGBTQ actors in Hollywood. The 84-year-old star – who came out in 2005 and married producer Brad Altman in 2008 – insisted that despite some “amazing progress” in terms of representation and acceptance, there’s still a lot of work to be done. He told the Daily Telegraph newspaper: “There’s no denying we have made amazing progress in terms of telling the LGBTQ story and having LGBTQ performers now acting and maintaining a career. “But… there’s always that ‘but’, in Hollywood and in America. Issues still remain.” For decades, the ‘Star Trek’ legend was in the closet because he wanted to protect his career after seeing how late Hollywood icon Tab Hunter – who came out the same year as him – was “vilified” long before he publicly confirmed his sexuality. He added: “It was a scandal sheet [Hollywood magazine Confidential] that exposed him as being gay. “And suddenly he disappeared. Warner Brothers dropped his contract, vilified him, called him box-office poison. I was stunned. “The lesson that I got from that was you can’t be an actor and be gay at the same time. And I passionately wanted to be an actor.” Takei also opened up on the “torture” of hiding his sexuality as he had an “instinct” to be open, as the Japanese-American actor had seen his parents refuse to give a loyalty oath at the Rohwer Relocation Centre – where they were taken shortly after the Pearl Harbor bombing in 1942 – which saw them moved to the Tule Lake camp. He explained: “It was torture being closeted, because my instinct was to speak out. My parents had stood their ground on the loyalty questionnaire. They were principled. “And so I felt an immense sense of guilt in not standing up. Especially when I was standing up on other grounds – certainly on the internment of Japanese Americans.” View the full article

Published by Al-Araby A transgender woman has been killed by her brother in the Iraqi Kurdistan region amid the indifference and impunity of the Kurdish authorities. The murder of the 23-year-old transgender woman in Iraqi Kurdistan has nonetheless provoked outcry among activists and civil society organisations. Doski Azad, 23, was reportedly killed by her brother, Chakdar Azad, on 28 January. Her body was found three days later in the village of Mangesh, around 12 miles north of the city centre of Duhok, after another brother of the victim called the police. “In a society rooted in heteronormativity, LGBTQ+ people… Read More View the full article

Published by NJ.com DEAR ABBY: Our 14-year-old granddaughter came out as a boy four months ago. The situation has been terrifying because he had thought about suicide. He was hospitalized and now sees a therapist and psychologist and is taking anxiety meds. This has been a trying time for us as well. I love my grandchild but I’m having a very hard time with this. So is my husband. I don’t know how to tell my sisters and their husbands about this. One set is pretty understanding;…[SecondQuestion] Read More View the full article

Published by Miami Herald To understand the state of education in 2022 Florida, take 19th century poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s famous love question — and add a twist: How do I mess with thee, Florida public schools, this legislative session? Let us count the ways. The Legislature is attacking core critical-thinking values, censoring students and educators, forsaking real American history for whitewashed versions — and refusing children the right to a public education in a healthy environment. Consider the misuse of taxpayer funds to punish urban districts seen as politically rebellious during the return to in-pers… Read More View the full article

Published by Orlando Sentinel ORLANDO, Fla. — Orange County, Florida, Public Schools removed one book from school libraries this fall because of a parent’s complaint about sexually explicit content and three others face reviews, including a memoir by a gay Black author already ousted from school libraries in Florida and several other states. Books in seven other Florida school districts faced challenges in recent months and a bill advancing in the Legislature would allow more public scrutiny of what books are kept in school libraries. In Indian River County, a chapter of Moms for Liberty — a conservative group challenging… Read More View the full article

Blurred Version of 5-second clip embedded. May be disturbing to some. Eaten by A Shark: (Videos could be disturbing to some.) See FULL VERSION of with only partial blurring here. And a hot take on the guy fishing. Published by Radar Online Mega A swimmer has been killed by a 13-foot great white shark on an Australian beach as a group of horrified beach-goers and fishermen could do nothing but watch the fatal attack unfold. According to Daily Mail, the vicious attack took place Wednesday in Buchan Point, a small coastal town just north of Sydney’s Little Bay Beach. The unbelievable scene was also partly caught on camera, as well as watched by witnesses who claim they first heard the victim screaming for his life. Mega This is the first fatal shark attack to take place in Sydney since 1963, making Wednesday’s tragedy the first to happen in nearly 60 years. After the witnesses reported the attack to the proper authorities, both rescue helicopters and jet skis were deployed in search of the swimmer while all other swimmers were promptly ordered out of the water. “Footage clearly shows a body, half a body being taken by a shark,” a New South Wales police officer tells a fellow officer over the police scanner. “They have found some remains.” In the footage taken during and shortly after the attack, witnesses can be heard reacting to the devastating incident they just watched happen. Mega “Someone just got eaten by a shark. Oh man! Oh no! That’s insane,” a fisherman could be heard shouting. “That’s a great white shark.” “F–k man, I heard a scream and the shark was just chomping on his body and the body was in half just off the rocks here,” another witness recalled shortly after the fatal attack. “It came back and swallowed parts of his body and that was it. It disappeared.” In a statement following the attack, New South Wales Police revealed that an investigation into the shark attack is still ongoing. “An investigation into the swimmer’s death is ongoing, and Little Bay Beach is closed as officers continue to search the area,” they said. “Unfortunately, this person had suffered catastrophic injuries and there wasn’t a lot paramedics could do when we arrived,” Lucky Phrachanh, the NSW Ambulance Inspector, also revealed in a statement following the attack. Mega “DPI extends sincere condolences to the family and friends and first responders at this tragic time,” a spokesperson for Australia’s Department of Primary Industries recently told the outlet. View the full article