Month: August 2023

There are few things Donald Trump loves more than sowing chaos, but another of his passions is more mundane (and moneyed): The man loves to golf. Over the weekend the former president was so stoked to win a tournament at one of his clubs that he bragged about it — while swearing that he didn’t cheat. But not all is sunny when it comes to Trump’s favorite sport.

As caught by Raw Story, Trump took to his rinky dink Twitter clone to announce that he can’t attend another tournament overseas because he has to stay in America and fend off his many legal woes.

“I have the Staysure Senior PGA Championship in Aberdeen, Scotland, on my great course, and I can’t go. I have to stay around and fight off the Crazed Radical Left Lunatics, Communists, Marxists, and Fascists,” Trump wrote. Those weren’t the only mean names Trump hurled at his enemies. “I wouldn’t want to be in Europe and watch this COUNTRY DESTROYING Scum work their disgusting and illegal ‘magic’ on unsuspecting Republican ‘leaders’ who just don’t think it is appropriate to Fight Fire With Fire. BUT WE WILL WIN. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”

The post comes mere days after Trump became the first American president to score a mugshot, after being arraigned a fourth time — another POTUS first. He’s also out on bail, having been charged with various counts of election interference in Georgia, to say nothing of his three other indictments. Perhaps he can take some solace in all the millions he’s nabbed in the last few days from his sometimes cash-strapped supporters.

(Via Raw Story)

Based on the lyrics of her new single, “Money Come,” financial gain is a clear motivating factor for rapper Iggy Azalea. Unfortunately, fans of Iggy weren’t able to get their money’s worth after she was reportedly forced to end her recent show early. On Friday, August 25, during Iggy’s scheduled concert at the Gamers8 event in Saudi Arabia, she suffered an embarrassing wardrobe malfunction.

Although Iggy has discussed her love for her body, her skin-tight onstage attire just couldn’t handle all the curves. In the clip captured by concertgoers, Iggy, dressed in what appears to be a latex catsuit, moves along to the choreography. But the garment quickly began to slip from her left leg, nearly exposing her intimate area.

As she places her hand to cover her private area, just in case the split rose any further, she looks to the side of the stage for guidance. Typically, a wardrobe malfunction can be brushed off, but because of the country’s strict dress code and other modesty laws, she ended the show.

In a now-deleted series of posts on social media, Iggy issued an apology to fans. On Instagram, she wrote, “Saudi Arabia… Wasssssss…. probably the worst possible place to have my pants split & unfortunately, I wasn’t permitted to end the show. . BUT silver lining, the promoters were amazingly kind to me & the PEOPLE who came were the absolute most supportive.”

In a screenshot captured by Page Six, Iggy also took to Twitter to write, “I love you guys. This was not what I intended for the show, but it’s a memory I’ll have forever & ultimately showed me how kind, loving & supportive people can be while you’re having such an embarrassing moment .”

In the song, YG makes it clear that he was not in favor of Trump’s presidential ambitions, rapping, “I’m ’bout to turn Black Panther / Don’t let Donald Trump win, that n**** cancer / He too rich, he ain’t got the answers / He can’t make decisions for this country, he gon’ crash us / No, we can’t be a slave for him / He got me appreciating Obama way more / Hey Donald, and everyone that follows / You gave us your reason to be President, but we hate yours / F*ck Donald Trump.”

During some of YG’s live performances, he’s continued to voice his disdain for Trump. At one point, he even invited Stormy Daniels to join him on stage.

YG’s official FDT t-shirt is on sale now. Find more information here.

Arleen Sorkin, actress and performer, has died, according to The Hollywood Reporter. She was 67. Sorkin was one of those talents with a broad and diverse body of work. She began in cabaret, did comedies and soap opera, co-hosted comedy shows, and did voice work. Perhaps her most famous work? Being not only the original voice of the Batman villain Harley Quinn but also the person who inspired her creation.

Unlike most Caped Crusader characters, Harley Quinn didn’t originate on the page. She made her debut in a 1992 episode of Batman: The Animated Series. The chaotic Joker gal pal was supposed to be a one-off, but she was such a hit that she returned eight more times, and then went on to become a DC staple.

The character was co-created by Paul Dini, a college pal of Sorkin’s who, during a sick day, caught her on an episode of Days of Our Lives, in which she appeared from 1984 through 2010. In the episode, she played a harlequin in a dream sequence. And that’s how you get one of the DC’s most popular and enduring characters.

News of Sorkin’s passing was mourned by many, including Mark Hamill, who voiced Joker during her Harley Quinn tenure.

“Devastated to learn we’ve lost the brilliant Arleen Sorkin,” Hamill tweeted. “Not just a wonderful talent, but a truly wonderful person. I’m grateful not only to have worked with her, but to have been her friend. Sending my heartfelt condolences to her family & loved ones.”

James Gunn, who directed Margot Robbie’s iteration of Quinn in the second Suicide Squad, also paid tribute, writing, “Rest in Peace, Arleen Sorkin, the incredibly talented original voice of Harley Quinn, who helped to create the character so many of us love. Love to her family and friends.”

Many others honored Sorkin for her gonzo work as Harley Quinn.

Some noted that Kevin Conroy, who voiced Batman on The Animated Series, himself passed away three years back.

Some shared some of Sorkin’s other work.

And others paid tribute as well.

(Via THR)

In 1933, Adolf Hitler handed the power of Jewish cultural life in Nazi Germany to his chief propagandist, Joseph Goebbels. Goebbels established a team of of regulators that would oversee the works of Jewish artists in film, theater, music, fine arts, literature, broadcasting, and the press.

Goebbels’ new regulations essentially eliminated Jewish people from participating in mainstream German cultural activities by requiring them to have a license to do so.

This attempt by the Nazis to purge Germany of any culture that wasn’t Aryan in origin led to the questioning of artists from outside the country.

Nazi book burning via Wikimedia Commons

In 1938, English author J. R. R. Tolkien and his British publisher, Stanley Unwin, opened talks with Rütten & Loening, a Berlin-based publishing house, about a German translation of his recently-published hit novel, “The Hobbit.”

Privately, according to “1937 The Hobbit or There and Back Again,” Tolkien told Unwin he hated Nazi “race-doctrine” as “wholly pernicious and unscientific.” He added he had many Jewish friends and was considering abandoning the idea of a German translation altogether.

The Berlin-based publishing house sent Tolkien a letter asking for proof of his Aryan descent. Tolkien was incensed by the request and gave his publisher two responses, one in which he sidestepped the question, another in which he clapped back ’30s-style with pure class.

His publisher sent the classy clap-back.

In the letter sent to Rütten & Loening, Tolkien notes that Aryans are of Indo-Iranian “extraction,” correcting the incorrect Nazi aumption that Aryans come from northern Europe. He cuts to the chase by saying that he is not Jewish but holds them in high regard. “I regret that I appear to have no ancestors of that gifted people,” Tolkien wrote.

Tolkien also takes a shot at the race policies of Nazi Germany by saying he’s beginning to regret his German surname. “The time is not far distant when a German name will no longer be a source of pride,” he writes.

Here’s the letter sent to Rütten & Loening:

25 July 1938 20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
Dear Sirs,

Thank you for your letter. I regret that I am not clear as to what you intend by arisch. I am not of Aryan extraction: that is Indo-Iranian; as far as I am aware none of my ancestors spoke Hindustani, Persian, Gypsy, or any related dialects. But if I am to understand that you are enquiring whether I am of Jewish origin, I can only reply that I regret that I appear to have no ancestors of that gifted people.

My great-great-grandfather came to England in the eighteenth century from Germany: the main part of my descent is therefore purely English, and I am an English subject — which should be sufficient. I have been accustomed, nonetheless, to regard my German name with pride, and continued to do so throughout the period of the late regrettable war, in which I served in the English army. I cannot, however, forbear to comment that if impertinent and irrelevant inquiries of this sort are to become the rule in matters of literature, then the time is not far distant when a German name will no longer be a source of pride.

Your enquiry is doubtless made in order to comply with the laws of your own country, but that this should be held to apply to the subjects of another state would be improper, even if it had (as it has not) any bearing whatsoever on the merits of my work or its sustainability for publication, of which you appear to have satisfied yourselves without reference to my Abstammung.
I trust you will find this reply satisfactory, and
remain yours faithfully,

J. R. R. Tolkien

This article originally appeared on 2.15.22

“Generation X” got its name in the early ’90s from an article turned book by Canadian writer Douglas Coupland. And ever since, they’ve been fighting or embracing labels like “slacker” and “cynic.” That is, until Millennials came of age and all that “you kids today” energy from older generations started to get heaped on them. Slowly, Gen X found they were no longer being called slackers… they weren’t even being mentioned at all. And that suits them just fine.

Here are 17 memes that will resonate with just about anyone born between 1965 and 1980.

Gen X basically invented “Whatever.”

SOURCE: TWITTER

Until recently, Generation X has been sitting back and watching as Millennials and Boomers eat each other with an amused, non-confrontational attitude. But recently, Millennials and Gen Z became aware of their presence, and dubbed them “The Karen generation.”

They seem to be embracing the Karen thing.

While I”m pretty sure the “Karen” thing is not complimentary — as BuzzFeed puts it, it’s meant to communicate someone who is “the middle-aged white mom who is always asking for the manager and wondering why kids are so obsessed with their identities,” lots of people landed on a different Karen to represent the generation: the martini-guzzling, wise-cracking Karen Walker.

Get it right!

Well [expletive] me gently with a chainsaw, she’s right. The 1980s cult classic starring Winona Ryder and Shannen Doherty really is the Mean Girls of the ’80s and a much better term than Karen

The disdain is mutual…

Most of my Gen X friends have Gen Z kids and they are intergenerationally very chill with each other. However, Gen X is the generation most likely to have Boomer parents and younger millennial kids, and this meme seems to be resonating a bunch with Xers of a certain age.

A lot of Xers are enjoying the “OK boomer” squabble.

The media tends to ignore Generation X as a whole — as a few tweets coming up demonstrate — and this pleases Gen X just fine. After all, they’re used to it. They were latchkey kids whose parents both worked long hours, so they’re used to being somewhat neglected.

A whole mood.

Gen X: “Look, don’t pull us into this. You’ll make me spill my beer.”

Gen X: Get used to it.

Perhaps Gen X’s blasé attitude to the generation wars has something to do with being called “Slackers” for a full decade.

Pass the popcorn.

Aside from this whole “Karen generation” blip, Gen X continues to be largely overlooked, and that fact — as well as their silent delight in it — is possibly one of the most Generation X things to happen to the class of 1965 to 1980.

Pay no attention to the man behind the venetian blinds.

Back in the ’90s, Gen X bore the same kind of criticism Boomers tend to heap on Millennials and Gen Z now. It’s not necessarily that they want to watch a cage match. It’s just they’re so relieved it’s someone else being called slackers and downers for a change.

See?

Although this chart doesn’t list the generation names, the approximate age ranges are all there… except for a big gap between the ages of 34 and 54 where apparently no humans were born? Poor Gen X (and some elder Millennials) apparently don’t have political beliefs worth examining.

Don’t you forget about me…

If Millennials are the “burnout generation,” I guess Gen X is truly the invisible generation. I’m starting to feel inspired to write a science fiction novel where everyone born from 1966 to 1980 inhabits a totally different dimension.

There are perks to being invisible…

Being overlooked can be an advantage when you just want to sit in the corner and be immature. Gen X spent all of the 90s being told they were immature slackers, and in their 40s, a lot of them are really leaning into that description, because what does it matter?

“No one cares what we think anyway…”

via GIPHY

This GIF of Janeane Garofolo mocking her classmates at the high school reunion is basically a whole Gen X mood and definitely captures how a lot of this generation caught in the middle feels about the “OK boomer” wars.

Party on.

Before Brené Brown was telling us all how to dare greatly, Gen X got their inspirational advice from a different kind of TED and his pal Bill, who taught us all how important it is to learn from history and be excellent to each other.

Too late and yet too early.

Romance — or getting lucky — was never easy for Generation X. They were the generation most impacted by the AIDS epidemic when it comes to anxiety about casual sex. Whereas Boomers had the free love of the late ’60s, Gen X was about safe sex, which usually meant less sex. And even when having safe casual sex, singles in the ’90s had to meet people the old-fashioned way or, if they did meet online, they felt shame over it. Now online dating is the norm.

When Gen X replaces the Boomers.

This is probably an optimistic view — because the truth is there are “Boomers” in every generation, and many of them tend to find their way into powerful positions. Let’s call this a best case scenario, though.

The Nihilism Generation

There is no generation more over it than Gen X. They are ready for the apocalypse, but don’t expect them to, like, help or anything!

This article originally appeared on 3.18.20

USA Basketball got its 2023 FIBA World Cup started with an eventual runaway victory over New Zealand, largely due to a big game by the bench unit, headlined by Paolo Banchero.

Banchero scored 21 points in the win off of the bench, helping Team USA erase an early double-digit deficit and run away to a 99-72 win. Austin Reaves (12 points) and Tyrese Haliburton (10 points) continued to provide big lifts off the bench as well, with Anthony Edwards (14 points) as the best of the starting unit. While there aren’t many real threats to the U.S. squad in the first round of group play, the starting unit is under some scrutiny as it’s not been firing on all cylinders even going back to some of the tune-up games.

Among the players struggling in the starting lineup is Brandon Ingram, who had 2 points against New Zealand and just doesn’t look comfortable playing a tertiary role alongside Edwards and Jalen Brunson, who have the ball in their hands far more often. The result is an offense that can get stagnant and doesn’t have the balance you’d like between on-ball scorers and guys more comfortable off the ball moving and knocking down spot up shots, and one has to wonder if Kerr will explore a lineup change going forward.

For Ingram’s part, he admitted it’s been “a little frustrating” early on, noting he’s just not playing a role he’s used to and is struggling to find a rhythm. The Pelicans star forward did say that he’s trying to figure out how he can be more effective and is trying not to let his frustrations individually impact a team that’s undefeated this summer, per The Athletic’s Joe Vardon.

“This is totally different than what I am used to,” Ingram told The Athletic Sunday, prior to the Americans’ practice at a Manila business district hotel. “The team is winning right now, so I can’t be selfish thinking about myself. But it’s a little frustrating right now for me, and I’m just trying to figure out ways I can be effective.”

Steve Kerr told Vardon he expects Ingram to figure it out and isn’t concerned about him, noting there’s always an adjustment to the FIBA game, but it could be that Monday’s game against Greece sees a lineup change to try and get Ingram in a more prominent role with the bench unit. Banchero would give the Americans some more size alongside Jaren Jackson Jr., and is a different kind of scoring threat from that position, capable of a more physical, downhill attack. Ingram could then be freed up a bit more on a bench unit playing opposite Edwards, as he and Haliburton would be the on-ball leaders, with floor spacers around them like Reaves and Cam Johnson.

Whether Kerr makes an early starting unit change or not, Team USA will need Ingram to find his rhythm at some point if they’re going to hit their ceiling as a team. He’s too good and plays too large a role not to be an impactful player, whether that’s as a member of the starting lineup or coming off the bench. As for his mindset, Ingram’s trying to be open-minded in a new environment, which figures to bode well for the prospects of him figuring it out sooner than later.

“I know who I am,” Ingram said. “In ways, I can get stuck and think my way is the best way. This is a learning experience. … I get to see everybody work, get to see everybody’s strengths and everybody’s weaknesses, so I can take it back to my team, be smart about it.”

Team USA plays Greece at 8:40 a.m. ET on Monday, and we’ll see if Kerr stays patient or tries to make a bigger adjustment to get the pieces all in the right place.

Unlike most people, Joe Biden hasn’t said much about Donald Trump’s towering legal woes. He’ll troll the Republican party with his “Dark Brandon” antics, but he’s played it cool when it comes to his presumptive rival for the 2024 presidency. (That is, if Trump can even run.) Even when reporters asked Biden what he thinks of Trump becoming the first American president to score a mugshot, he only offered four words.

As per HuffPost, Biden took a break from vacationing in Lake Tahoe, California, to field questions from reporters. One asked if Biden had seen the mugshot. Biden let out a chuckle, replying, “I did see it on television.” Asked to elaborate, Biden did, sort of, saying, “Handsome guy. Wonderful guy.”

Trump’s historic mugshot came during his fourth arraignment in only the last six months. This one was in Fulton County, Georgia, where he and 18 other defendants were charged in relation to alleged election interference in 2020. It wasn’t only Trump’s mug that was photographed; he also reported his height and weight, claiming the latter to be 215. A lot of people were not buying that one, though at least his mugshot scored some, uh, pretty decent reviews from Fox News.

(Via HuffPost)

The extension of Adele’s Las Vegas residency has given fans even more time to cut loose with the Grammy Award-winning singer. On each of the singer’s albums, she explores gut-wrenching topics, but in her Weekends With Adele performances, she allows people to see a softer and even, at times, comic side of her.

However, on Saturday, August 26, Adele was forced to step outside of her bubble to defend a fan from an overly aggressive security guard. In a clip posted by a fan, Adele stopped mid-performance, ready to set fire to the rain. “What is going on with that young fan there that has been bothered so much since I came [on stage] for [just] standing up,” she shouted.

As the crowd turned their attention to what was going on, Adele focused in on the security guard, asking, “Why are you bothering him? Could you leave him alone, please?”

Apparently, the staff member must have obliged the request, because as Adele returned to the center of the stage, she was heard apologizing to the ticketholder. “They won’t be bothering you anymore, darling,” she declared.

In the past, Adele discussed show etiquette with fans when it came to tossing items on stage. Now, she’s letting staffers know her standards regarding how to handle excited fans.

Adele’s Weekends With Adele residency at The Colosseum at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas will run through November 4. Shows will be held on Fridays and Saturdays. For more information, click here.

France was a co-favorite to win Group H with Canada entering the 2023 FIBA World Cup, but after getting absolutely blasted by the Canadians in the opener, the French side found itself in a precarious position entering Sunday’s game against Latvia.

Latvia, despite not having star Kristaps Porzingis, had won their opener against Lebanon and, as such, could eliminate France with an upset win. Early on, Evan Fournier seemed determined to right the wrongs of the opener, after which he said that France simply got their “asses kicked,” as the Knicks guard dropped 15 of his 27 points in the first quarter to push France into the lead.

However, the Latvian side would not go away, as Davis Bertans knocked down four threes off the bench, but it was Rolands Smits and Arturs Zagars that led the way, combining for 42 points on 16-of-21 shooting to keep Latvia back into the game.

Still, France held a comfortable lead with seven minutes to play when starting point guard Nando de Colo was ejected for his second technical foul with France up 75-66. From there, Zagars, Bertans, and Smits would lead a furious comeback that pushed Latvia in front 87-86 with 34 seconds to play, as they grabbed their first lead of the second half in the final minute. France would then miss two from close range, allowing Latvia to push their lead out to two as Zagars split two free throws with 10 seconds to go, and then a Sylvain Francisco three went begging at the buzzer to give Latvia the stunning upset and advance to the second group stage.

With the win, Latvia moved to 2-0 and secured their spot in the second group stage alongside Canada (which blew out Lebanon on Sunday as well). France, meanwhile, is eliminated and will now have to look at a number of things as they get ready for a home Olympics where they expect to compete for gold but clearly have some work to do (and need to get all their stars on the floor) to have a chance at bouncing back from a massive disappointment.