Month: August 2023

One should never plot to overturn an election, but if one does, it would behoove one not to do it in front of a documentary crew. And yet that’s exactly what Roger Stone did. Last summer news broke that the longtime GOP fixer had had the foresight to let filmmakers to film him up to, including, and after the 2020 election. (Amazingly, Donald Trump did the same thing.) Now that footage is finally being made public, and, well, check this out.

On Wednesday, as per The Daily Beast, MSNBC aired a clip from A Storm Foretold, Danish filmmaker Christoffer Guldbrandsen’s film comprised of footage he shot of Stone mid-chicanery. It finds the Nixon back tattoo-haver on November 5 — two days after the election and days before Trump officially lost — dictating to a lackey about his plan to keep Trump in power.

“Although state officials in all 50 states must ultimately certify the results of the voting in their state… the final decision as to who the state legislatures authorize be sent to the Electoral College is a decision made solely by the legislature,” Stone tells the associate. “Any legislative body may decide on the basis of overwhelming evidence of fraud, to send electors to the Electoral College who accurately reflect the president’s legitimate victory in their state, which was illegally denied him through fraud.”

He then adds, ““We must be prepared to lobby our Republican legislatures…by personal contact and by demonstrating the overwhelming will of the people in their state — in each state — that this may need to happen.”

Well, then! After the clip aired, Guldbrandsen told MSNBC host Air Melber that Stone is ““upset” that the footage has been made public. He added, though, “I respect that he has been able to restrain himself from going after me.”

Guldbrandsen also aired a clip in which Stone, learning on Trump’s last day in office that he would not be getting a pardon from the exiting leader, grew quite upset — so upset that he called Trump’s eldest daughter, Ivanka, an “abortionist b*tch.” Similar footage was released early last year. Another clip from A Storm Foretold catches him bragging about how he likes to manipulate Trump.

(Via The Daily Beast)

Coachella’s reputation precedes itself. Even so, the annual festival always finds new ways to one-up the previous year. This April, Coachella 2023 featured unprecedented headliners like Bad Bunny and Blackpink. While we wait for the 2024 lineup, information has been released about location and ticketing.

We can count on Coachella returning to the Empire Polo Club in Indio, California, but the number of people flooding the grounds across two weekends is anyone’s guess. According to The San Diego Union-Tribune, Coachella 2023 was “the first edition of the six-day, two-weekend festival at Indio’s Empire Polo Club since 2010 to not sell out in advance.”

The same report relayed the following:

“Coachella, which grossed $117 million in 2017, averages 125,000 daily attendees. About 20 percent of them each year are from San Diego County.

Coachella’s opening 2019 weekend sold out in 40 minutes, while the second 2019 weekend sold out slightly over five hours later. It is not uncommon for most tickets to be purchased the previous year, before even a single performer has been announced.

Intriguingly, the 2019 sell-out actually represented a slowdown compared to the event’s 2017 and 2018 editions. They each sold out in just three hours.”

Brittanica also noted, “In 2010 organizers angered some attendees by eliminating single-day tickets in favor of full three-day festival passes. Attendance was not hurt, however, and Coachella set a record by attracting about 75,000 people each day. By the early 2020s, average daily attendance was about 125,000.”

This year was the first that Coachella performances across six stages were livestreamed. But whoever chooses to attend the 2024 edition will be in for a treat, according to what Uproxx‘s Philip Cosores observed at this year’s edition.

“While YouTube can give you the feel of a performance and show you what’s happening, that shared emotion of being in the same space stays on the polo fields,” wrote Cosores. “Year after year, while people knock Coachella for changing — I prefer evolving and growing — it only takes one trip out there to realize that it’s still expertly curated, featuring some of the most exciting rising and established acts in music, and full of moments of pure joy.”

One woman was so floored by her husband‘s kind and poignant words regarding the unfair beauty standards women continue to endure that she decided to record them. And people can’t get enough of the clip.

“Tell me what you just said, it was so brilliant,” says Chrissy Powers in her TikTok video. “I just looked at a picture of … Jennifer Lopez. And I said, ‘How does she look that good at 50 something?’ And you said …”

“I said she spends millions of dollars on herself to look like that … That’s the problem with patriarchal culture,” he responds before diving into an incredibly insightful, totally uplifting speech.

---

“The patriarchal culture tells women that if they don’t look like a celebrity, their value is, like, nothing,” he continues, referencing a joke made by comedian Bill Burr about how men go to the movies and see a shirtless, buff Brad Pitt but don’t internalize any shame around it.

“We know we can’t, so we just accept it. We are just us,” he quips.

The conversation then hones in on how there’s a double standard specifically when it comes to aging.

Powers says, “If we see women getting old, then we say, ‘She let herself go.’” and her husband immediately links that mentality to a falsehood promoted by capitalism.

“The idea that a woman is only valuable when they’re between the ages of 18 and 25. That’s ridiculous,” he says. “Listen, women have to stop believing the lies that the patriarchal culture machine tells them, that their value is only because they look young. It’s ridiculous.”

via GIPHY

“Aging is not the problem,” he attests. In fact, when his wife asks if he thinks she is hotter now than when they first met, this is his thoughtful response:

“Oh, 100%. Oh, God, you’re so much more beautiful. I mean, you were hot then. But you have…there is a wholeness to your beauty now because it comes with wisdom,” he tells her. “It comes with inner knowing. It comes with doing the work that is required to get to this point. Because if you’re not growing, you’re stuck. So you’re doing the beautiful work of the change, the lasting change of moving forward, which is wisdom.”

And now for his mic-drop moment:

“Women who can love themselves for how beautiful they are…that’s what so attractive to any man.”

Um, yeah. This guy is a keeper.

@chrissyjpowers Sunday Sermon: How the patriarchy makes women question their beauty and then makes money of their insecurities. #realbeauty #aginggracefully #embracingaging #consciousrelationships ♬ original sound – Chrissy Powers

And perhaps the best part? During the entire conversation, their young daughter sat absorbing what Powers captioned as “true beauty” being defined by a “conscious man.” Talk about leading by example.

So far, over 280,000 people have viewed Powers’ post, and women have flooded the comments section sharing how much her husband’s words meant to them.

“When you said ‘there is a wholeness to your beauty now…’ tears came. Women aren’t told this enough if at all. So, we learn to tell ourselves. Thank you”

Another joked, “Is this man an actual unicorn?”

At this point in human history, it seems somewhat arbitrary that children almost always receive their fathers’ last names. A lawyer in London, England, made the case that babies should be named after their mother, and it caused a bit of a stir on X (formerly known as Twitter.)

On August 9, Dr. Charlotte Proudman tweeted: “A message to pregnant women — please give the baby your surname. You carried a baby for 9 months, gave birth, and will be responsible for that child for the rest of your life. When you’re registering the baby, ask yourself: why is the father’s surname more important than yours?”

---

The tweet received 5.3 million views and over 34,000 likes.

— (@)

Many responded by explaining why babies tend to take the names of their fathers. However, should those reasons apply today? Many also said that giving a child the father’s name makes them more likely to want to care for the child, but that’s setting the bar pretty low for men.

The point is to make the father feel responsible for the child.

— David Pinsen (@dpinsen) August 10, 2023

From patronymics to trade professions learnt from your father to dynasties named after a common ancestors title, yes its long been the default in the West to refer to ones parents via their male line

— Placeholder (@_Plac3_hold3r) August 10, 2023

I’d assume it started because going wayy back last names would originally be based around your family profession, and the father would be the one working and therefore pass on his name and profession, it would be nonsensical for the mother to pass on the name of her father.

— Dom 🌻 (@Vladispook) August 10, 2023

Even though there were good reasons for passing down the father’s name in the past, why should they matter in 2023 when the world is drastically different?

Traditional solutions are to problems long forgotten.

— Elliot Hammer (@ElliotHammerSR) August 15, 2023

While some fought for tradition and others cheered for an outright reversal of naming customs to catch up with the times, others thought people should do what they feel is best for their families instead of conforming to someone else’s ideas.

Or everyone can just do whatever they want and we don’t have to make it a thing

— Triggery Fingers (@triggeryfingers) August 10, 2023

I think it’s my choice what surname I give, rather than feeling some obligation for my maiden surname.

— Emma Nash 🕷🇪🇺 (@DrEmmaNash) August 9, 2023

Everyone is free to have whatever opinion they choose on baby surnames. But Dr. Proudman’s tweet does bring up one significant issue. Just because we’ve always done something one way doesn’t always make it right. No tradition is sacred enough to be beyond reevaluation.

Nobody likes jury duty…well, there may be some people that enjoy it, but for most people, it’s an inconvenience that you hope you’re somehow cut from. If you work, you have to take time off to make a very small daily stipend in comparison to your regular hourly wage. If you’re a stay-at-home parent, you have to find childcare so you can sit in a cold courtroom on uncomfortable seats, waiting to hear if you need to show up again tomorrow.

But what happens when childcare can’t be secured? Your civic call to duty still has to be answered. Torrey Scow, a Utah mom of four found herself in this very predicament after her call to jury duty was not excused. Instead of risking a fine of $1,000, Scow decided to bring her 1-year-old triplets and 4-year-old with her on a field trip to the local courthouse.

---

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Torrey Scow (@torreyscow)

Scow’s husband couldn’t get out of work according to the now-viral video the mom posted to Instagram. She assured him that it wouldn’t be a big deal because she’d have the babies with her and the judge would likely send her right back out the door. Except, he didn’t. The mom, with more babies than hands, was stuck entertaining three babies and a preschooler for two-and-a-half hours before the judge finally dismissed her.

“I just knew it was going to be a crap show. So that’s why I was like, ‘I’m going to film some of this,'” Scow told CNN.

She fed them all the snacks they could handle before everybody pooped. The courtroom then smelled, and the babies were truly everyone’s problem at that point, but she still wasn’t excused. It’d be surprising if it didn’t sound like she won the lottery when the judge finally dismissed her from the courtroom.

Watch the full interview below:

Mental health affects everyone, even people that are in professions who’s sole job is to help others. Yup, that means, nurses, doctors, teachers and even therapists can have mental health challenges that they have to manage every day. One group of teachers are working to normalize mental health struggles by offering advice for students.

The teachers from different parts of America teamed up with PBS NewsHour to help teens understand that they’re safe people to talk to about their mental health.

“I want to tell all students struggling with mental health that we are here for you and that all teachers were teenagers once. We all did grow up and we have experience of what it’s like to be in middle school, to be in high school and that we can see the struggles that you’re going through,” Holly Goldberg, a teacher in Fort Lauderdale, Florida shares. “Growing up is not easy and we want you to know that we’re here to listen to you and here to help you.”

---

It can be easy for teens to forget that adults weren’t born as adults and that while the technology has changed, a lot of the teenage experience is still the same. Having the reminder that trusted people may understand what they’re going through can be helpful. Another teacher in the PBS video admits that he’s open with his students about his own mental health struggles and find that helps build trust to foster communication.

“Depending on what you’re comfortable with, open up a bit with them, be a little vulnerable. My students, we always talk about it. I struggle with panic disorder and so I’m struggling with some of the same things they struggle with. So letting them know, hey you’re not alone,” Robert Casas, a teacher in San Diego, California reveals.

Teens are experiencing mental health challenges at higher rates than previous years. Teachers being open with them about their own experiences or just being available for these conversations can help teens have a safe outlet.

Watch the entire heartwarming video below:

There are many traditional staples of fatherhood—love, support, protection, security, providing an example—but there is, of course, that other not-so-warm-and-fuzzy feeling that dads can provoke in their kids at any given moment … sheer, utter embarrassment.

Usually in a father’s humiliation tool belt is the infamous dad joke. These corny puns have been around since 2003, and let’s face it, they’ll never leave. Of course, no dad needs one to make your eyes roll. They can do that most of the time simply by being themselves.

For his well-known #Hashtags segment, Jimmy Fallon asked his “Tonight Show” audience to share “funny, weird, or embarrassing” stories about their dads. Fallon, a father himself, is no stranger to the cringeworthy power of a dad joke. In a 2020 interview with TODAY, Fallon admitted, “I’m starting to get the eye rolls now where Daddy’s not the funniest person in the world.”

---

Don’t worry Fallon! Clearly you’re not alone, because people replied with some truly hilarious comments. Dads might be silly, but we’ll gladly put up with it for the love they give us.

Enjoy 20 of the very best #DadStories. As usual, Fallon went first:

1.

“Instead of buying a smoker my dad just grills in the garage with the door closed.” – @jimmyfallon

2.

“At my aunt’s wedding reception, my dad ran out from the bathroom when he heard You Should Be Dancing by the Bee Gees play, and proceeded to do John Travolta’s routine from Saturday Night Fever.” – @MJ_Rose88

3.

“My Dad will call me sometimes when he wants me to bring him food. He refers to me as ‘GrubDash.'” – @FalPalAMF828

4.

“My dad likes to play a very morbid game called ‘guess who died’, which consists of him gossiping about someone I probably haven’t seen in 20+ years and can’t remember at all, who died recently. Bonus points for guessing the cause of death.” – @jon_jonz

5.

“My dad used to drink his morning coffee with his dentures in his hand while reading the newspaper. When we asked him why, he said his teeth also wanted to read the newspaper.” – @FallonHolic_

6.

“When my dad took my sister to her first Jr. HS dance, she asked to be dropped off a block before the school. My dad proceeded to take her all the way up to the main entrance, got out of the car and loudly announced her arrival!” – @77BroncosFan

7.

“Asked my dad if he knew who Taylor Swift was…he said, I don’t care who he is!” – @JessyKrupa

8.

“My dad whistles really loud. He sticks his head out the window and whistles back to birds. But when the lady next door heard him, she called 911. The cops told her, ‘Lady, he didn’t whistle at you. He only flirts with birds.'” – @tostianascripts

9.

“When my dad would leave a message on my answering machine, he would end the message saying, ‘This is dad signing off.'” – @RealRobFindor

10.

“We were on vacation and the gift shops selling fudge called plain fudge ‘chocolate no nuts.’ A guy walked up to my dad with some samples and offered him some saying ‘chocolate no nuts?’ And my dad said ‘what did you just call me?'” – @lauraceciliaOT

11.

“My Dad laid a new floor in my brother’s house. It was all finished so we couldn’t understand why he was taking up the boards again. Turns out he had seen a spider run underneath and was worried it would be trapped.” – @Sohnzie

12.

“Whenever my dad would try to talk us into trying something new to eat he’d state, ‘It’s so good it’ll put hair on your chest.’ He had 3 daughters.” – @Bookelew

13.

“My mom once bought a 6 ft Santa statue at a yard sale without telling dad. When he got home and parked, we heard banging, crashing and swearing. We went to look and the Santa was laying face down on the curb. Dad thought someone was trying to jump him.” – @dknessfalls

14.

“My dad couldn’t decide if he wanted to be called ‘grandpa’ or ‘papa’ so he just told all of us to call him ‘Coach.’ He’s not a coach.” – @iPopEditor

15.

“My father went to the McDonalds drive thru and asked for a whopper. When they said ‘they didn’t have whoppers’, He just drove off without placing an order.” – @Marisa_Rosie22

16.

“One day we went out to eat at Pizza Hut and sat in front of an empty table with some pizza left on it. My dad, being the penny pincher he is, grabbed some and started eating it. A few minutes later the couple comes back from the bathroom asking ‘where’s our pizza?'” – @Alex_Erickson3

17.

“My dad let a bee land on his hand and watched it closely as it stung him because he ‘wanted to see the process up close.'” – @TrippyPsycholo1

18.

“My dad once tried to tell a lady she had a Big Bug on her, but accidentally told her she had a Really Big Butt. She was not amused.” – @Sallyjo25

19.

“My dad thinks it’s funny to introduce my mom as his ‘first wife’….my parents have been married for 58 years and are in their late 80’s.” – @annMcD87

20.

“My dad entered Canada by swimming across the Niagara from the US under the cover of night.” – @albertduic

This story originally appeared on 06.17.22

Donald Trump may have wanted a fourth indictment to lock down the GOP nomination, but now that he has one, he may have wisher’s remorse. After all, if Fulton County, Georgia DA Fani Willis gets her wish, the trial into whether he and 18 other defendants committed election interference could start at the most inopportune time possible for the big guy’s third campaign.

As per The Daily Beast, Willis — who has already had to endure the reckless nonsense of the case’s primary target — is reportedly seeking a relatively early date for her trial. The district attorney is said to be eyeing March 4 of next year. Perhaps that date doesn’t sound so special. But to Trump it sure is: March 5 is the day before Super Tuesday, aka the day when the greatest number of states all hold their primary elections.

Will Trump find himself dealing with the start of a momentous trial when he should be doing some Hail Mary boostering for his campaign? Probably not. Ty Cobb, a former White House lawyer who happens to share a name with a feisty historical baseballer, told CNN this week that there’s “no chance” a trial with this many moving parts gets underway for a good long while.

“Everybody will have motions galore,” Cobb explained. “This case will take a long time for people to prepare. There will be motions for severance, motions to dismiss, and if it takes her two years, I mean heaven forbid that Trump wins the presidency, then there will be a fight to the Supreme Court over whether she can proceed against the sitting president during his term.”

In fact, whether a sitting president can be prosecuted is “an issue that’s never been resolved.”

Another possibility is that Trump will make like Mark Meadows and try to get the trial moved to federal court. By doing so, The Daily Beast explains, he “could buy more time, get a more favorable jury pool, and even land a judge whom he appointed.” What’s more federal convictions, unlike local ones, can be pardoned by U.S. presidents.

That doesn’t mean Trump can’t still face the music before the 2024 election. Indeed, the big guy has a jam-packed legal schedule, with four criminal trials possibly crammed into five busy months.

In the meantime, he has to prepare for his fourth arraignment in only a handful of months.

(Via The Daily Beast)

In April, Uproxx identified Bakar among “The Small-Font 2023 Coachella Artists You Can’t Miss.” The British artist released “Right Here, For Now” alongside a captivating live video on Wednesday, August 16, and it’s yet another example of his growing magnetism.

The video finds Bakar with his band in an abandoned warehouse. He’s casually sprawled on the ground until it’s go time. From the first kick snare and taste of Bakar’s unique tone, it’s impossible to sit still. Bakar seamlessly melds the past (“We tried everything, ain’t got much more”), present (“I’m your muse at heart / Peddle me like I’m your drug”), and future (“I can’t wait ’til you’re right here”), all while dissecting a relationship.

Bakar is fresh off performing at Lollapalooza 2023 in Chicago on August 6. “Right Here, For Now” comes nearly two months after “Alive!” Per a press release, both singles are on the tracklist for his upcoming sophomore album, Halo.

Watch “Right Here, For Now (Live Session)” above, and check out Bakar’s upcoming headlining The Halo Tour dates across European and UK below.

11/09 — Milan, Italy @ Magnolia
11/12 — Berlin, Germany @ Kesselhaus
11/14 — Amsterdam, Netherlands @ Melkweg
11/15 — Cologne, Germany @ CBE
11/16 — Antwerp, Belgium @ Trix
11/18 — Copenhagen, Denmark @ DR Koncerthuset
11/21 — Glasgow, UK @ O2 Academy
11/22 —Dublin, Ireland @ Academy
11/23 — Belfast, Ireland @ Limelight
11/25 — Paris, France @ Le Bataclan
11/28 — London, UK @ Eventim Apollo
11/29 — Manchester, UK @ Albert Hall
11/30 — Manchester, UK @ Albert Hall

Halo is out 9/22 via Black Butter. Find more information here.

The summer movie season has seen its share of flops and underperformers, but not all has been gloomy. Indeed, at the rate of money it’s Hoovering up, the season will belong to a movie that triggered he hell out of far right pundit Ben Shapiro. Barbie’s run isn’t even a month old and it’s still made a fortune, so much so that it’s already breaking a record once held by Batman.

As per Variety, as of Wednesday, Greta Gerwig’s follow-up to her prized adaptation of Little Women had made $537.5 million domestically. That makes it the biggest money-maker in the history of Warner Bros. (not adjusted for inflation). What film did it usurp? No less than The Dark Knight, Christopher Nolan’s beloved second Caped Crusader picture, which once held the honor with $536 million, made back in 2008.

And yes, that means Gerwig has surpassed her fellow “Barbenheimer” filmmaker Chris Nolan.

For the record, if one does adjust for inflation, it’s a very different story. The Dark Knight‘s $536 million from 2008 translates to a staggering $761 million today. So Barbie still has a ways to go if you compute it like that.

Mind you, Barbie isn’t yet the highest grossing film of summer 2023. That title still goes to The Super Mario Bros. Movie, whose domestic earnings stand at $574.2 million and global at $1.3 billion. Barbie’s international take is currently $1.19 billion, but given that it’s still gobbling up cash, it’s likely that it will soar past that total imminently.

(Via Variety)