Category: News

A Republican having a problem with the truth is nothing new, really. (See: Donald Trump, Donald Trump, and Donald Trump.) But even by GOP standards, congressman elect George Santos’ alleged fabrications about his past and qualifications to represent New York’s 3rd District could be considered a real whopper.

On Monday, The New York Times ran a story titled “Who Is Rep.-Elect George Santos? His Resume May Be Largely Fiction.” Which basically tells you everything you need to know about the 34-year old, who broke some new ground by becoming the first openly gay non-incumbent elected to Congress, as well as the first Brazilian-American to hold a seat in the House. But it turns out that much of the information Santos has released about himself and his background may not be true.

Specifically, as CNN reports, Santos has claimed that he received degrees from both Baruch College and New York University, though neither school has any record of him attending—let alone graduating. Santos’ bio on the National Republican Congressional Committee website states that “He has worked for companies such as Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, Linkbridge Investors, and Met Global,” though both Citigroup and Goldman Sachs told CNN they had no record of his employment.

Santos also claimed that he founded an animal rescue organization, Friends of Pets United, and gave a very specific number of animals he helped to save — yet no such organization seems to exist either with the IRS or in a database of registered charities in either New York or Florida, where Santos has also done business. But the weirdest part of the story is that that’s not even the weirdest part: While Santos himself has been dodging questions about what seems to be a largely fictionalized backstory, his lawyer attempted to defend him by offering up a quote from Winston Churchill… that was ALSO fake.

As Politico reports, “An attorney for Republican Rep.-elect George Santos (R) responded to allegations in The New York Times that the politician made up core portions of his resume with a quote from Winston Churchill that PolitiFact says the British politician never uttered.”

That’s right, an elected official who is being accused of lying about his educational and professional background responded to the story via a prepared statement from his lawyer, which he shared on Twitter, and that, too, came with a side of horsesh*t.

The statement, which was attributed to alleged attorney Joseph Murray, ended with these words: “As Winston Churchill famously said, ‘You have enemies? Good. It means that you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life.” But PolitiFact claims that the legendary British Prime Minister never said those words — famously or otherwise.

Perhaps more tellingly, according to Politico: “The statement did not refute any of the allegations that Santos made up or exaggerated key portions of his resume.”

As Winston Churchill famously said, “You’re f***ed, Santos.”

(Via Politico)

R&B crooner Trey Songz’s legal issues are far from over. After avoiding charges stemming from a physical altercation with law enforcement at a Kansas City Chiefs game in January 2021, allegations of hitting a woman with his car, and a series of sexual assault allegations (one he was cleared of in April while another was dismissed due to the statute of limitation expiring), the “Bottoms Up” singer has been entangled in the court system for a few years now.

Spilling over from last month, the singer’s alleged assault on two people (a woman and a man) in a New York City bowling alley has landed Songz in jail. According to TMZ, despite proclaiming his innocence, the musician has voluntarily turned himself into authorities.

This isn’t the first time Songz has been accused of physically assaulting someone. Back in May of 2021, the “Slow Motion” singer made headlines for allegedly punching a bartender.

However, Songz’s attorney, Mitch Schuster, ensures these charges will not stick, telling TMZ, “We have been proactively communicating with New York law enforcement, the District Attorney, and all those involved. While we will respectfully and proactively work through all the appropriate channels, we are confident that Trey will be fully cleared of any wrongdoing,” later adding, “This is another instance where those involved try to blame the celebrity with hopes of getting fame or riches.”

The alleged woman victim did seek medical attention. However, the man victim did not seek medical treatment for allegedly being punched in the eye.

Edie Falco is one of those actresses who can basically do whatever she wants simply because she has starred in your favorite show, The Sopranos, your mom’s favorite show, Nurse Jackie, and your dad’s favorite show, Oz. So she gets to sprinkle in a James Cameron movie every once in a while!

But because she stays busy, Falco might not be the best at keeping track of all of her high-profile projects. And who can blame her? She is currently preparing to star as Pete Davidson’s mom in Bupkis, so she clearly has other things on her brain besides a silly little movie.

Falco was chatting with the ladies of The View this week when she admitted that she had been so busy, she kind of thought the movie already came and went (she probably doesn’t use Twitter) and he had never heard about it. “The second Avatar, the one that’s coming out, I think I shot four years ago,” Flaco explained. “And then I’ve been busy, and doing stuff, and somebody mentioned Avatar, and I thought, ‘Oh, I guess it came out and didn’t do very well,’ because I didn’t hear anything.” To be fair, it took a very long time for this movie to come out.

Falco added that somebody mentioned the film to her recently, to which she responded, “Oh, it hasn’t come out yet?” Hopefully that somebody she was speaking to wasn’t James Cameron.

Despite the memory lapse (hey, it’s been a stressful few years) Falco is ecstatic to be in the movie, mostly because she wanted to be blue. She didn’t get to be blue. “Well, I wanted to be blue. I was excited — I was going to be blue and very tall…I didn’t get either of those things,” Falco admitted. She portrays General Frances Ardmore, a major antagonist in the sequel. “But I did get that exoskeleton, and that was pretty darn cool. All of this is so out of the realm of anything I’ve ever done!”

Now that the movie finally came out, Falco will be delighted to know that it did not flop. But she still hasn’t seen it! Though she’ll be happy to know that James Cameron thinks it’s just like The Sopranos.

(Via indieWire)

It has been a long time since a game like Elden Ring came out that captured people’s hearts and minds in a way where even now 10 months after its release it is still resonating with people. It is really difficult to understate just how much this game meant to people, and how it clearly stood above all games in 2023 when it comes to impact.

Elden Ring for many is not the best game that came out this year, including this lone writer’s opinion, but it’s impossible to dispute that for months on end it was the only game that anyone could talk about. From memes to speedruns, to debating its approachability there was no game that sparked more conversation than From Software’s successor to the Souls franchise. How did it do it though? How did a game developed by a team notorious for making extremely challenging and niche games break into the mainstream and become easily the most impactful game of 2022?

Without a doubt, the biggest appeal has to be the world that Elden Ring created, the desire everyone had to explore it, and the freedom we had in that exploration. A lot of times when a game comes out there is a silence across the usual discussion forums like Discord or Twitter because there is a respect everyone has for each other to let those experiences be raw and unspoiled. Elden Ring meanwhile was a game where people flooded message boards so they could share what they saw, tell their own personal adventures, and share information with each other. It created this sudden community discussing how if you go to this one location and open up this chest you’ll find an awesome sword, or if you go an entirely different direction you’ll find a miniboss to take on. Along the path to those locations though, everyone has a different experience based on how they approached battles, the enemies they may have faced, or the invasions they suffered at the hands of bloodthirsty players. Soon, sharing your adventure with friends was just as fun as overcoming challenges.

The challenges we had to overcome in Elden Ring though were of course a part of the game. The creator of these games, Hidetaka Miyazaki, once apologized for always making games so difficult, but for him, these challenges weren’t there to crush the player and make them feel lesser, but so they can eventually feel the exuberance of finally overcoming a boss or clearing an area. When Elden Ring first came out, there was a slight concern among fans of the series that its popularity would draw people in only for them to bounce off crushed by its difficulty. Instead, the opposite happened, and new fans were born as they pushed forward until they eventually achieved the thrill of overcoming a great challenge. While not an exact science, one of the first major challenges of the game is Margit, the Fell Omen a boss that you must defeat to move the plot of the game along. According to PSNprofiles.com, 84.30% of players passed Margit and another 79% would go on to defeat Godrick. Elden Ring was not only popular, but everyone playing it was pushing through. They embraced the challenge and found enjoyment in that.

We already mentioned the exploration aspects from earlier, where players are able to go off and explore to their hearts’ content until their numbers are big enough to overcome even some of the game’s most challenging enemies, but this is just one example of the many ways Elden Ring guided the player more than the previous Souls games possibly didn’t. For starters, summons are available to the player very early and they can completely break certain boss fights. So much so that for a while it became a fun meme to post a video clip of you beating a boss without even trying cause the summon did all the work for you.

If spirits aren’t your jam then you can always just call in a friend! Elden Ring can be almost entirely a co-op experience by summoning your friends into boss fights and taking them down together. It’s another layer of fun on the game and does take away a little bit of the challenge. Of course, if you don’t want to do this then you do not have to, but the option is there for those of us who might not be as good at the game but want to see what the next explorative area has to offer.

With all of this behind it, you can see how Elden Ring has spent the entirety of 2022 at the forefront of people’s minds. However, there is one thing that helped it be the most impactful game of the year and it has nothing to do with communities, gameplay mechanics, or difficulty in games. It’s that it is a fun game. At the end of the day if you make a fun video game people are going to play it and nothing will ever change that. Elden Ring is fun and if you haven’t yet you should see if you can give it a try. Just be ready to die. A lot.

Rootin’ tootin’ Lauren Boebert barely won her reelection bid, but she must be feeling secure enough these days in the GOP because she tossed a barb in the direction of (former?) congressional ally Marjorie Taylor Greene. You may have already caught wind of the pre-Christmas scuffle, in which the pair — who seemed to be pretty tight at one time, even coming together to heckle President Biden during a SOTU address — appeared to be at odds over House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy.

More specifically, Greene seemed really steamed about Boebert’s behavior, in which she “childishly threw me under the bus for a cheap sound bite.” What was the sound bite? While standing alongside Matt Gaetz, Boebert revealed her displeasure at Greene stumping for McCarthy as House Speaker. When prompted by Charlie Kirk on the subject, Boebert took a swing where it hurts most: Marjorie Taylor Greene’s 2018 conspiracy theory about Jewish space lasers. Greene tends to grow angry and upset when the subject arises, and Boebert went there in this video clip regarding McCarthy: “I don’t believe in this just like I don’t believe in Jewish space lasers.”

Boebert prefaced her remarks with this: “I’ve been aligned with Marjorie and accused of believing a lot of the things that she believes in.” The space laser thing, though, is a blow to Greene, who responded with a dig at how Boebert nearly lost her seat during the midterm elections.

Yet perhaps Boebert wants to put some real distance between herself and far-right politicians including Greene. Whatever the case, Boebert’s going in hard with public appearances. Here she is discussing how “I’ve grown, I’ve been refined, and I’m ready to lead with strength and grace.”

Nothing gets past Pusha T. With over two decades in the rap game, the rapper can catch a sub from a mile away. Such is the case with rapper Drake, who is thought to have fired some cryptic shots at Pusha T over the past four years after Push dissed him on the scathing track, “The Story Of Adidon.”

Thankfully, Push isn’t too bothered by Drake’s alleged disses, as he revealed in a recent interview with XXL. Rather, he believes Drizzy is still hurt by their much-publicized musical row.

“Every time I hear a subliminal in one of his songs, it just lets me know how deep it hurt him,” he said. “Because it’s been four years now. And we still talking about it. He is. I don’t. I’m cool. But every time it’s a subliminal, I’m like, yes. It burns. It still burns. It lets me know. I love it.”

Drake has never mentioned Push by name, however, Push revealed that he’s not sure what he would do if this were the case, nor does he ever expect it to happen. Either way, he doesn’t intend to invest any more energy into the feud.

“We should see,” said Push. “I don’t know what he’ll do. At this point, that’s contradictory. Would he jump out the window? And he wanna say I took it too far? Then he gon’ tell people. Tell the label. Tell J. Prince. My God. It’s a lot. With all of that being said, it’s like I’m not interested anymore. I’m just really not.”

A weird thing happens to many women in their 40s, something I had heard rumblings of before I arrived at them but didn’t fully understand until I was in them. Somehow, somewhat suddenly, you just get better.

I mean, there are definitely some complaints about aching bones and perimenopause to be lodged at this age, but there’s an internal shift that happens where you sort of come into your own self. You know who you are and you feel comfortable in your skin.

Kate Winslet described it perfectly in a recent interview with BBC Radio 4’s ‘Woman’s Hour.’

“I’m 47, there are bits that don’t do what you want them to do anymore. There’s something kind of fab about going: ‘Oh well, that’s just the way it is, isn’t it?’”

Yes. It is totally fab. My body has changed in ways that feel far too “old” for the age I feel inside, and there are some days when I look at my suddenly crepey arm skin and go “Whoa!” But generally, there’s a kind of acquiescence to change that goes along with this age. Even if we take good care of ourselves and even if we use all the creams and serums in the world, our bodies are still going to change in ways we can’t control. Fighting change is fruitless.

Winslet continued:

“But I think women come into their 40s, certainly mid-40s, thinking: ‘Oh well, this is the beginning of the decline and things start to change and fade and slide in directions that I don’t want them to go in anymore.’ And I’ve just decided no.

“We become more woman, more powerful, more sexy. We grow into ourselves more, we have the opportunity to speak and speak our mind and not be afraid of what people think of us, not care what we look like quite so much. I think it’s amazing. Let’s go girls, let’s just be in our power. Why not? Life’s too flipping short.”

So much yes to all of that. I remember being younger and sort of fearing my 40s, feeling like it all must be downhill from there. But it’s not. Not even close.

I’m exactly the same age as Winslet, and I’ve felt that power she describes.

One thing that happens is you start to simply and calmly not care what people think. It’s not the purposeful, semi-rebellious version of not-caring-what-people-think that some are able to achieve when they’re younger; it’s a genuinely effortless confidence that just sort of arrives one day unannounced. There’s a freedom in the effortlessness of it that is impossible to know until you experience it, but it’s utterly delicious.

“Life’s too flipping short” sort of sums it up. It’s a saying we pay lip service to when we’re younger, or which we use to justify all manner of YOLO risk-taking, but at this age it’s more about not wasting our precious time or energy or life force on things that really don’t matter.

This is not to say that women in our 40s have figured out the keys to everything or never experience self-doubt. Definitely not. But this decade is definitively powerful. It feels nothing like it looked like it would feel from the outside. I’ve never felt more comfortable in my own skin. I’ve never felt less pulled by trends. I’ve never felt better in my body (and yes, never sexier). I’ve had friends who are a little older than I am tell me about this phenomenon, and now that I’ve experienced it myself, I want to share it with women who might be fearing their 40s.

Never fear—the 40s are fabulous. Kate Winslet is right. We do become more ourselves, and it is amazing. And from what I’ve heard from women in their 50s, it keeps getting better, at least for a good while longer.

“Let’s just be in our power,” she says. Yes, let’s. It’s the absolute best place to be.

The 4th of July may be more than half a year away, but it bears repeating that the holiday is a very stressful time for dogs, cats and animals with hypersensitive hearing. According to Psychology Today, a dog’s sense of hearing is four times as powerful as a human’s. So, what we can hear 20 feet away, they can hear from 80.

Dogs can also hear far more than we do because they’re attuned to a higher frequency of sounds. That’s why the loud bangs, pops and booms of the 4th of July are so terrifying to a dog. According to NPR, pet shelters experience a huge influx of dogs around the fourth because many get scared and run away from their homes.

We’re sharing a story from WXYZ Detroit because it’s a reminder of how sensitive dogs are to fireworks, but it also has a happy ending.

Last summer, Andrea and Pablo Campos dropped their dog Tawny off at a daycare in Ingham County, Michigan, en route to a vacation in Traverse City about three hours away. While they were on vacation they got a call that Tawny had escaped the facility by scaling an 8-foot-high fence. The people at the facility believe she may have been spooked by the fireworks.

The family quickly canceled their vacation and returned home to find their missing dog. “We went door to door to people’s houses and just looking for weeks and weeks and weeks and she was nowhere to be found,” Pablo told WXYZ.

Unbeknown to the Campos family, Tawny traveled 60 miles away from their home and was living in the woods, behind a post office in Livonia. The postal workers would feed Tawny from time to time but as it got colder, they decided she needed to be somewhere warm.

Postal workers Steven Persyn, Dave Brisco, Adam Kaminski and Jason Sobieski worked with the South Lyon Murphy Lost Animal Recovery to rescue the dog. “I can say there’s not a postal person I’ve met that doesn’t love animals,” a representative for the animal rescue wrote on Facebook. “Thank the lord for our post office!”

At the animal rescue, they found that Tawny had a microchip and they were able to locate her family. The animal shelter says that Tawny was recovered six years to the date that she was adopted by the Campos family.

The Campos family said that it’s a “Christmas miracle” that Tawny was able to make her way home. “We considered her a princess that needed lots of pampering. And somehow she’s managed to live on her own and make it,” Pablo said.

“I know there’s so many cliches talking about Christmas miracles, but we really, actually got one,” Andrea added.

Tawny’s story is a touching Christmas story and also a poignant reminder about the dangers of dogs and fireworks. But there’s another lesson that the South Lyon Murphy Lost Animal Recovery would like everyone to remember as well. “THIS HAPPENED BECAUSE SHE WAS MICROCHIPPED!” they emphatically wrote on Facebook. “Get a microchip, and then follow through and register it!”

As the trial against Tory Lanez for allegedly shooting Megan Thee Stallion in the foot continues, the Canadian rapper scored a victory in court on Monday (December 19), avoiding additional charges for witness tampering. According to Rolling Stone, Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Kathy Ta attempted to enter the new charges citing Tory’s alleged offer of $1 million to witness Kelsey Harris, but the charges were rejected by Judge David Herriford on the grounds that the prosecution took too long to request them. “I think it’s unfair at this juncture,” he said, “so I would deny that motion.”

Meanwhile, Harris was characterized last week as a reluctant witness, prompting the judge to allow prosecutors to play her full witness statement tape in court after she claimed she didn’t remember any of the statements and changed some of her answers — particularly, ones regarding Tory’s alleged bribery attempt and threats against her. However, during her testimony, she did give two solid answers — that Megan was indeed shot and that she did not fire the weapon herself.

Lanez remains on the hook for charges of assault with a firearm causing great bodily injury; concealing a loaded, unregistered firearm in a vehicle; and discharging a firearm with gross negligence. The latter was added as the trial began. All three are felonies and could result in his deportation from the United States; a conviction could also see him land in prison for almost 23 years. Meanwhile, another witness, which Rolling Stone posits is Megan’s former bodyguard Justin Edison, went “missing” ahead of his expected testimony yesterday. The prosecution says that he heard Lanez confess to the shooting the day after at his home; prosecutors were given an additional day to locate him.

Megan Thee Stallion is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Selena Gomez has turned her beauty line, Rare Beauty, into a globally-loved makeup company.

“What I’m most proud of is the conversation that we’ve created in the beauty space,” Gomez told People magazine during her company’s product launch event. “I feel like we were challenging the norms and I really wanted to create a brand that was for everyone.”

While Gomez has made an extremely popular makeup brand that is disability-friendly and affordable under $30, she revealed that she first thought it wouldn’t be successful. “I thought that wasn’t going to sell,” she admits.

Gomez also spoke more in-depth about her Rare Beauty intentions during a recent interview with Glamour. “My hope with Rare Beauty is that we have open conversations around beauty and mental health and can change the industry by breaking down unrealistic standards of beauty together,” she said. “This is really what we had in mind when creating the Kind Words Lip products – something that lasts all day and doesn’t move around. The lipstick is so comfortable, and the liner lasts all day without feeling sticky.”

For fans looking to shop the pop star’s favorite products, Gomez gives recommendations of the Soft Pinch Liquid Blush, Stay Vulnerable Glossy Lip Balm, Positive Strokes Universal Volumizing Mascara, and the Liquid Touch Brightening Concealer.