Category: News

The year began well for the Cuomo brothers. Andrew was very pleased with himself, even writing a book about how he handled the pandemic as governor of New York. Chris had his own weeknight show on CNN. But it appears 2021 will end badly for both. First Andrew resigned in the wake of multiple accusations of sexual misconduct. Now Chris has been fired from his network gig.

As per The Hollywood Reporter, Chris Cuomo is out of a job “effective immediately” following an internal investigation into how he comported himself in relation to his brother’s harassment scandal. Last week, a New York Times piece revealed that Chris was a lot more involved in Andrew’s defense than he had let on. He even used his position in an attempt to dig up dirt on his brother’s accusers. After the report surfaced, CNN let him do what amounted to his final show. The next day they took him off the air indefinitely.

“Chris Cuomo was suspended earlier this week pending further evaluation of new information that came to light about his involvement with his brother’s defense,” CNN said in a statement. “We retained a respected law firm to conduct the review, and have terminated him, effective immediately.”

They added that during the investigation, “additional information has come to light.” They didn’t specify what they meant, adding, cryptically, “Despite the termination, we will investigate as appropriate.”

Chris’ downfall at CNN came after the New York State Attorney General’s office released transcripts and other documents that wound up shedding more light on his involvement with his brother’s defense team, which included phoning into meetings. After his suspension, Chris said, on his podcast, that he was embarrassed by his actions and that “can understand” why they did what they did.

(Via THR)

Houston rapper Monaleo is among the freshman rappers to keep an eye on for 2022. The 20-year-old independent musician has caught the eye of many thanks to the success of her debut single “Beating Down Yo Block,” which boasts a sample of Yungstar’s “Knocking Pictures Off Da Wall” plus her sharp confidence as she relays her anger about a past lover who did her wrong. Monaleo concludes her strong year with the new single “We Not Humping.”

The track features Monaelo’s trademark energy and hard-hitting bars, which she uses to shut down a man’s request to get intimate. She gets straight to the point with lines like “Put a bag on your head ’cause it’s in my budget / All I gotta do is push a button” and “He don’t like my ways but I’m not changing / I don’t text him back ’cause that sh*t draining.”

The new song comes after Monaleo teamed up with fellow Houston native Maxo Kream for “Cece” off his latest album, Weight Of The World. Prior to that, she dropped a strong follow-up to “Beating Down Yo Block” with “Suck It Up,” which took aim at the women who have an issue with her confidence, success, and ability to attract the attention of men.

You can listen to “We Not Humping” above.

For months, the highly transmissible virus that has thrown the world into disarray over the last two years has overwhelmingly targeted conservatives. And there’s a good reason for that: The GOP has been downplaying its danger, attacked masks and vaccines, and all but ensured that a large portion of its base won’t ever take precautions that good save their own lives. (Then again, there’s this nonsensical attempt to blame it all on the libs.) As winter looms and a new variant tears across the planet, cases and deaths are bound to go up. And yet people like Marjorie Taylor Greene are still out there, spreading patently moronic misinformation.

The Georgia lawmaker (who hasn’t made many laws since she’s been booted from most of her committee duties) took to Twitter on a cold, lazy December Saturday, unleashing what she thought was a damning “gotcha” on the scientific community and the politicians who listen to their expertise.

“Every single year more than 600,000 people in the US die from cancer. The country has never once shut down,” Green wrote. “Not a single school has closed. And every year, over 600,000 people, of all ages and all races will continue to die from cancer.”

She went on, praising the horse drug, claiming that COVID deaths mostly target the obese and elderly (and not those who are unvaxxed), and that people should be free to “choose natural immunity or vaccines, w/o discrimination.”

There’s just one thing. Actually, there’s a few things, but one is more obviously false than the others: Cancer, unlike COVID, isn’t contagious. Whoopsidaisies! And when people caught wind of Greene’s tweet, they not-so-gently reminded her of that pesky factoid.

Then again, there is one way cancer is contagious: Non-smokers can contract lung cancer through secondhand smoke. But then, we do have rules about public smoking.

Other people didn’t feel like pointing out Greene’s illogic. They just called her dumb.

In the meantime, please remember to listen to scientists when it comes to matters of immunology, and not people who were in their late 40s when they learned about the Holocaust.

Ben Roethlisberger‘s time in the NFL might be coming to an end. According to a report by Adam Schefter of ESPN, Roethlisberger, the two-time Super Bowl winning signal caller who has spent the entirety of his NFL tenure in the Steel City, has told people around him that his expectation is this will be his final season with the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Roethlisberger is going to turn 40 years old in March and will no longer be under contract at the conclusion of this year. While the door could remain open for him to play elsewhere, Schefter explains that there are a few reasons why that is probably not going to happen.

Roethlisberger has told many that he never would want to play anywhere other than Pittsburgh, where his time is coming to an end. It doesn’t mean he couldn’t surface next season in another NFL city, but that is “highly unlikely,” according to one source.

The Steelers currently find themselves 5-5-1 on the year and sit in last place in the AFC North, but are firmly in the mix for a Wild Card spot. On the year, Roethlisberger is 248-for-384 (64.6 percent) with 2,522 yards, 14 touchdowns and six interceptions. He’s played in all but one game this season, which he missed after getting placed on the NFL’s reserve/COVID-19 list.

Kyle’s last album, See You When I Am Famous!!!!!!!!!!!!, arriv ed in the summer of 2020, with features from Rich The Kid, K Camp, Bryson Tiller, Trippie Redd, Tyga, and more. The rapper originally considered delayed it due to the pandemic but he changed his mind. A year and a half later, Kyle is ready to deliver another work, this time with a twist: He announced his fifth project, It’s Not So Bad, on social media and explained how it will be a little bit different.

“IT’S NOT SO BAD – MY FIFTH PROJECT – JAN 28th,” he tweeted. “Instead of splitting the royalties with the label, I’ll be selling this project as an NFT to give an opportunity for my fans to own this project with me. We’re in this together. Forever & Ever. [two hearts emoji].”

This year Kyle released a bunch of singles that will presumably appear on the project, including “Love Me Like You Say You Love Me,” “Optimistic” with Dougie F, and “Sunday.”

As for It’s Not So Bad, it remains to be seen what guest features Kyle will include on the project. Thankfully, we’ll learn about that within the next few weeks, as it’s less than two months until It’s Not So Bad becomes available.

In 2002, Halle Berry made history: With her turn in the drama Monster’s Ball, she became the first Black woman to win a Best Actress Oscar. Three years later she received a more dubious trophy: Worst Actress at the Razzie Awards for 2004’s Catwoman. Berry even collected it in person, much as Tom Green did for the five such awards he earned for Freddy Got Fingered. In a recent interview for her directorial debut, Bruised, the actress opened up about why she showed up — and what she did to the trophy afterwards.

Berry spoke with Vanity Fair (as caught by The Hollywood Reporter) about her career, and about that night, when she took the stage, holding her Oscar in one hand and her new, crappier one in the other.

“I went to the Razzie [Awards] because I feel like we all take ourselves so seriously,” she said. “If we get an award, if we get the Oscar, we somehow are made to feel like we’re somehow better than everybody else, but we’re really not. You were just chosen that year by your peers, and you were acknowledged for doing what they considered stellar work.”

She even took the anti-accolade in stride. “If you find yourself face to face with a Razzie, does that mean you’re the worst actor there ever was? Probably not,” she said. “You just got the piss taken out on you that year by a group of people that can.”

Besides, it’s a good display of modesty. “If I can show up to collect an Oscar when you’re honoring me, I can certainly show up to collect a Razzie when you say, good try, but do better,” Berry explained. “I always learned that if you can’t be a good loser, then you don’t deserve to be a good winner. So I went there and made fun of myself.”

All in all she doesn’t regret going, although the award wasn’t long for this world. “I had a great time and then I set that thing on fire,” she said.

Berry has opened about Catwoman before, saying she doesn’t regret doing it and that, piss-poor cinema or not, it was one of her bigger paydays. Not that she’ll ever return to the role à la the alumni cast members in the next Spider-Man. Besides, she’s about to get another trophy anyway.

(Via Vanity Fair and THR)

Juicy J and Wiz Khalifa’s friendship goes back more than a decade, when Juicy appeared on a remix of Wiz’s 2010 breakout hit “Black & Yellow.” Wiz returned the favor by appearing on “Stoners Night (Part II),” from Juicy’s mixtape Blue Dream & Lean. Since then, the duo has worked together time and time again, and nearly 12 years later, they’re getting ready to deliver a joint album. The currently untitled project is set to arrive in early 2022, according to Complex, and while the two remain tight-lipped about details surrounding the project, they have dropped one of its singles.

The song is called “Pop The Trunk,” a sinister track that’s paired with a music video, which follows the pair as they somehow convince strangers to give them their souls.

The forthcoming album won’t be their first joint effort. Back in 2016, they teamed up with producer TM88 as the TGOD Mafia collective for TGOD Mafia: Rude Awakening, which boasted 16 songs, plus a lone feature from Project Pat. “Pop The Trunk” arrives after Juicy was involved in a fight during Three 6 Mafia’s Verzuz battle against Bone Thugs-N-Harmony. As for Wiz, he recently dropped the single “Million Dollar Moment” earlier this year.

You can listen to “Pop The Trunk” in the video above.

The Baylor Bears are the champions of the Big 12. Baylor took on Oklahoma State in Arlington on Saturday afternoon in a rematch of a game the Pokes won in Stillwater earlier this year. Despite fifth-ranked Oklahoma State needing a win to keep their hopes of making the College Football Playoff alive, Baylor was able to get revenge with a 21-16 victory.

It wasn’t particularly easy for the ninth-ranked Bears, though, as the Cowboys got the ball with 3:14 left and managed to march down the field. Despite there being 90 yards between them and the end zone, Oklahoma State kept chipping away until they found themselves deep in Baylor territory. And after a defensive pass interference in the end zone was called on a third-and-3, the Pokes found themselves with the ball on the Bears’ 2.

Oklahoma State found itself in this position earlier in the quarter, when they got the ball on the one, couldn’t punch it in on three attempts, and opted to kick a field goal. This time, though, they had to go for broke, and after one run gained a yard, another was stuffed, and a pass fell incomplete, one yard was going to determine who won the conference. Cowboys QB Spencer Sanders handed the ball off to Dezmon Jackson, who saw some daylight and decided to bounce it.

Unfortunately for him, Baylor’s Jairon McVea made one heck of a play to force him to keep going wide. Jackson dove for the end zone, was unable to reach the pylon, and as a result, the Bears won the football game.

This was as good a play as you’ll see by a defensive player, as McVea sniffed out Jackson trying to bounce it and did exactly what he needed to do. As a result, Baylor gets to call itself champions.

Perhaps you noticed a big change on Spotify: Over the past week, a number of high-profile stand-up comics, among them John Mulaney, Kevin Hart, and Tiffany Haddish, were suddenly AWOL from the streamer’s vast coffers. Well, there’s a reason for that: As per Entertainment Weekly, hundreds of comedians wanted to get paid when their audio version of their acts are played. And for now, at least, they’re simply no longer there.

Hundreds of comics have banded together to push back against a contractual difference between spoken word and musical artists. Musicians are paid royalties whenever a song is played on Spotify. The same does not apply to comedians. As per EW:

A growing number of comedians are seeking to get paid royalties when their jokes are played on streaming or radio, much the way songwriters are compensated for usage of their music and lyrics. The company Spoken Giants, which counts such performers as Gabriel Iglesias, Patton Oswalt, Paula Poundstone, and Roy Wood Jr. as members, is attempting to secure a more lucrative deal for “spoken-word creative works,” according to its website.

“Compared to music and other media, Spoken Word assets are under-represented in today’s sonic landscape and more importantly key rights, provided for under copyright law, are not paid by the very channels that obtain great value from using comedy works, podcasts, and other spoken-word assets,” a statement on Spoken Giants’ site reads.

Negotiations between Spoken Giants and Spotify evidently has not gone swimmingly. After talks, the group received an email from the streamer saying that content from the comics associated with them would simply be removed until further negotiations.

Spotify has long been criticized for not adequately compensating the reams of artists that fill their coffers. And sometimes, as in this case, those artists push back.

(Via EW)

Next week will mark one month since the tragedy that occurred at Travis Scott’s Astroworld Festival. The incident left ten dead and hundreds injured. It also left the rapper with hundreds of lawsuits, with those affected aiming to receive compensation for their injuries and loss. According to Rap-Up, 275 cases have been filed against Scott as well as organizers and promoters behind Astrowrold, but a much simpler process seems to be in the works for the mounting lawsuits. According to Billboard, all of the cases against Scott and Astroworld organizers could be consolidated into one giant case.

The attorneys for both the victims and the festival filed a joint petition on December 3 that would combine the 275 cases into a multi-district litigation that would be handled by one judge. They both agreed that consolidating the cases would be the best and simplest way to handle the lawsuits, which include over 1,250 plaintiffs. The petition is pending approval from a judge, but if it gets the green light, a new judge would then be selected to oversee the overall case.

“This type of litigation is exactly what the Texas MDL process is designed to address,” they wrote in their petition. It was filed after nearly half of the families of victims’ from Astroworld turned down Scott’s offer to pay for the funerals of those who died at the festival. A lawyer representing one of the victims’ families said, “Of all the things this case is about, that’s the least of any concern.” They added, “This family is set on making change and ensuring this never happens at a concert again.”