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While many of us have opted to use the extra time at home we’ve had during the COVID-19 pandemic to watch Squid Game and decide for ourselves whether sipping on a can of Flamin’ Hot Mtn Dew is truly as horrible as it sounds, Joshua Swiger has opted for a different path. As Fox News reports, the former Jeopardy! champion has turned what has been an emotionally trying time into an opportunity to focus more on himself and his health. Over the past year and a half, he has shed more than 200 pounds.

Swiger appeared on Jeopardy! in January 2020, where he won $16,400 during his first appearance. That triumph occurred just weeks before the country—and the world—went into a global lockdown. Yet Swiger had no idea that even bigger wins were on the horizon for him.

Swiger, who told Fox that he had been “morbidly obese” for 20 years, had tried—and failed—to lose weight on his own several times over the preceding decades. So in July 2020, he met with a doctor to discuss his possible candidacy for bariatric surgery, believing that was his last and final hope for dropping weight from his then-400-pound frame. As part of the surgery routine includes the prospective patient attempting to lose weight on their own before going under the knife, Swiger once again attempted to lose weight on his own. Only this time he learned more about nutrition and physiology ahead of time, so went in armed with more information.

“I was able to stick with it long enough to see consistent results,” Swiger said. “Instead of losing 20 or 30 pounds and then giving up when things got difficult, I learned to just hang in there and keep going and eventually, start losing the weight again.”

Because of the pandemic, Swiger was also out of work. He had run his own private tour company, which was forced to shut down when quarantine procedures went into effect. While it wasn’t an ideal situation, Swiger admitted that running his own company was stressful, and he often turned to food for comfort. With that stressor removed, focusing on his health goals became easier.

“When I gave up on doing it my way, that’s when I learned how to do it the right way,” Swiger said. He opted to adopt a low-carb lifestyle, because “that’s the easiest place to cut calories out. Because you need some fats and you absolutely need protein, but you can get by without carbs. I don’t necessarily say everybody should do low-carb, but that’s what worked for me.”

Cut to: January 2021. Swiger never underwent that surgery, because he didn’t need to. Establishing new eating patterns and sticking with them was the key for Swiger, who has now lost more than 200 pounds.

He has also made a change in profession: Swiger now works as a personal trainer, helping others to learn about nutrition and find out what works best for their individual bodies.

“There’s somebody out there who weighs more than I did who’s going to be an even bigger success than me and I can’t wait to help that person,” Swiger told Fox News.

Swiger has been documenting his journey on Instagram and YouTube.

(Via Fox News)

Listening to Rudy Giuliani speak today, it would be hard to imagine that the disgraced attorney could mastermind what to eat (or drink) for breakfast, let alone a massive conspiracy to overturn the results of a very legitimate presidential election. But as authorities continue to gather information about Team Trump’s attempts to capsize the results of the 2020 presidential election, at least on paper, most of the roads appear to be leading back to Rudy, even though he himself admitted that he didn’t investigate the election fraud claims before very publicly slamming them. And at least one prominent legal expert thinks the former New York City mayor should be “very worried.”

As Raw Story reports, CNN’s Erin Burnett welcomed former federal prosecutor Shan Wu onto her show, Out Front, to talk about the massive fraud that was reportedly planned in submitting fake electors to Congress in order for Trump as the winner of the 2020 presidential election that, as you probably remember, he did not win. And how Giuliani may have been more than just the face of these attempts to certify Trump as president, but the mastermind.

Wu said that Giuliani “should be very worried, legally” about his involvement in this subversive plot. “[Giuliani] says that he wouldn’t ‘associate himself with anything false,’ and there he is doing exactly that. And these evidences coming out that he was in charge of this, his own representations of his role sounds like he is a mastermind, a key player. That’s going to be a big problem for him here.”

While Wu admitted that there could be some defenses Giuliani might put up, from a legal perspective, he maintained that “overall, if the Department is looking at this and they charge, they are going to charge the whole kit and caboodle. And I would be very surprised if he is not charged, frankly, if this continues.”

You can watch the full segment below.

Also: Do they serve scotch in prison?

(Via Raw Story)

Warpaint’s most recent album is their well-received late-2016 effort Heads Up. That was nearly six years ago, which is a long gap between albums, especially in today’s fast-paced music industry. Now, though, the band is finally ready to return, as they announced today that Radiate Like This, their fourth album, is set for release on May 6.

They also shared “Champion,” a new single that is driven by the band’s signature subdued groove and atmospheric sounds. The group said of the inspiration behind the song, “Being a champion to oneself and for others. We are all in this together, life is too short not to strive for excellence in all that we do.”

Last April, the band’s Theresa “TT” Wayman noted of recording the new album, “We got really lucky because the foundation of what we’ve recorded was recorded together. It would feel really disjointed if we had to write it from scratch from afar. It’s actually been amazing that we’ve been separate and had time to record the top layers and we can get even more considered with them. It’s really helping us that there are no time pressures and money constraints. […] I’ve been thinking a lot about lyrics and so I’ve been thinking about [Bob] Dylan a lot and how he strings a story together. He finds these perfect ways to say something that is so normal, it’s something that everyone experiences, but he unlocks this great metaphor for it.”

While it’s been a few years since the band’s last album, Warpaint members have kept busy. Since 2016, Stella Mozgawa has contributed to albums like The xx’s I See You; Sharon Van Etten’s Remind Me Tomorrow; Kurt Vile’s Bottle It In; Courtney Barnett’s Things Take Time, Take Time (which she co-produced with Barnett); and Vile and Barnett’s Lotta Sea Lice. Wayman also dropped her debut solo album, LoveLaws, in 2018.

Listen to “Champion” above and find the Radiate Like This art and tracklist below, along with Warpaint’s upcoming tour dates.

1. “Champion”
2. “Hips”
3. “Hard To Tell You”
4. “Stevie”
5. “Like Sweetness”
6. “Trouble”
7. “Proof”
8. “Altar”
9. “Melting”
10. “Send Nudes”

05/09 — Paris, France @ La Cigale
05/11 — Bristol, England @ O2 Academy
05/12 — Manchester, England @ Albert Hall
05/13 — Glasgow, Scotland @ SWG3 Galvanisers
05/14 — Dublin, Ireland @ National Stadium
05/17 — Bexhill, England @ De La Warr Pavilion
05/18 — London, England @ The Roundhouse
05/20 — Berlin, Germany @ Huxleys
05/21 — Cologne, Germany @ Live Music Hall
05/22 — Hamburg, Germany @ Fabrik
05/24 — Amsterdam, Netherlands @ Paradiso
05/26 — Brussels, Belgium @ Ancienne Belgique
05/28 — Warsaw, Poland @ Progresja
06/01 — Istanbul, Turkey @ Zorlu Performing Arts Center
06/03 — Barcelona, Spain @ Primavera Sound

Radiate Like This is out 5/6 via Virgin. Pre-order it here.

Call me crazy, but I’m of the belief that it’s never a good idea to storm the Capitol building. But — and hear me out — it’s an especially bad idea to storm the Capitol building without scrubbing your social media first, as one rioter is discovering.

Jeremiah Caplinger was part of the failed coup on January 6, and he’s already pleaded guilty to “stepping on, climbing, removing, or injuring property on Capitol grounds,” according to Business Insider. He faces up to six months in prison, and prosecutors are using a Game of Thrones quote that Caplinger posted on social media as proof of intent.

Prosecutors explained the plot of a “Game of Thrones” episode to argue that a Capitol rioter who quoted the character Cersei Lannister on social media showed proof of criminal intent, according to a sentencing memorandum filed Tuesday. Two days after the insurrection, Jeremiah Caplinger, 25, posted an image of a soldier from the American Revolution with the caption: “As said by Cersei Lannister ‘I choose violence,’” according to the document.

The quote comes from the season six episode, “No One,” when Lancel, the religious fanatic who was previously in a romantic relationship with Cersei, tells his cousin, “Order your man to step aside or there will be violence.” She replies, “I choose violence.” The filing argues that “in stating, ‘I choose violence’, Cersei Lannister embraced — and then carried out — mass murder to achieve her political ends. In the context of Caplinger posting this just two days after January 6, Caplinger’s adoption of this quote is alarming and provides insight into his mental state and intent in storming the Capitol.”

You know nothing, Capitol rioter.

(Via Business Insider)

In a recent interview, Ye (aka Kanye West) claimed he recovered a laptop from Ray J that contained a second sex tape Kim Kardashian and Ray J had made together, saying, “I met this man at the airport, then got on the red-eye, came back… delivered it to her at 8 a.m. in the morning. I gave it to her, and she cried when she saw it. You know why she cried when she saw that laptop? It represents how much she’s been used… It represents how much people didn’t love her, they just saw her as a commodity.”

While Kardashian isn’t denying the story of Ye getting the laptop for her, it appears the computer may not have actually had another sex tape on it.

People reports they obtained a statement from a Kardashian representative that reads, “After review, there was nothing sexual unseen, only footage on the plane on the way to Mexico and footage at a club and restaurant on the same trip. Kim remains firm in her belief that there is no new second tape that exists. After 20 years, she truly wishes to move on from this chapter with focus instead on the positive things she continues to do as a mother, entrepreneur and advocate for justice reform.”

In a 2021 interview, Kardashian told The Los Angeles Times of the original tape, “I do think that, obviously, as producers, I’m sure they loved it. And loved [us] wanting to talk about the elephant in the room. And I probably wouldn’t have, unless it was for the show. Sometimes I feel like, ‘OK, I know I should probably deal and get this over with. Someone’s gonna ask me, so I might as well just go ahead and do it.’ In a way, filming has helped us deal with things, instead of sweeping them under the rug. At the end of the day, I was always open and honest and wanted to share whatever I was going through. I wasn’t gonna hold back.”

The Dallas Mavericks traveled to San Francisco to take on the Golden State Warriors on Tuesday night, and during the first half of action, one of the team’s most prolific perimeter scorers left the game with a potentially serious injury.

Tim Hardaway Jr. pushed the ball in transition and saw a lane to attack the rim. With only Damion Lee between himself and the basket, Hardaway decided to embrace contact, create a little bit of space, and go up for a layup. While he missed, Hardaway was fouled and hit both of his attempts at the free throw line.

However, Hardaway stepped awkwardly on his left foot and couldn’t put weight on it. After the free throws, he was helped to the back for further examination.

The team eventually announced that Hardaway suffered a fracture of the fifth metatarsal of his left foot, and that more will be announced regarding the extent of his injury soon.

According to In Street Clothes founder Jeff Stotts, we’ll learn more about a potential timeline when it’s eventually determined where the fracture occurred.

Hardaway opted to stay with the Mavericks this past offseason, agreeing to a $72 million contract with the franchise that acquired him in the trade with the New York Knicks that also brought Kristaps Porzingis to Dallas. Hardaway has averaged 14.3 points per game this season.

Rihanna has long used her platform to support good causes. In 2021 she signed a pair of open letters that called for police reform, and she, along with Jay-Z and others, demanded that the New York Attorney General “reopen the case and probe the wrongful death of Danroy ‘D.J.’ Henry.” This year, Rihanna is bringing her focus to organizations that are fighting climate change, pledging a $15 million donation through her Clara Lionel Foundation.

A press release said the donation will specifically target groups that “are focused on and led by women, youth, Black, Indigenous, LGBTQIA+ and people of color to accelerate climate justice for those at greatest risk.” Rihanna also shared a statement about the move.

“At the Clara Lionel Foundation, much of the work is rooted in the understanding that climate disasters, which are growing in frequency and intensity, do not impact all communities equally, with communities of color and island nations facing the brunt of climate change,” the singer said in the statement. “This is why CLF prioritizes both climate resilience and climate justice work across the U.S. and Caribbean.”

Justine Lucas, the Executive Director of the Clara Lionel Foundation, also spoke about the donation in a statement of her own. “CLF believes strongly that funders must build partnerships with organizations and acknowledge their deep understanding of what is necessary to achieve climate justice in their own communities,” she said.

The following organizations have been approved for the donation from Rihanna’s Clara Lionel Foundation: Black Feminist Fund, Black Visions Collective, Caribbean Youth Environment Network (CYEN), Center for Popular Democracy (CPD), Climate and Clean Energy Equity Fund, Climate Justice Alliance, Deep South Center for Environmental Justice, GirlsCARE, Helen’s Daughters, HEY Campaign (The Ashley Lashley Foundation), Hive Fund for Gender and Climate Justice, Indigenous Environmental Network, Integrated Health Outreach, Movement for Black Lives (M4BL), Native Movement, NDN Collective, The Caribbean Climate Justice Project, and The Solutions Project.

You can read more about Clara Lionel Foundation’s work on fighting climate change here.

This April marks four years since Saba released his last album, Care For Me. Luckily the Chicago rapper will release his third at the beginning of next month. Called Few Good Things, it’s locked in for a February 4 release date, and so far, he’s shared three singles: “Stop That,” “Fearmonger” with Daoud, and “Come My Way” with Krayzie Bone. With a little over a week left until the album arrives, Saba unveils its full tracklist and artwork.

The cover for Few Good Things depicts a middle-aged man posed in front of a fence with light pink flowers slightly covering parts of his body. As for the tracklist, it includes featurs from 6lack, Smino, G Herbo, Black Thought, Mereba, Foushee, Eryn Allen Kane, Benjamin Earl Turner, Pivot Gang, Cheflee, Daoud, and Day Wave.

You can view the cover art for Few Good Things above and check out its tracklist below.

1. “Free Samples” Feat. Cheflee
2. “One Way Or Every N**** With A Budget”
3. “Survivor’s Guilt” Feat. G Herbo
4. “An Interlude Called ‘Circus’” Feat. Eryn Allen Kane
5. “Fearmonger” Feat. Daoud
6. “Come My Way” Feat. Krayzie Bone
7. “Still” Feat. 6lack & Smino
8. “A Simpler Time” Feat. Mereba
9. “Soldier” Feat. Pivot Gang
10. “If I Had A Dollar” Feat. Benjamin Earl Turner
11. “Stop That”
12. “Make Believe” Feat. Foushee
13. “2012” Feat. Day Wave
14. “Few Good Things” Feat. Black Thought & Eryn Allen Kane

Few Good Things is due 2/4 via Pivot Gang, LLC. You can pre-save here.

We don’t see or hear from Joe Biden all that much, which is as it should be: It’s not normal to be aware of what the president is doing every day, much less every hour. Americans may have even gotten used to having a commander-in-chief who doesn’t think he’s the center of the universe. Others miss that feeling of non-stop anxiety. One of them is Eric Trump, the less seen non-teen son of the previous president. (Although at least Eric isn’t the one his father reportedly thinks should serve jail time.) Like Don Jr., Eric likes to go on TV and publicly suck up to his own dad. Still, some of the claims he makes about him don’t seem to add up.

Eric went on Fox News Tuesday, where he slammed the Biden administration while also heaping hyperbole upon his own father, whose own former personal attorney thinks will gladly allow his kids to go to jail instead of him. Eric took umbrage with how Biden and team aren’t always “present,” unlike his father, often traveling or relaxing.

“These people are not present,” Eric railed. “The difference between them and my father, my father sat there 24 hours a day.”

For one thing, Trump wasn’t that present either. As per The Washington Post, he visited Trump properties, including Mar-a-Lago, for over half of the weekends he was president. He played 261 rounds of golf in four years; Obama, meanwhile, played 333 rounds over eight years. Most of those were in Florida, at his own golf resort. What’s more, he may have cost taxpayers $109 million just for his Mar-a-Lago flights alone.

But what did he do while in the White House? Well, he watched a ton of Fox News. According to intel leaked to Axios, in his last year in office, he blocked off three hours every morning for “Executive Time,” which isn’t as presidential as it sounded: It was so he could watch TV and tweet, usually angrily. His first meeting wasn’t held till 11am. (George W. Bush, meanwhile, would hold his at 6:45am.) He only worked till 6pm — a mere seven-hour day — though even when he was on the clock, he spent much of that making calls and watching more TV. Some days he would end as early as 4:15pm.

Then again, Eric didn’t actually say his father “worked.” He said he “sat.” So maybe that was just a Freudian slip, revealing what he really did.

Eric’s exaggerated comments about his dad’s impossible schedule did not go unnoticed on social media.

Eric also failed to mention his father’s terrible diet, which may explain why he’d spend all day as president sitting on his butt.

(Via Raw Story)

Lana Del Rey just keeps it coming with new music. In 2021 the singer released two albums in the span of two months: Chemtrails Over The Country Club and Blue Banisters. This year, she’s already released the song “Watercolor Eyes,” which also appeared in the trailer for HBO’s hit show Euphoria. Now it seems like Del Rey could have more music on the way thanks to a recent appearance she made during a concert in Austin, Texas. Country singer Nikki Lane was performing during in the city when Lana and singer Sierra Ferrell accompanied her on stage to perform their new song “Prettiest Girl In Country Music.”

Del Ray also spoke to the audience about the song during the concert and revealed that it was created after Lane told her story about being hit on by an older man. “Nikki told me a little story about him about he had a little meeting with her and he crept a little too close to her,” Lana said. “And he said, ‘How does it feel to be the prettiest girl in country music?’ and I was like, ‘Bleh!’” She added, “So immediately I wrote a little chorus and then we expanded.”

The trio’s performance comes after the US Army earned plenty of attention on Twitter after they used a quote from Lana Del Rey to encourage female soldiers.