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NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - A Louisiana federal judge has ruled many New Orleans homeowners whose houses sustained water damage after Hurricane Katrina are not excluded from coverage under their insurance policies, a judgment that represents a loss for the insurance industry. Mayor Meets With Shooting Victim's Kin
Soap to feature transgender character
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Clik magazine did it! I just returned from what was clearly a successful and historic event recognizing African-American Same Gender Loving individuals. I flew into Atlanta from California on Saturday (the same day as the award show) because I attended a fundraiser the night before in Oakland so I got there a little out of it. The weather was fabulous when we arrived and the news reporter said that Atlanta had been experiencing unseasonably warm temperatures (almost 70 degrees) over the Thanksgiving weekend. I want to thank the employees of Gladys Knight and Ron Winans restaurant located in Midtown Atlanta for your hospitality and that delicious food! When we arrived at the FOX Theater we lined up on the red carpet and were interviewed by film director, actor, and dear friend Maurice Jamal…with his crazy self. The event was hosted by the funny man Rodney Chester of Noah’s Arc and the hilarious female impersonator Harmonica Sunbeam. I was totally impressed with the diversity of the African-American same gender loving people in the room. Twenty five of us were chosen and I received an award in the same category as one of my new favorite people Jasmyne Cannick, for “Community Advocacy”. There were people that you always see in the LGBT media but even more exciting was meeting people you might hear about but never or rarely see like the Hon. Ken Reeves (Mayor of Cambridge Mass) and Sophia Macintosh. I also got the chance to record video chats after the show with some “Clik Elite” awardees including Lisa C. Moore of “Red Kitchen Press,” Author E. Lynn Harris (Thank you), Kevin Aviance (beautiful spirit), my nephews from the DL Chronicles- directors Quincey LeNear and Deondray Gossett (love you guys), Noah’s Arc’s Wilson Cruz (beautiful), and another one of my old friends and event promoter Derrick Wallace of Xtreme Entertainment in Atlanta (love you man). I must give a shout out to Clik Elite Award winner (Media) and international photographer Duane Cramer for being one of only two Bay Area winners. However California did really well at the ceremony; check out Jasmyne Cannick’s blog for a complete list of winners. I was also fortunate to conduct a bonus interview with Clik Elite Award winner, the beautiful and amazingly talented Billy Porter. Billy and I got a chance to talk after we returned from a festive night out at the Lion’s Den. We were tired! It was also an honor to meet and chat with the legendary house leader Andre Mizrahi and the hilarious and flawless Harmonica Sunbeam. Thank you Dwight Powell for pushing the envelope and doing something that didn’t just recognize a certain “Clique” of individuals, but included a broader selection of people who are working to advance the cause of same gender loving people everywhere. You and your Managing Editor Luis Medrano must take some time off during the holidays you certainly deserve it. I also hope that everyone reading this blog will subscribe right now to the worlds number one publication truly designed for our empowerment – Click Magazine!
Over the past decade, Tupac Shakur's fans have wondered what the rapper would be doing if he were alive today. During the filming of a video for Shakur's posthumous single "Pac's Life" in Atlanta early this month, his family and friends had their answers.Some say he would probably be the most prolific rapper today; some say he would have given up the mic altogether and gotten into politics; others say Tupac Shakur the author would have been a sure bet. "I think 'Pac is limitless [with] movies, poetry, writing, rapping," Ashanti, who sings the hook on the song, said in her trailer in between shooting. "He probably would have developed another route for all of us. I think he would be versatile in anything and everything." MORE ON THIS STORY
John Legend By JEFF MILLER - Variety.com Earlier this year, Lionel Richie tried to stage a comeback. That effort was mostly unsuccessful -- perhaps because John Legend has already cornered the market on his brand of half-soulful, half-schticky R&B. Legend's most recent album, "Once Again" (Good Music/Sony Urban), a follow-up to the Grammy-winning "Get Lifted," is packed with '80s-sounding keyboards and his strong, willful voice; Legend's live show plays up its loungier, nearly Caribbean arrangements and Legend's Vegas-y showmanship. Unfortunately, a poor mix -- with Legend's vocals piercingly loud and the drums buried behind layers of synths and background vocals -- took all subtlety out of Legend's otherwise moving run-through of his smash ballad "Ordinary People" and the noodly guitar of "Heaven Only Knows," turning them into hit-you-over-the-head displays of histrionics. It was a shame, because Legend's got range; even when he's expressing gooey-eyed sentiments of love, it's with an obvious passion for the material that lifts him well beyond other, lesser R&B hitmakers like Usher. MORE ON THIS STORY
K-Fed -- Still V.I.Pimpin'
Black Awareness Day was celebrated this past Monday in Brazil with holidays in Rio and São Paulo. While this year's Gay Pride Parade attracted 2 million people, the third annual march for Black Awareness at Avenida Paulista gathered only 12,000 people, a sign of racial and social inequality prevalent in the country. On the right is actress Taís Araújo, who keeps on pushing boundaries by scoring leading roles in Brazilian soaps. Since the topic is black awareness, I want to clarify that the lack of posts related to African-Brazilians is due to the fact that there is not much available in the Brazilian media for me to pick from, aside from soccer players and a few actors. I would also very much like to see a black model shot for Terra's The Boy, and hope that will happen at some point next year. For more information about the event, check out Afrobras.
GAME, AKON TOP CHARTS WITH NEW MATERIAL: Albums top Billboard; Akon scores first No. 1 single with Snoop assist. Compton rapper The Game and Senegalese singer Akon are No. 1 and No. 2 respectively on The Billboard 200 album charts this week, while Akon earns his first-ever No. 1 single on the Hot 100 singles tally. Game’s Geffen disc “Doctor’s Advocate” sold 358,000 to earn the top spot, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The numbers fall short of his 2005 debut, “The Documentary,” which bowed with 587,000 units during its first week. Akon’s “Konvicted” sold 284,000 to land at No. 2 on the Billboard 200, which obliterates the 24,000 first week sales tally of his 2004 debut, “Trouble.” Released on Akon’s Konvict imprint through SRC/Up Front, the singer has benefited from two huge singles, "Smack That" (featuring Eminem) and "I Wanna Love You" (featuring Snoop Dogg), which reached No. 1 on the Hot 100 singles chart this week. Elsewhere on the album chart, Beyonce's Columbia set "B'Day" re-enters the top 10, climbing 16-9 with a 17% sales increase. The boost in numbers is likely due to her new single, “Irreplaceable,” which moves up 4-3 on the Hot 100 chart and is its greatest airplay gainer for a second week in a row. The song also climbs to No. 1 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, ending the four-week reign of Chris Brown's & Say Goodbye. Justin Timberlake’s “My Love” featuring T.I. moves from No. 1 to No.4 this week on the Hot 100 chart. With a four-position increase, Bow Wow's "Shortie Like Mine" featuring Chris Brown and Johnta Austin reaches No. 10. & The Game's "Let's Ride" earns the Hot 100's top debut at No. 46. Also new is Snoop Dogg's "That's That S***" featuring R. Kelly at No. 85, Ludacris' "Runaway Love" featuring Mary J. Blige at No. 91 and Young Jeezy's "I Luv It" at No. 100. FOXY BROWN TOSSED OUT OF RADIO INTERVIEW: Power 105.1’s Egypt had enough of her non-answers. Rapper Foxy Brown tried to direct the flow of questioning during her interview on Power 105.1’s Egypt and Ashy show and was given the boot for her efforts. According to the New York Post’s Page Six, the Brooklyn artist refused to answer questions surrounding her rumored dismissal from Island/Def Jam, or that label president Jay-Z has been frustrated over her lack of productivity. What people don't know is that I initiated Def Jam ... they could never drop me. I am a multi-platinum artist," she reportedly snapped. A portion of the interview addressing her recent hearing loss was punctuated by Ashy reportedly yelling to Foxy: “Can you hear me?” The rapper, whose real name is Inga Marchand, told Ashy she didn’t think that was funny, considering she’s been through so much hardship over the condition. Ashy reportedly apologized. Foxy dodged a series of subsequent questions, including queries about her recent assault trial. When Foxy began gathering her belongings, Egypt asked if she was intending to leave? After a few seconds of the silent treatment, Foxy explained that the interview was not going as the two had discussed during a prior phone conversation with Egypt. When Ashy asked Egypt if he should leave the room so that the interview could continue, Egypt said, “No baby, I don’t want you to leave the room. Foxy, YOU can leave the room.” Listen to the interview here:
http://www.zshare.net/audio/egypt_ashy-mp3.html
The Alicia Keys fan club Web site (www.ALICIAKEYS.com) has received an extreme makeover and now includes a variety of new amenities, including a personal audio blog, the Alicia Keys’ Book Club, all released audio, bonus tracks, videos, behind-the-scenes photos, interviews and unreleased mobile ringtones, voicetones and ringbacks. “I am thrilled to create another avenue to communicate with my unbelievable fans” says Keys. “I encourage fans to participate in the interactive component of this site, as I truly believe that we can grow together and help shape a musical legacy for generations to come”
THIEVES CREATE ONLINE OPRAH HUSTLE: Attorney General warns against unsolicited e-mails offering tickets for sale. Through unsolicited e-mails, scam artists have been offering consumers bogus tickets to “The Oprah Winfrey Show” as bait to steal the identities of their customers. Illinois’ state Attorney General Lisa Madigan told AP that the e-mails ask people to give up personal information, verify financial information or wire money to a third party for tickets to the show. With the large number of Oprah's fans worldwide, we are concerned that their excitement at the opportunity to attend a taping of her TV show may result in fans responding to this unauthorized offer," Madigan said Tuesday in a news release. & Winfrey’s show does not sell tickets to tapings. Reservations are taken for free admission on a first come, first served basis.The state was notified about the e-mails by lawyers with Oprah's Harpo Productions Inc. The goal with this alert is to not have any victims, because once consumers respond to this or send money, it's very, very difficult to make them whole," Madigan spokeswoman Cara Smith said Wednesday.
Slain Richmond Officer Dated Her Suspected Killer BCN RICHMOND shooter who remains at large. According to Richmond police Lt. Enos Johnson, Officer Kaliah Harper, 28, was shot to death Friday outside a memorial service for two children who were killed in a Solano County car crash. Police identified Quartus Lee Hinton, 28, as Harper's suspected killer, Johnson reported. According to Johnson, Harper had dated Hinton for about six months before they broke up about two or three weeks ago. MORE ON THIS STORY
NEW YORK - Police fired 50 rounds Saturday at a car of unarmed men leaving a bachelor party at a strip club, killing the groom on his wedding day in a shooting that drew a furious outcry from family members and community leaders. The spray of bullets hit the car 21 times, after the vehicle rammed into an undercover officer and then an unmarked NYPD minivan twice, police said. Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly would not say if the collisions were what prompted police to open fire. It was too early to say whether the shooting was justified, Kelly said. Police thought one of the men in the car might have had a gun. But police found no weapons. MORE ON THIS STORY
Two men were killed early Saturday morning when the car they were in slammed into a light pole near the intersection of Bancroft and Parker avenues in East Oakland, police said. The driver of the vehicle, identified by police only as a 31-year-old male Oakland resident, and a passenger, only identified as a male, both died at the scene, a police dispatcher said. Two other passengers were taken to a hospital to be treated for injuries, police said.The Alameda County coroner's office was working to notify family on Saturday morning and did not release the names of the deceased. The car was speeding west on Bancroft Avenue around 12:12 a.m. when the driver lost control and crashed into a light pole, police said. MORE ON THIS STORY
Just Found Out?
A POZ.com Guide for HIV Rookies
So you just tested HIV positive.
Don't panic!
Testing positive is not:
The end of the world.
The end of your relationships.
The end of you.
Testing positive is:
A raw deal you'll probably feel strongly about, even if at first you're numb.
A challenge to you and to the people in your life.
An opportunity to grow.
Take a deep breath. And check out our guide for the newly diagnosed by clicking on the 10 key questions at your right—to which we offer a uniquely POZ mix of well-tested smarts and cutting-edge information. For more personal stories and expert advice, read our Think Positive issue next.
We also recommend that you join POZ Mentor, POZ.com's online peer support service, which matches up HIVers by what they need and what they know. It's designed especially with rookies like you in mind.
Then tell us what you think—and what's up with you—by emailing [email protected]
Positive Sex
The ins and outs of getting laid safely
POZ.com wants every HIV positive person to have as much fun in bed as the next horndog. Though the facts about HIV transmission and STDs are the same for every status, viral myths and myth-understandings can shrivel the friendliest flirtation. Do condoms block HPV? What's superinfection?
The questions along the right side of this page are among the most common queries that come across our desks here at POZ. Unlike most safe-sex primers, ours ditches the do's and don'ts for a more educational, well, tool—by and for positives. MORE INFO
Strength, Courage, & Wisdom
India.Arie has been called everything in the book: Self-righteous. A head wrap-wearing phony. Oprah with a guitar. Strength, Courage, & Wisdom
by Tomika Anderson
India.Arie has been called everything in the book: Self-righteous. A head wrap-wearing phony. Oprah with a guitar. A lone, spiritual songbird in a roost of materialistic chickenheads, her ethereal messages of self-love—though championed by fans—often try the patience of critics. “People need to know they are loved,” the 30-year-old singer explains of her spiritual approach to Testimony: Vol. 1, Life & Relationship, her third album. “They need to know that their lives are worth something. I want my music to remind them of that.” Fortunately, a higher calling helps to keep Arie’s shorn head up. As her lyrics profess, she is indeed not her hair—or any of that other image-obsessed nonsense. And at a time when HIV cases among blacks are at an all-time high and Africa’s plight is yet a blip on America’s emotional radar, Arie has embraced a cause much greater than herself.
The National AIDS Memorial Grove, located in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, is a dedicated space in the national landscape where millions of Americans touched directly or indirectly by AIDS can gather to heal, hope, and remember. For all the promising prospects on the horizon, AIDS continues to invade our lives, violate our past, and rob us of our comfortable assumptions about the future. The sacred ground of this living memorial honors all who have confronted this tragic pandemic both those who have died and those who have shared their struggle, kept the vigils, and supported each other during the final hours. The National AIDS Memorial Grove signifies that the global tragedy of AIDS will never be forgotten. MORE ON THIS STORY
HIV Infection On The Rise Worldwide
(Reuters Health) by Stephanie Nebehay
HIV infection is rising in every region of the world and, most worrying, in countries like Uganda and Thailand that had been heralded as success stories in the fight against AIDS, UNAIDS and the World Health Organisation announced Tuesday. Nearly 40 million adults and children are infected worldwide, according to the "2006 AIDS Epidemic Update," issued by the two agencies. The most striking increases are in east Asia, eastern Europe and central Asia, mainly due to drug use and unsafe sex. MORE INFO
| On Thanksgiving, the NFL will air the first of eight live pro football games on its own network. But it won't be available to many viewers across the country because the league hasn't reached carriage agreements with several major cable operators. The... |
Diddy's Little Helpers
Why hip-hop ghostwriting is an art now, and an actually respectable one
I believe the industry as a whole needs certain events to happen to sustain it and keep it alive. . . . You need Dre albums, you need Eminem albums, you need 50 albums, you need big artists. . . . —Jay-Z, to the Associated Press in June So now even J-Hova will occasionally allude to Hip-Hop's Imminent Demise, though he prescribes cultural CPR through fourth-quarter sales events, which may explain why he's the one with a net worth rivaling Diddy's. Jay's Kingdom Come will of course eclipse it, but surely Diddy's own 2006 record, Press Play, was an event. So why was he left off Jay's list of "big artists"? MORE ON THIS STORY
| The U.S. Copyright Office says it should be legal for you to crack lockout codes that keep you from porting your cell-phone to another carrier. And retro-gamers will be able to crack copy protection on abandoned titles -- for "archival" purposes. In Gear Factor. |
More Than Words -- Mo'Nique
Clik Magazine Elite 25 Awards &"Noah's Arc" Submits for NAACP Image AwardReport: Right Wing "Abstinence Only" Policy Spreads HIV, Death
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Local election feuding continues online; Mingles closes, but a new hip-hop club is slated for Sweet Jimmie's space; Iraq whistleblower has some, uh, issues.Digital Underground is his past. Islam is his future. What caused The Transition of rapper Saafir?
Sapp insists food was tampered with on road trips
| Warren Sapp insisted Wednesday his food was tampered with during his nine-year tenure in Tampa Bay from 1995-2003. |
| Carnival ship is stricken with Norovirus . . . |
| Six Thanksgiving Movies Worth Watching |
| NBA TV highlights the best slam dunks from the second week of the 2006-07 NBA season. |
| TNT takes a look at Charles Barkley as a future contender for "Dancing With the Stars". |
| The supermodel and the singer welcome their third child, Johan |
Filed under: Break-Ups, Britney and Kevin TMZ.com: Britney's back, and the newest bachelorette is popping up (and out) everywhere. It started with her drive-by appearance on Letterman on the night before filing divorce papers. The very next night, she was caught at a New York City Gap store shopping... Read moreInside Diddy's A-List Baby Shower
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The television special was to air on two of the final three nights of the November sweeps, when ratings are watched closely to set local advertising rates. It has been a particularly tough fall for Fox, which has seen none of its new shows catch on and is waiting for the January bows of American Idol and The closest precedent for such an about-face came when CBS yanked a miniseries about Ronald Reagan from its schedule in 2003 when complaints were raised about its accuracy. The Reagan series was seen on its sister premium-cable channel, Showtime, instead. One station manager who had said he wasn't airing the special said he was concerned that whether or not Simpson was guilty, he'd still be profiting from murders. I have my own moral compass and this was easy, said Bill Lamb, general manager of WDRB in Louisville. For the publishing industry, the cancellation of If I Did It was an astonishing end to a story like no other. Numerous books have been withdrawn over the years because of possible plagiarism, most recently Kaavya Viswanathan's "How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life," but a book's removal simply for objectionable content is virtually unheard of. Sales had been strong, but not sensational. If I Did It" cracked the top 20 of Amazon.com last weekend, but by Monday afternoon, at the time its cancellation had been announced, the book had fallen to No. 51.
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