SoylentNews

R. Kelly

R. Kelly denies sexual abuse allegations in explosive interview

R. Kelly was "unhinged" in interview with Gayle King, columnist says (12m36s)

Gayle King talks about her explosive R. Kelly interview on CBSN (7m18s)

Full interview is apparently around 80 minutes and has not been released in its entirety yet. Even Oprah wants the full video.

Turmoil or manipulation?

Previously: R. Kelly Contracts Ligma
R. Kelly Exposes Himself

Mardi Gras

Mardi Gras: The most fun you'll have with a history lesson

Patricia Clarkson on leading the Mardi Gras group breaking with tradition

In New Orleans, The Fight Over Blackface Renews Scrutiny Of A Mardi Gras Tradition

Mobile mom says shoes thrown from Mardi Gras float sent her kid to the ER

Popeyes might be onto something with chicken-tender-cradlin’ Mardi Gras beads

Sounds like a great way to get grease all over your shirt on Fat Tuesday.

One of my favourite Soylentils, ~realdonaldtrump, has been missing in action for several weeks. There were no tweets since Feb 19th, and I was worried that something had happened.

Thankfully, ~realdonaldtrump is back. I can only assume that he was on vacation (perhaps in Vietnam?). Anyways, I'm glad he is back and tweeting here again.

Yes, sir.

- Harry Hurt III

---------------------

*sigh* Going full Hollywood

parrucchino?

New CPAC stars: Black gun rights activists

For a few minutes at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Thursday afternoon, the message was more Malcolm X than William F. Buckley.

Sporting a red hoodie, his hair in cornrows, Maj Toure touted his group, Black Guns Matter. "We go where there's high violence, high crime, high gun control — high slave mentalities, to be perfectly honest,” he said, “and inform urban America about their human right, as stated in the Second Amendment, to defend their life."

A besuited interviewer seated on stage next to Toure told him, "You don’t look or sound like your stereotypical Second Amendment advocate."

[...] Philip Smith, president of the National African American Gun Association, said Trump was one driver of black interest in gun rights, along with general anxiety about the state of the world. "They are seeing the uncertainty within society across the board," he said. Smith, who did not participate in CPAC, founded his group in 2015, hoping he might attract a few hundred members. Membership quickly climbed into the thousands, and it tripled in the months following Trump’s inauguration. He said the group now has about 30,000 members.

Smith said that 60 percent of his members are black women, who often feel the most vulnerable to violent crime.

There's nothing like a big explody event to distract attention. But so soon? Does the internet speed things up that much?
-----
Well, Trump finally goes to Vietnam, and Mr. Cohen goes to Washington.

Do we need to ask which got the higher ratings?

First ~6 minutes is the action, the rest is the extended version.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fax-kXMCbtA (NSFW language)

It was lit.

Culture Shock for French in Quebec: ‘We Smoke Cigarettes, They Smoke Pot’

Some Montrealers call them “FFF’s” — French from France.

FFFFFFFFFFFFFF

"The Democratic Party of the U.S. and other opponents to the negotiations move overtly and covertly to disrupt them as supported by scepticism backed by all sorts of groundless stories and misinformation even at such a crucial moment as now,"... Trump's opponents would bear the responsibility if the summit failed to achieve results, which would leave the U.S. people exposed to "security threats"

Regardless of what you think of the man, he still won the election, and with the opposition so distracted by bullshit, he will probably win again.

Kraft Charges Reveal a Sordid World Thriving in Florida

The 77-year-old Kraft proclaims his innocence in a broader investigation that ensnared two other prominent financiers, including John Havens, Citigroup Inc.’s former president. John Childs, a buyout pioneer, was also charged in a related prostitution investigation. The police say in total 26 encounters are captured on video in the Orchids.

The case has peeled back one of the most unsavory aspects of this stretch of Florida -- where a playground of the wealthy filled with golf courses and beaches meets with what authorities say may be a human trafficking ring spanning from China to the U.S. There are multi-million dollar mansions as well as the massage tables that police say women slept on when not engaged by customers.

[...] Jupiter is home to countless celebrities and sports stars, as well as the Trump National Golf Club, where the president golfed with Tiger Woods and Jack Nicklaus earlier this month. Thirty minutes to the south, in the area around near Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club, there are $10 million homes tucked behind carefully groomed hedges and the valet lines teem with Lamborghinis and Rolls-Royces.

Reimer: Prostitution charges against Robert Kraft are degrading and beneath him

Robert Kraft, one of the most powerful and recognizable men in the country’s preeminent entertainment industry, visited a seedy day spa in a Florida strip mall twice last month and illegally solicited prostitutes, law enforcement officials say. Even worse, police say Kraft’s alleged acts are captured on videotape.

TMZ staffer Evan Rosenblum told “Dale & Keefe” Friday he thinks it is “almost a certainty” the videos get released. Florida does have one of the most transparent open records laws in the U.S., which mandates any records received by a public agency, such as state law enforcement, be made available for examination, unless the state legislature rules otherwise.

For anti-human trafficking crusader Ivanka Trump, Robert Kraft could make things awkward

If you're a billionaire, don't be stingy. Just buy a live-in sex slave.