FORMER MAHARANI OF JAIPUR PRINCESS AYESHA GAYATRI DEVI DIES

The former queen of the western Indian desert kingdom of Jaipur, Gayatri Devi, who was often described as one of the most beautiful women in the world, died Wednesday. She was 90.
Gayatri Devi, who also served three times as a national lawmaker, was hospitalized for about 10 days with stomach and respiratory problems before she died, her doctor S.C. Kala said.
Gayatri Devi's classical good looks ensured that photographs of her in elegant chiffon saris and diamonds and pearls were splashed across fashion and lifestyle magazines. She was also known for her love of horses and polo.
She was born into the royal family of Cooch Behar in what is now eastern India on May 23, 1919, decades before the partition of the subcontinent that heralded the demise of Indian royalty. She became the third wife of Sawai Man Singh, the "maharaja" or ruler of Jaipur, in 1939. Gayatri Devi was the "maharani."
More than 500 such royal families ruled parts of India and received "privy purses" or payments from British colonial rulers. When India became independent in 1947 royal titles were abolished and payments cut off. Several royal households slipped into penury but the former Jaipur royal family remained wealthy, converting some former palaces into luxury hotels.
In 1960 Gayatri Devi launched a political party and contested and won a place in India's Parliament. She withdrew from politics in the 1970s.
She supported education for women and established a girl's school which was named after her in Jaipur, now the capital of the state of Rajasthan and the city where she died.
Her funeral was to take place Thursday at the cremation grounds used by the former royal family, her stepson Bhawani Singh said.
Gayatri Devi is survived by two grandchildren and several relatives from her husband's family.

GAY PORN ACTOR GETS 3-8 YEARS IN PA BEAUTY SHOP BREAK-INS

A porn star who was accused of using a handsaw and an ax to break into stores through their rooftops while his twin brother and occasional co-star acted as a lookout is going to prison for at least three years.
Taleon Goffney, who appeared with his brother in such gay skin flicks as "Marc and the Twins," was arrested last year after police said they saw the twins breaking into a beauty shop.
He pleaded guilty to two counts each of burglary and criminal conspiracy and was sentenced to three to eight years. Charges including criminal trespass, receiving stolen property and possession of an instrument of crime were dropped in exchange for his pleas.
Goffney, 27, could have faced up to 40 years in prison if convicted after trial.
"Thank you for your lenience in accepting my plea," Goffney, of Pennsauken, N.J., told a judge in court Wednesday. "These crimes won't be happening again."
Goffney's twin brother, Keyontyli Goffney, also is charged and appeared at Wednesday's hearing, but it was unclear if he planned to negotiate a plea. He's due back in court Aug. 6. Neither his lawyer, Gerald Stein, nor Assistant District Attorney Caroline Keating immediately returned telephone calls from The Associated Press on Thursday.
Keating told the Philadelphia Daily News that Taleon Goffney is sure to serve at least the minimum three years due to his prior criminal record. Goffney's lawyer, Michael F. Gushue, told the newspaper that his client plans to complete his college education while in prison.
"I think he's had an epiphany," Gushue said. "He's a bright young man."
The brothers have appeared in Internet porn videos under the names Teyon and Keyon, said Erik Schut, of Philadelphia-based video retailer TLA Entertainment Group. They could have had good careers if they hadn't gotten into trouble, he said in February.
"They are incredibly good-looking, and being identical twins, it's a novelty," Schut said then.
In "Marc and the Twins," the brothers offer to audition for chiseled porn star Marc Williams in a seedy hotel room and are seen rubbing each other's chests.
Keyontyli Goffney has appeared in porn since at least 2002 and worked as a fashion model, while Taleon Goffney got involved in porn more recently.
Taleon Goffney, who police believe is a trained gymnast and karate expert, has used his athleticism to make several daring escapes.
He was handcuffed in the back of a moving police cruiser after a 2006 drug arrest in Clementon, N.J., when he broke out the glass with his head and jumped into a lake while still handcuffed, police Chief Dave Kunkel said.
"He swam across like Flipper, taunting the officers, saying, 'You'll never catch me,'" Kunkel told the Daily News for a story in February.
He turned himself in a week later.
In January 2007, he jumped 30 feet from the roof of a Camden, N.J., liquor store and swam across the frigid Cooper River before he was caught, police said.
A defense lawyer, Jeffrey Zucker, said Goffney "should have signed up for the Olympics" and referred to him as Spider-Man.

SARAH PALIN'S NEW FOCUS: KILLING OUR CHANCE TO BUILD A CLEAN ENERGY ECONOMY

In an op-ed in today's Washington Post, Sarah Palin announced her new focus: killing our chance to build a clean energy economy, starting with the energy bill currently in Congress.

Her op-ed is a marvel of misinformation and outright lies. Just like conservatives in Congress, Palin is trotting out the "energy taxes" scare tactic, and arguing instead for more drilling and more dirty coal. This bill already has too many giveaways to Big Coal and Big Oil, but that's still not enough for Palin.

This is the same Sarah Palin who doesn't believe climate change is caused by humans. The same Sarah Palin who is obsessed with drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. And the same Sarah Palin who's looking for controversial issues to launch a 2012 presidential bid.
Now she's positioning herself as the face of the conservative attack against clean energy, against the Clean Air Act-even against the creation of millions of new jobs in solar and wind.
But wind and solar create more than twice as many jobs as coal and oil. Clean energy is the only way to make America's economy competitive in the 21st century.
The truth is we need a stronger energy bill in the Senate to combat our economic and climate crisis, but Sarah Palin's lies could sink our hopes for a clean energy economy.

Read Sarah Palin's op-ed, if you can stomach it:

There is no shortage of threats to our economy. America's unemployment rate recently hit its highest mark in more than 25 years and is expected to continue climbing. Worries are widespread that even when the economy finally rebounds, the recovery won't bring jobs. Our nation's debt is unsustainable, and the federal government's reach into the private sector is unprecedented.
Unfortunately, many in the national media would rather focus on the personality-driven political gossip of the day than on the gravity of these challenges. So, at risk of disappointing the chattering class, let me make clear what is foremost on my mind and where my focus will be:
I am deeply concerned about President Obama's cap-and-trade energy plan, and I believe it is an enormous threat to our economy. It would undermine our recovery over the short term and would inflict permanent damage.
American prosperity has always been driven by the steady supply of abundant, affordable energy. Particularly in Alaska, we understand the inherent link between energy and prosperity, energy and opportunity, and energy and security. Consequently, many of us in this huge, energy-rich state recognize that the president's cap-and-trade energy tax would adversely affect every aspect of the U.S. economy.
There is no denying that as the world becomes more industrialized, we need to reform our energy policy and become less dependent on foreign energy sources. But the answer doesn't lie in making energy scarcer and more expensive! Those who understand the issue know we can meet our energy needs and environmental challenges without destroying America's economy.
Job losses are so certain under this new cap-and-tax plan that it includes a provision accommodating newly unemployed workers from the resulting dried-up energy sector, to the tune of $4.2 billion over eight years. So much for creating jobs.
In addition to immediately increasing unemployment in the energy sector, even more American jobs will be threatened by the rising cost of doing business under the cap-and-tax plan. For example, the cost of farming will certainly increase, driving down farm incomes while driving up grocery prices. The costs of manufacturing, warehousing and transportation will also increase.
The ironic beauty in this plan? Soon, even the most ardent liberal will understand supply-side economics.
The Americans hit hardest will be those already struggling to make ends meet. As the president eloquently puts it, their electricity bills will "necessarily skyrocket." So much for not raising taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year.
Even Warren Buffett, an ardent Obama supporter, admitted that under the cap-and-tax scheme, "poor people are going to pay a lot more for electricity."
We must move in a new direction. We are ripe for economic growth and energy independence if we responsibly tap the resources that God created right underfoot on American soil. Just as important, we have more desire and ability to protect the environment than any foreign nation from which we purchase energy today.
In Alaska, we are progressing on the largest private-sector energy project in history. Our 3,000-mile natural gas pipeline will transport hundreds of trillions of cubic feet of our clean natural gas to hungry markets across America. We can safely drill for U.S. oil offshore and in a tiny, 2,000-acre corner of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge if ever given the go-ahead by Washington bureaucrats.
Of course, Alaska is not the sole source of American energy. Many states have abundant coal, whose technology is continuously making it into a cleaner energy source. Westerners literally sit on mountains of oil and gas, and every state can consider the possibility of nuclear energy.
We have an important choice to make. Do we want to control our energy supply and its environmental impact? Or, do we want to outsource it to China, Russia and Saudi Arabia? Make no mistake: President Obama's plan will result in the latter.
For so many reasons, we can't afford to kill responsible domestic energy production or clobber every American consumer with higher prices.
Can America produce more of its own energy through strategic investments that protect the environment, revive our economy and secure our nation?
Yes, we can. Just not with Barack Obama's energy cap-and-tax plan.

SPAIN LIBERALIZING BUT TEEN ABORTION HITS A NERVE

Spain's Socialist prime minister has irked his natural enemies on the right and in the Catholic church by legalizing gay marriage and instituting fast-track divorce. Now he has hit a raw nerve even among his supporters with a proposal to let 16-year-olds get abortions without parental consent.
The debate is harsh and emotional, showing that for all the changes Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero has introduced with his trailblazing social agenda since taking power in 2004, abortion remains sensitive in a country where most people call themselves Catholic, even if few churches are full on Sundays.
Liberalizing teen abortion is part of a broader change proposed for Spain's abortion law, the main thrust of which is to allow the procedure with no restrictions up to 14 weeks into a pregnancy.
The government gave the bill preliminary approval in May and Parliament is expected to take it up in the fall. Zapatero probably has the votes to get it passed. However, the outcry over teenagers may force him to backtrack.
Under the current law, Spanish women can in theory go to jail for getting an abortion outside certain strict limits - up to week 12 in case of rape and week 22 if the fetus is malformed. But abortion is in effect widely available because women can assert mental distress as sole grounds for having an abortion, regardless of how late the pregnancy is.
Now Zapatero is seeking to deepen his mark on Spanish society. What he's proposing wipes away the threat of imprisonment and declares abortion to be a woman's right.
"That is a qualitative change in Spanish culture and politics," said Javier del Rey, a professor of political communications at Complutense University in Madrid. "Something that had been a crime is transformed into a right."
Britain, France and Germany already allow minors to get abortions without parental permission. But here it's the issue that is dominating the debate.
The conservative opposition Popular Party asks why a girl who cannot legally buy alcohol can have an abortion without asking her parents. "The inconsistency is crushing," lawmaker Sandra Moneo wrote in the newspaper El Pais.
"No father or mother can understand the idea of a minor going through that trauma without the advice, support and opinion of her parents," Moneo said.
Zapatero's camp counters by noting that 16-year-old Spaniards can choose to have open-heart surgery or chemotherapy without parental consent, but not an abortion.
Tempers have flared on both sides. Conservatives were enraged when Bibiana Aido, the minister of equality, suggested abortion was no bigger an issue than breast enlargement.
Socialists saw red when Antonio Canizares, a Spanish cardinal who holds a key position at the Vatican, seemed to play down a report detailing decades of sexual and other abuse of children by religious orders in Ireland and said abortion was worse.
Zapatero himself was asked in a radio interview how he would feel if his daughter, after she turned 16, had an abortion without telling him.
Zapatero said he would rather she tell him, and that it was up to parents to instill that kind of trust in their kids.
"But in the end, the decision is up to the person deciding whether to voluntarily interrupt a pregnancy," the premier said.
Polling numbers are against him: A survey published last month by the newspaper La Vanguardia said 71 percent oppose the teenage abortion reform, and the proportion among Socialist voters was 60 percent. A poll in El Pais put the figures at 64 and 56 percent, respectively. Both surveys gave a margin of error of 3.2 percentage points.
Lawmaker Carmen Monton, the Socialists' point woman on the abortion bill, said it was designed to help girls from troubled families who need an abortion and cannot tell their parents.
"We are not legislating for model families with fantastic relations between parents and children. We are legislating for all of society," Monton said in an interview.
Josefina Elias, president of the polling firm Instituto Opina, said she would not be surprised if Zapatero withdraws or tones down the proposal, and some suspect he put it forward to serve as something he can concede if necessary to win passage of the broader change.
One idea already being floated is to oblige teens to tell their parents they plan to have an abortion, although not to obtain permission.
Elias said Zapatero's mistake was to forgo prior social debate about teen abortion.
"It has all been done like an elephant charging into a china shop," she said.

BRUNO

The problem with "Bruno" is Bruno himself. Compared to Borat there simply isn't enough to the character to build an entire feature-length film around him. Both spring from the brash and creative mind of British comic Sacha Baron Cohen, who unleashed them upon the world through his sketch comedy program "Da Ali G Show." Borat, the bumbling journalist at the center of the 2006 smash "Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan," provided a prism through which to explore people's prejudices, hypocrisies and foibles. Sure, Baron Cohen frequently shot fish in a barrel, but as Borat traveled across the United States trying to understand what makes us tick, the uncomfortable discoveries he made seemed endless. More importantly, for a comedy, they were usually funny. Bruno is a one-joke character in a one-joke movie, and it's a joke Baron Cohen beats into the ground. He's a flamboyantly gay Austrian fashion correspondent who repeatedly shocks people with his flamboyant gayness. The end. In small doses - on the TV show and at the film's high-energy start - he can be a hoot. Here, big laughs come intermittently, and the longer "Bruno" drags on, the more apparent it becomes that there's nothing to him. He's as vapid as the celebrity culture he's stridently spoofing - which makes it hard to care about him.

2 Stars out of 5.

JACKSON BIOGRAPHER: MICHAEL WAS GAY

Unauthorized Michael Jackson biographer and investigative celebrity reporter Ian Halperin has claimed in London’s Daily Mail that the “king of pop” was gay and that Halperin had spoken to two of Jackson's former lovers.
Halperin, who predicted in December that Jackson had six months to live and is currently at work on a book on the final years of the pop star, said that rumors Jackson had sexually abused children are false. He had no interest in children, Halperin said.
But in the article, Halperin writes, "In the course of my investigations, I spoke to two of his gay lovers, one a Hollywood waiter, the other an aspiring actor. The waiter had remained friends, perhaps more, with the singer until his death last week. He had served Jackson at a restaurant, Jackson made his interest plain, and the two slept together the following night. According to the waiter, Jackson fell in love."
In 2006, Jackson’s brother Jermaine said he and his brothers had suspected that Michael was gay.

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!

With all the progress we've made in marriage equality, domestic partnership protection, hate crimes legislation, equal employment and housing legislation, we have a lot to be proud of and can look forward to a day when we will all be equal under the American Constitution.
In acknowledgement of all the strides we've made across the U.S.A. this year-

Happy 4th of July!

SARAH PALIN RESIGNING

Supreme leader of Alaska and neighbor to Russia, Sarah Palin, has announced she will be resigning.
Palin announced at a "hastily convened" press conference earlier today that she will resign and transfer power to Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell at the end of the month. She didn't take any questions, or field any inquiries about her future plans. Common speculation has been that she's gonna make a run for the presidency in 2012.
There was a sudden press conference that had her surrounded by family earlier. That's typically more indicative of a motion of support, less one of a political maneuver/preparation.
Is Bristol pregnant again? Is more dirt going to come out on her harassment of Wasilla librarians? Or, is the model-mother pregnant herself?
Whatever the case, her bizarre, teary press-conference statement "I know when it's time to pass the ball. Some are going to question the timing of this. This decision has been in the works for a while," leaves us in the dark, for now.
Maybe she'll announce her intentions after the MJ funeral.

LA TOYA JACKSON SCENE REMOVED FROM 'BRUNO' MOVIE

The filmmakers behind “Bruno” have decided to delete a scene involving La Toya Jackson following her brother’s death.
Universal Pictures, which is releasing the comedy, said the decision came “out of respect for the Jackson family.”
The moment was first cut out of the movie’s Los Angeles premiere Thursday night, which took place just hours after the Michael Jackson’s death at age 50.
“Bruno,” starring British comic Sacha Baron Cohen as a flamboyantly gay Austrian fashion correspondent, is set to come out July 10 and is the follow-up to his 2006 smash “Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.” La Toya Jackson had been featured in an absurd interview with Bruno in which she sits on a Mexican man’s back and eats sushi off a second, naked Mexican man.
The moment is classic Baron Cohen, the kind in which he places some unsuspecting person in a weirdly deadpan situation and waits for the humiliation - and the humor - to follow. He also tries to interview Paula Abdul in this setting but she quickly feels uncomfortable and leaves. (The joke’s on the audience, too, because we don’t know which scenes are real and spontaneous and which feature players who are in on the gag.)
Jackson arrives at a contemporary L.A. home under the guise of being interviewed by Bruno, a character Baron Cohen introduced alongside Borat on his sketch comedy program “Da Ali G Show.” Because there’s no furniture in the house, Bruno asks Jackson to sit on the back of a Mexican laborer, who’s on his hands and knees functioning as a chair. Another man serves as a table with pieces of sushi spread across his naked body.
Jackson hangs out awhile and politely banters with Bruno, who asks whether she will introduce him to her brother, Michael. She tries to deflect his persistent requests but relents when he asks to see her cell phone - then he finds what is supposedly Michael Jackson’s number and reads it to his assistant in German.