Hasta La Gadget!

Former Vice President Joe Biden acknowledged the challenges facing the LGBTQ community under President Donald Trump in a fiery, impassioned speech this week. 

Speaking at a Democratic National Committee (DNC) LGBT gala in New York Wednesday, the 74-year-old urged queer rights advocates to push back against Trump, who ran on an explicitly anti-LGBTQ platform. 

“The first thing you should do, even though he won’t respond, is hold President Trump accountable for his pledge to be your friend,” Biden said in his speech, which can be viewed in the video above. Pointing to a 2016 tweet in which Trump vowed to “fight” on the community’s behalf, Biden added, “Demonstrate that public opinion and history are on our side! Just because you don’t have Barack [Obama] and me in the White House doesn’t mean it’s time to give up, keep quiet, stay in the sidelines.”

Though Trump was touted by The New York Times as having “more accepting” views on LGBTQ issues than many Republicans on the campaign trail, the president’s first months in office have been anything but queer-friendly. The Trump administration stripped policies protecting transgender students’ bathroom rights in February, just weeks before the Census Bureau announced questions relating to sexual orientation or gender identity would be removed from the 2020 census. Though the president has called himself a friend of the LGBTQ community, the White House has stayed silent on Pride Month.  

Biden, meanwhile, saluted Pride Month in his Wednesday speech, calling it a time to “honor generations of brave activists.” 

“Most change occurs culturally long before it occurs governmentally. The country is way ahead of the political leadership,” he said. “We’ve come this far because you spoke up for who you are, and you didn’t ask, you demanded justice which has long been denied despite some vicious voices of intolerance that tried to drown you out.” 

Biden spoke out in the past against the Trump administration for having “shift[ed] the focus” on LGBTQ issues. “As much great work as we’ve done, we face some real challenges ahead,” he said in March. “We thought things were moving in the right direction.” 

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TV shows made in New York might soon be hiring more women and people of color. 

Just before adjourning for the summer, the New York state legislature passed a bill late Wednesday that carves out $5 million of the state’s $420 million film tax credit program for diversity hires in writer and director roles.

The bill aims to “enhance the diversity of stories and casts” by targeting creators. The plan found broad support among writers, including Tina Fey, the Writers Guild of America and the Directors Guild of America. (HuffPost is unionized under the auspices of the WGA-East.)

Focusing on TV shows, generally produced more quickly and in greater number than film projects, maximizes the measure’s impact. And considering so many projects are filmed in New York (City, particularly) that there’s been a sound stage shortage, it seems viewers may start noticing a broader array of stories pretty soon.

The bill must still be signed by Gov. Andrew Cuomo to take effect.

Sponsored by state Sen. Marisol Alcantara and Assemblyman Marcos Crespo, the measure is nearly identical to a bill currently pending in California, Deadline notes. A number of states have introduced tax credit programs to lure jobs and potential tourism dollars, but none include diversity provisions aimed at changing the finished products.

Since it will be a first of its kind, the bill’s actual effectiveness remains to be seen. But research supports the idea that behind-the-scenes diversity influences what we see on screen.

Welcome to Battleground, where art and activism meet.

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In terms sharper than anything else he’s offered in his post-presidency, Barack Obama lashed into Senate Republicans on Thursday for pushing a health care bill that he framed as fundamentally inhumane. 

“The Senate bill, unveiled today, is not a health care bill,” the former president wrote in a Facebook post. “It’s a massive transfer of wealth from middle-class and poor families to the richest people in America. It hands enormous tax cuts to the rich and to the drug and insurance industries, paid for by cutting health care for everybody else. Those with private insurance will experience higher premiums and higher deductibles, with lower tax credits to help working families cover the costs, even as their plans might no longer cover pregnancy, mental health care, or expensive prescriptions. Discrimination based on pre-existing conditions could become the norm again. Millions of families will lose coverage entirely.” 

“Simply put, if there’s a chance you might get sick, get old, or start a family ― this bill will do you harm,” he added. “And small tweaks over the course of the next couple weeks, under the guise of making these bills easier to stomach, cannot change the fundamental meanness at the core of this legislation.” 

Obama has been relatively muted on these matters since leaving the White House, choosing to weigh in on some major debates in only the most surface-level of terms. But the Affordable Care Act is his signature domestic achievement and his willingness to chime in with harsh indictments indicates that he, too, thinks it is under existential threat. 

And he’s probably right. A few weeks ago, it wasn’t entirely clear whether the Senate would be able to put together a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. But an incredibly secretive legislative process culminated on Thursday with the unveiling of legislation that would dramatically scale back Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, potentially weaken protections for consumers, and likely swell the ranks of the uninsured. 

Obama won’t sway the votes of any legislators on the Hill. But his commentary is likely designed to encourage activism among his supporters. And it’s notable that he framed his critique in a similar vein to what President Donald Trump offered when he deemed the House and Senate health care bills “mean.” 

“I hope our Senators ask themselves ― what will happen to the Americans grappling with opioid addiction who suddenly lose their coverage?” Obama wrote. “What will happen to pregnant mothers, children with disabilities, poor adults and seniors who need long-term care once they can no longer count on Medicaid? What will happen if you have a medical emergency when insurance companies are once again allowed to exclude the benefits you need, send you unlimited bills, or set unaffordable deductibles? What impossible choices will working parents be forced to make if their child’s cancer treatment costs them more than their life savings?”

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Is it a sign of the times or simply the eccentric reaction of one person?

A Donald Trump supporter in Boerne, Texas, has paid for a billboard telling ABC News he is angry they are covering a legitimate news story.

Of course, he didn’t phrase it in exactly those terms.

Kyle Courtney grew up watching ABC News, but he’s angry that the network keeps harping on all those pesky allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 election.

You know, stories such as former Homeland Security Chief Jeh Johnson telling a congressional committee Wednesday exactly how Russia meddled in the vote.

Courtney decided to make his thoughts very public this week with the billboard in the city about 40 miles northwest of Texas that says:

“ABC News: I grew up with you. We are through. The Russians didn’t elect Donald Trump. I did.”

It should be noted that Courtney didn’t actually elect Trump, the Electoral College did. Trump won 30 states and 306 Electoral College votes even though about 3 million more people voted for Hillary Clinton.

Courtney’s sign is expected to stay up for two months, according to the Fox News San Antonio affiliate.

Courtney, who runs a business drilling water wells, gave a statement to HuffPost elaborating on why he’s angry: 

“ABC News was the only channel I watched as a child growing up in Texas but I think they have lost touch with America and forgotten the working man. They don’t represent our voice anymore. Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign was funded by the Clinton Foundation in close coordination with the media, and now we’re seeing them try to fix what they couldn’t fix during the election. They are doing everything they can, night after night, to create narratives and sway people’s direction to impeach Donald Trump. Our democracy is at stake when a major political party and the media are in bed together. I’m not asking anyone to boycott the Democratic Party. I’m not in the brainwashing business, but the liberal media is.”

He says the support he’s getting for his breakup billboard is overwhelming.

“I’m considering starting a GoFundMe campaign to raise money to buy up vacant billboards for various Trump supporters who otherwise couldn’t afford it to make their voices known,” he told HuffPost by email.

Courtney also says he won’t change his mind about ABC even if the evidence proves Trump’s campaign colluded with Russia.

“This was not an easy decision. For 35 years I have watched how their agenda has changed. This didn’t just start with Donald Trump, I watched them systematically destroy George Bush and hand us Barack Obama on a silver platter.” 

A spokeswoman for the network in New York, asked for a response, emailed HuffPost: “Thank you for the heads up. I’m sorry we don’t have anything to add.” 

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Courteney Cox has a lot of thoughts on raising kids today.

The 53-year-old actress and her ex-husband David Arquette have a 13-year-old named Coco. In an interview with New Beauty, Cox opened up about motherhood, miscarriages and wanting to have another kid. 

In the interview, Cox said Coco likes to experiment with makeup in her spare time, though she can only wear mascara at school. 

“I know some people think I should rein her in with the makeup, but it’s a form of self-expression. As long as she’s not sexualizing herself, it’s really just what makes her feel good,” she said, adding she admittedly sometimes has concerns about the length of her daughter’s shorts. “But I want to keep an open relationship with her. I care more about what she’s watching than what she’s putting on her face.” 

Cox also opened up about health struggles she’s faced. The actress told New Beauty she discovered she has an MTHFR gene mutation, which affects her body’s methylation and can cause a host of mental and physical health problems. 

“I suffered miscarriages, my dad died of a really rare cancer, and depression runs in my family, which made my doctor think I should get this gene checked out,” she explained. As a result, she changed her diet and started taking a vitamin to help keep the effects under control. 

Cox is currently in a relationship with Irish musician Johnny McDaid. In the interview, she spoke about wanting to have a child with him.

“I would love to have a baby now. I mean, I could carry someone else’s egg. I may be one of the older people doing it, but I would love to, with Johnny that is,” she said.

She added, “I know it’s crazy, but I would.”

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