Nice story, though
The brother of 2020 presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg's husband has said the scenario the South Bend, Indiana, mayor's campaign is spinning about Chasten Buttigieg is false.
The campaign portrays Chasten as growing "up with nothing and his parents kicked him out," said Rhyan Glezman.
But he said the family was not poor, that his brother had his own phone and his car insurance paid for, and that his brother had not been kicked out of the house.
Though the family disagreed on Chasten's choices, Glezman said, the family members were not bigoted, they hosted Chasten's boyfriends in their home, and that he had gone to a baseball game with Buttigieg and his brother.
"To me, that's very sad," he said. "If that's all you have to stand on, you're not fit to be president of the United States."
Glezman said he supports President Donald Trump and could not vote for his brother-in-law because of "his extreme view on abortion," his desire for open borders, his hope for changing the Electoral College and his determination "to change the makeup of the Supreme Court."
"Those are things that are very important to me," he said.
Hear no evil
A play set for Washington, D.C., that sheds light on the effort to bring down President Donald Trump, based on the actual text messages between FBI lawyer Lisa Page and her lover, former FBI agent Peter Strzok, no longer has a home.
The Mead Theatre, part of Studio Theatre, was to host filmmaker Phelim McAleer's production of "FBI Lovebirds: UnderCovers," in June.
The theater blamed "threats of violence made surrounding it which raise legitimate safety and security concerns," but McAleer debunked that by mentioning the one tweet that had been in any way threatening and cited the real reason.
"This is censorship of facts that they want to keep hidden from the American people," he said, "and they are hiding behind 'safety concerns' in order to squash diversity of opinions in the theater."
McAleer added, "The people who run the Studio-Mead Theatre are hypocrites and they are cowards, scared of a play that tells the truth and might challenge their cozy bubble." He said he felt the play eventually would get a venue and it would be filmed for digital release as planned.
A news release from McAleer last week further exposed the left's fears.
"Verbatim theater," the former journalist said, "really scares the intolerant left because they can't challenge the words. There is nothing added. These are the actual words and texts of Strzok and Page and they are shown in all their conspiratorial plots, using the power of the FBI and the intelligence services, trying to stop Trump being elected and then trying to undermine his presidency."
The cult of Bernie
A former Bernie Sanders staffer says the cult following of the 2020 Democratic presidential candidate is such that his voters may not jump on the bandwagon of just any candidate if Sanders loses in the primaries.
Tezlyn Figaro said on Fox News last week that the Vermont U.S. senator would likely support the ticket, but "he can't control, you know, his supporters. The playbook is very clear. Sanders supporters attack, attack, attack anyone that challenges Sen. Sanders."
She said they've even done that to her.
"This morning," Figaro said, "I was added to a list called 'human garbage' [by Sanders supporters], and I'm not even running for president."
She termed those following the self-proclaimed democratic socialist more of a cult.
"It's bigger than just [current poll leader] Joe Biden," Figaro said. "We have 20-plus candidates who are running for the Democratic nomination. Sanders supporters are very clear if anyone challenges 'King Sanders,' they are there to destroy and divide and there will be no unity. We can pretend there is, but I know the playbook and I know it well, and we will see it all play out in the next year."
For the fashionista feminista
New for 2020, Gucci has a new line of abortion-wear.
Creative director Alessandro Michele, according to the Associated Press, has "made a clear abortion rights message" with its new line.
For instance, a jacket used in a fashion show at Rome's Capitolene Museum last week included the 1970s phrase "My body, my choice."
Elsewhere, a dress featured an embroidered flowery uterus. "I wanted to portray the idea that to interrupt a pregnancy" - abort, that is - "does not wipe out the garden, the flower, that is the uterus of every woman," said Michele.
Pieces in the collection also included the date May 22, 1978 ("22 05 1978"), when abortion was legalized in Italy. In promoting the items with the date, though, the company's social media chose to use the term "voluntary interruption of pregnancy" instead of the usually used term "voluntary termination of pregnancy."
"Gucci," according to Refinery29, "wants the social media record to reflect that it is now on the right side of history."