We first featured Jessie J on our blog last year, but we just can’t seem to get enough of her. According to Wikipedia: Jessica Ellen Cornish (born on 27 March 1988), better known by her stage name Jessie J, is an English singer-songwriter, currently signed to Island Records. She began her career as a songwriter for artists including Chris Brown and Miley Cyrus. Her debut single, “Do It Like a Dude”, was released in November 2010 and peaked at number two on the UK Singles Charts. Follow-up single “Price Tag” reached number one in the United Kingdom, France, Ireland and New Zealand, and reached the top 10 in nineteen other countries. Her debut album, Who You Are, was released in February 2011 and charted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. In February 2011 Jessie J won a BRIT Award, Critics’ Choice. It was revealed in October 2011 that Jessie J will be a coach and a mentor on the television show, The Voice UK.

Jessie J is openly bisexual and stated in an interview on the “In Demand” radio show on March 3, 2011, “I’ve never denied it. Whoopie doo guys, yes, I’ve dated girls and I’ve dated boys – get over it.”

Check out some music videos after the jump…

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Cherry Lips

Pucker up! This delightful drink, using French Cointreau and your favorite vodka, is featured at the Eden Bar at the Eden au Lac Hotel in Zurich. Prepared with orange juice and Grenadine syrup, it will hold your taste buds captive and craving for more. And it’s quick and easy to make for your friends before you head out for a night on the town.

Ingredients:

20 ml of Vodka

20 ml Cointreau Liquor

50 ml Orange Juice

10 ml Grenadine Syrup

Directions:

Shake ice, vodka, liquor, and orange juice in a shaker intensively.

Pour in a martini glass.

Add the Grenadine Syrup carefully.

Top with a cherry.

After JC Penney launched their new campaign with Ellen DeGeneres as their spokesperson in late January, some conservatives and anti-gay activists (like OneMillionMoms), started a campaign against JC Penney. Why? Because she is an open lesbian. OneMillionMoms released a statement on their website saying that Ellen was not a true representation of the “traditional families” who shopped at JC Penney, and foretold that the store would lose sales because of this.

Read what OneMillionMoms had to say, and JC Penney’s response, after the jump.

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During a six hour-long hearing yesterday, the State Assembly passed legislation to allow gay and lesbian couples to marry in New Jersey. The Judiciary Committee passed the bill along party lines, 5-2, sending it to a battle between the Democrats and Gov. Chris Christie who has vowed to veto the legislation. Christie insists on allowing voters to decide on the issue by putting it on the ballot, but Democrats believe that this is a matter of civil rights, and has no place on the ballots for public decision. [NJ]

View supporter and opponent testimony after the jump.

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After much protest from officials, supporters, and the public, Susan G. Komen for the Cure restored halted grants to Planned Parenthood. They stated on their Facebook page that they wanted to “apologize for recent decisions that cast doubt upon our commitment to our mission of saving women’s lives.”

Just yesterday top officials like Dr. Kathy Plesser, a Manhattan radiologist on the medical advisory board of Susan G. Komen for the Cure’s New York chapter, said she would resign from the organization if they did not reverse their decision to stop grants to Planned Parenthood. Plesser joins Komen’s top public health official, Mollie Williams, and the executive director of Komen’s Los Angeles County chapter, Deb Anthony, both of whom also threatened to resign in protest.

After Susan G. Komen for the Cure reported they would stop the funding of 19 Planned Parenthood affiliates last week, many speculated it was the cause of right-wing anti-abortionist pressures, and nothing to do with an investigation of the affiliates, as Komen for the Cure claimed. [CBS]

Our original desire was to fulfill our fiduciary duty to our donors by not funding grant applications made by organizations under investigation. We will amend the criteria to make clear that disqualifying investigations must be criminal and conclusive in nature and not political. That is what is right and fair.

 

 

According to this information we just received from GLSEN: Anti-LGBT extremists are campaigning to make this Sunday’s Super Bowl a showcase for intolerance. Anti-gay activist Linda Harvey of Mission America is trying to pressure Grazie Media — owner of the Jumbotron outside the Super Bowl stadium in Indianapolis — to cancel air time it generously donated to GLSEN. That would have meant pulling the plug on highly visible presentations of our ThinkB4YouSpeak public service ads featuring NBA star Grant Hill and comedian Wanda Sykes.

Thank Grazie Media for Standing Strong Against Anti-LGBT Extremism. Grazie Media has stood against the pressure, and we want them to know they did the right thing and have the strongest gratitude of GLSEN supporters. We need your help to send a strong message of support to Grazie Media right now. Yours is critical. Just click on the link below, and add your name and email address to our letter.

Grazie Media will know right away that people like you won’t tolerate organized anti-LGBT bigotry. Harvey and her followers are counting on a wave of publicity about their attack on GLSEN and LGBT and allied youth. Grazie Media must know fair-minded people like you are speaking out, too.

Sign Our Thank-You Letter to Grazie. Keep the Super Bowl Safe for GLSEN’s Anti-Bullying Message

Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN), with sponsorship by ChatterBlast Media, a Philadelphia-based social media strategy firm, today announced a nationwide contest that invites supporters of LGBT military equality to design its Twentieth Anniversary t-shirt. The contest will be conducted entirely via Facebook, allowing participants to enter an unlimited number of submissions. The winner will be chosen via Facebook votes and announced at SLDN’s Twentieth Annual National Dinner on Saturday, March 3, 2012 in Washington, D.C. The first SLDN national dinner since the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT) last September, the event will mark the kickoff of a year-long celebration of the organization’s twentieth year of service to the nation’s LGBT service members. SLDN was founded in 1993, shortly after the passage of the discriminatory DADT law.

“This is an exciting time to be an advocate for full LGBT equality in the military, and we are thrilled to invite SLDN’s supporters to get involved in helping us design the t-shirt that will commemorate this anniversary year,” said Army Veteran and SLDN Executive Director Aubrey Sarvis. The shirt will be available for sale via SLDN’s web site and will be used at events across the country throughout the Twentieth Anniversary celebration.

The contest begins today, with submissions accepted through February 13. Voting will take place online February 14 – 24. For the full contest rules and to enter,visit SLDN’s Facebook page here.

If you love food, the Food Network, the beach, and the excitement of Miami, quickly grab your tickets to The Food Network South Beach Wine & Food Festival taking place from February 23-26. Guests include Food Network cooking geniuses Guy Fieri, Emeril Lagasse, Anne Burrell, Paula Dean, Bobby Flay, Geoffrey Zakarain, Robert Irvine, and more. If these chefs aren’t enough to make your belly rumble, then participate in events such as Conscious Bite Out, which teaches you how to cook from local, fresh ingredients, or check out The Q After Dark and sip fine cocktails while dancing the night away. When you’re done indulging, burn some calories on South Beach’s iconic stretch. For an up close and personal look at Lee Schrager, the man who started the South Beach Wine & Food Festival, visit Amazon.com for a copy of the February issue of Passport Magazine.

The U.S. Government No Fly List has reached a staggering 21,000 names! According to a report from CBS News the Obama administration is using whatever means necessary to prevent terrorist attacks in the USA. But many people are also very concerned about what this means for civil liberties for American citizens. How does someone get on the No Fly List? What other lists is the U.S. Government keeping, and why is everything about these lists Top Secret? Take a look at the CBS report and let us no what you think.

We know our tech-savvy readers and travelers all enjoy the convenience of laptops, iPads, Smartphones, etc. The beauty of apps, for example, allows our readers to subscribe to Passport Magazine from their iPad and iPhone. However, the inhumane abuse of workers who create this useful technology has us considering a boycott of Apple. In the past couple weeks, publications like The New York Times and Slate Magazine have released articles about the working conditions in the factory’s where Apple builds all their products. The findings were not pretty.

Read more after the jump…

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