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A decision Thursday by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) will apply new restrictive anti-family pressure on nations wanting to host the Olympic Games. On December 8, the IOC unanimously approved a wide-ranging package of 40 recommendations, the Olympic Agenda 2020, that includes a rewording of its anti-discrimination Principle 6 clause to include a reference to "sexual orientation" as a protected category.Hosting the games, or ‘belonging to the Olympic movement’ as its styled by the IOC, “requires compliance with the Olympic Charter and recognition by the IOC." Thus, countries hoping to host Olympic Games in the future, such as the two...

President Obama made a surprise video appearance at the opening ceremonies of the 2014 Gay Games in Cleveland on Saturday. Joining Greg Louganis, Lance Bass, the Pointer Sisters, and Broadway’s Andrea McArdle and Alex Newell in celebrating the event, Obama said, “Since 1982 the Gay Games have given lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender athletes and supporters around the world a chance to come together to compete, celebrate, and inspire others.” President Obama, who is vacationing on Martha’s Vineyard, noted how the country has changed since the games began in 1982. “We’ve also seen America change in that time, even since...

Johnny Weir and Victor Voronov have decided to call it quits, the figure skating commentator announced on Twitter. "It is with great sadness that I announce that my husband and I are no longer together. My heart hurts, and I wish him well," he wrote yesterday. Even though this relationship didn't work out, Weir, 29, let his fans know he hasn't given up on love. "No matter what, I am a cheerleader of love and partnership and creation. I am sad yet I am thankful that I was loved and that I could love," he added. Voronov added that he...

The United States announced Monday it would boycott the upcoming Paralympic Games in Sochi to protest Russia’s incursion into Ukraine, as a State Department spokesperson said it was “likely” that the U.S. would impose sanctions on Russia. The boycott effectively means a presidential delegation will not be attending the games, an announcement that comes as President Obama and Congress scramble to respond to Russia’s aggression on Ukrainian territory in Crimea. “In addition to other measures we are taking in response to the situation in Ukraine, the United States will no longer send a Presidential Delegation to the upcoming Winter Paralympic...

Christ, they must just be laughing hysterically at the Kremlin right now. They know he isn't going to do anything of any consequence. History is written by THE VICTORS, not ideological, rhetorical idiots. This is all for US Domestic consumption, to counter the appearance of being weak. The problem is, it's tough to walk back this kind of rhetoric.

OTTAWA - The U.S. president now owes Prime Minister Stephen Harper two cases of beer — Samuel Adams brand, specifically. The friendly bet was made earlier in the week in Mexico, where the two leaders met for the North American Leaders' Summit. After the Canadian women's Olympic hockey team came back to tie their Yankee rivals in the last minute of the game and win the gold in overtime, Harper announced via Twitter he was looking forward to his case of beer from Barack Obama. After the Canadian men's Olympic team defeated their American rivals Friday in a 1-0 shutout,...

SOCHI, Russia (AP) — An Italian gay-rights activist says she was detained by police in the Olympic host city after being stopped while carrying a rainbow flag saying "Gay is OK" in Russian. Vladimir Luxuria, a former Communist lawmaker in the Italian parliament who has become a prominent transgender rights crusader, said on her website and Twitter feed that she was held for several hours Sunday before being released. It was not known if she was charged with any offense. Her website published a photograph of her after her release. Before her arrest, she tweeted: "I'm in Sochi. Greetings in...

Several American doubles lugers said they were irritated by a popular Canadian video celebrating diversity that pokes fun at their sport. The Canadian Institute of Diversity and Inclusion recently released a promotional video that shows doubles luge, a sport in which one rider lies on top of the other as they sled down the track. At the end of the video is the tagline: “The Games have always been a little gay. Let’s fight to keep it that way.” “They’re making fun of our sport for their cause and it doesn’t really make a lot of sense to me,” Christian...

SOCHI, Russia, Feb 10 (Reuters) - Irina Rodnina, the figure skater who lit the Olympic flame at the Sochi Games, blamed hackers on Monday for a tweet about U.S. President Barack Obama that caused a racism row. Some Western media questioned the choice of Russia's triple Olympic champion Rodnina featuring in the climax of the Games opening ceremony on Friday. A tweet on her timeline last year showed a picture of Obama which was photoshopped to add a banana in the foreground. The image angered many including the outgoing U.S. ambassador to Russia, Michael McFaul, who called it "outrageous behaviour"....

President Obama says part of Russian President Vladimir Putin's "shtick" is to look like the tough guy in Russia. "I think that’s where some of these perceptions come up," Mr. Obama said. "My sense is that’s part of his shtick back home politically as wanting to look like the tough guy. U.S. politicians have a different style. We tend to smile once in a while. ..." ...""There is no doubt we wanted to make it very clear that we do not abide by discrimination in anything, including discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation,..."

SOCHI, Russia, A Minnesota businessman says he hopes to alleviate one of the many pains in the neck to surface at the Sochi Olympics -- a shortage of pillows for athletes. Mike Lindell, founder and chief executive officer of My Pillow, said he had heard rumblings of the shortage and was even called by a Chicago radio station, asking if his company would intervene. Lindell agreed and has readied a shipment of 3,000 pillows to be sent via FedEx to Sochi, the (Minneapolis) Star-Tribune reported Saturday. The only problem -- he doesn't know where to send them. Multiple shipping addresses...

FULL TITLE: Rob Ford asks for Pride flag — just raised at City Hall to support gay rights at Sochi — be taken down Police investigating threat against Rob Ford, mayor's office says Mayor Rob Ford demanded on Friday that officials remove a rainbow-coloured flag raised at Toronto City Hall in solidarity with the gay community in Russia during the Olympics, prompting fresh accusations that he is homophobic. The mayor duct-taped a Canadian flag to his office window overlooking Nathan Phillips Square shortly after officials pulled down a City of Toronto flag from a “courtesy” flagpole on city hall’s roof...

Coming just a week after Coke made waves when it aired the first Super Bowl ad to showcase a set of same-sex parents, the car-maker's new campaign is called "The New Us" and portrays a series of wide-ranging families. "And while what it means to be a family hasn't changed," intones the Chevrolet narration over clips that include nuclear families, mixed race couples, adoptive parents, gay and lesbian parents, combinations of the above, and others, "what a family looks like, has. This is the new us." The games have been criticized for taking place in Russia, which has made "gay...

SOCHI — The protest was tiny by any global, urban standard. But the sentiment of the pair of men holding the signs was unmistakably loud. On a promenade in front of this city’s main railway station, one man held a placard, written in Russian and topped with an American flag, that read, GOD BLESS PUTIN BECAUSE HE IS AGAINST THE SIN OF SODOMY AND GOD BELIEVES IT IS DISGUSTING. Another raised a sign in English, this one surmounted by a Russian flag, with four boldfaced words: HOMO SEX IS SIN. Protests in and around these Olympic Winter Games are supposed...

Former Arizona Governor and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano will be part of the United States delegation to the Winter Olympics in Sochi next month.

What to ask the ruler? Last summer I joined the presidential press pool in Sochi, Russia, the home of February's Olympics. Russian president -- and self-appointed Sochi Games manager -- Vladimir Putin was in town to christen an Olympic hockey rink and watch a junior game between the U.S. and Russia. The woman from his press office said I would have the chance to ask him a question. This was a significant proposal. Putin holds just one press conference a year, and even that is more like an autograph session. I hopped inside the van outside the Sochi Breeze Spa...

A law in Russia banning "homosexual propaganda" has been condemned by critics, who say it incites hatred. But a day hunting and relaxing in the forest - and hearing some extreme views - suggests it has plenty of support. Saunas are supposed to be relaxing but the prospect of this one filled me with dread. I was to share it with two heavily armed Russian hunters - Yuri, a steely-eyed veteran of Russia's bloody war in Afghanistan, and Georgy, a burly businessmen who cut his teeth during the violent chaos that consumed Russia after the fall of communism. That afternoon,...

This a collection of articles reflecting the developing news from Russia. The short of it is that a popular theologian, professor and thinker Deacon Kurayev decided to publicly condemn homosexuality and possibly pedophilia in his beloved Orthodox Church, to which he has every intention to remain faithful. The accusations take the form of a series of publications in Kuraev's blog; the accounts from the victims are published and the peculiar pattern of careers blocked or promoted based apparently on the intimacy of the candidate to a gay sponsor. The abuse itself is rarely criminal (other than grounds for a harassment...

MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin said Friday that gay people have nothing to fear in Russia as long as they leave children alone. Putin met with a group of volunteers in the Olympic mountain venue at Krasnaya Polyana near Sochi on Friday to wish them success at the Games. During a question-and-answer session, a volunteer asked him about Russia’s attitudes toward gays, a subject that has provoked worldwide controversy, and Putin offered what was apparently meant to be a reassuring answer for visitors to the Olympics. “One can feel calm and at ease,” he said. “Just leave kids alone, please.”...

MSNBC host Thomas Roberts said Monday that “many people consider President Obama to be the first gay president.” Roberts was speaking to Shawn Gaylord of Human Rights First, a group fighting discrimination against homosexuals and other sexual minorities. The organization is pushing the White House to defy Russia’s harsh anti-gay laws by sending openly gay delegates to next year’s Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. “It’s not about asking for special protection,” Roberts claimed. “It’s about asking and seeking equal respect. We do know as we look at the larger picture here, Shawn, that LGBT rights is just one of the...