BEVERLY HILLS, California (Reuters) – Hollywood actress Jodie Foster confirmed long-running speculation that she is gay by coming out at the Golden Globes awards on Sunday, but joked she wouldn’t be holding a news conference to discuss her private life.
The notoriously private Foster stunned the audience of stars and Hollywood powerbrokers as she accepted a life-time achievement awarded by announcing she was now single.
“Seriously, I hope that you’re not disappointed that there won’t be a big-coming-out speech tonight,” she said, “because I already did my coming out about a thousand years ago back in the Stone Age.”
Foster said she had always been up front with trusted friends and family about her sexual orientation.
“But now apparently, I’m told that every celebrity is expected to honor the details of their private life with a press conference … that’s just not me,” she said.
Foster, 50, then talked to her “ex-partner in love” Cydney Bernard, from whom she recently split, and their two sons in the audience.
“Thank you Cyd, I am so proud of our modern family, our amazing sons,” Foster said.
Over the years, Foster had come under withering criticism from the gay community for not publicly recognizing she was gay.
The two-time best actress Oscar winner for “The Silence of the Lambs” and “The Accused” said she had valued her privacy because of her early acting career, which started at the age of three.
“If you had been a public figure from the time that you were a toddler, if you’d had to fight for a life that felt real and honest and normal against all odds, then maybe you, too, might value privacy above all else,” she said.
(This story is corrected with spelling of Bernard’s first name to Cydney in paras 6 and 7)
(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy and Mary Milliken; Editing by Jon Boyle)
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When I first heard former President Bill Clinton talk about his vegan diet, I was inspired to make the switch myself. After all, if a man with a penchant for fast-food burgers and Southern cooking could go vegan, surely I could too.
At the grocery store, I stocked up on vegan foods, including almond milk (that was the presidential recommendation), and faux turkey and cheese to replicate my daughter’s favorite sandwich. But despite my good intentions, my cold-turkey attempt to give up, well, turkey (as well as other meats, dairy and eggs) didn’t go well. My daughter and I couldn’t stand the taste of almond milk, and the fake meat and cheese were unappealing.
Since then, I’ve spoken with numerous vegan chefs and diners who say it can be a challenge to change a lifetime of eating habits overnight. They offer the following advice for stocking your vegan pantry and finding replacements for key foods like cheese and other dairy products.
NONDAIRY MILK Taste all of them to find your favorite. Coconut and almond milks (particularly canned coconut milk) are thicker and good to use in cooking, while rice milk is thinner and is good for people who are allergic to nuts or soy. My daughter and I both prefer the taste of soy milk and use it in regular or vanilla flavor for fruit smoothies and breakfast cereal.
NONDAIRY CHEESE Cheese substitutes are available under the brand names Daiya, Tofutti and Follow Your Heart, among others, but many vegans say there’s no fake cheese that satisfies as well as the real thing. Rather than use a packaged product, vegan chefs prefer to make homemade substitutes using cashews, tofu, miso or nutritional yeast. At Candle 79, a popular New York vegan restaurant, the filling for saffron ravioli with wild mushrooms and cashew cheese is made with cashews soaked overnight and then blended with lemon juice, olive oil, water and salt.
THINK CREAMY, NOT CHEESY Creaminess and richness can often be achieved without a cheese substitute. For instance, Chloe Coscarelli, a vegan chef and the author of “Chloe’s Kitchen,” has created a pizza with caramelized onion and butternut squash that will make you forget it doesn’t have cheese; the secret is white-bean and garlic purée. She also offers a creamy, but dairy-free, avocado pesto pasta. My daughter and I have discovered we actually prefer the rich flavor of butternut squash ravioli, which can be found frozen and fresh in supermarkets, to cheese-filled ravioli.
NUTRITIONAL YEAST The name is unappetizing, but many vegan chefs swear by it: it’s a natural food with a roasted, nutty, cheeselike flavor. Ms. Coscarelli uses nutritional yeast flakes in her “best ever” baked macaroni and cheese (found in her cookbook). “I’ve served this to die-hard cheese lovers,” she told me, “and everyone agrees it is comparable, if not better.”
Susan Voisin’s Web site, Fat Free Vegan Kitchen, offers a nice primer on nutritional yeast, noting that it’s a fungus (think mushrooms!) that is grown on molasses and then harvested and dried with heat. (Baking yeast is an entirely different product.) Nutritional yeasts can be an acquired taste, she said, so start with small amounts, sprinkling on popcorn, stirring into mashed potatoes, grinding with almonds for a Parmesan substitute or combining with tofu to make an eggless omelet. It can be found in Whole Foods, in the bulk aisle of natural-foods markets or online.
BUTTER This is an easy fix. Vegan margarines like Earth Balance are made from a blend of oils and are free of trans fats. Varieties include soy-free, whipped and olive oil.
EGGS Ms. Coscarelli, who won the Food Network’s Cupcake Wars with vegan cupcakes, says vinegar and baking soda can help baked goods bind together and rise, creating a moist and fluffy cake without eggs. Cornstarch can substitute for eggs to thicken puddings and sauces. Vegan pancakes are made with a tablespoon of baking powder instead of eggs. Frittatas and omelets can be replicated with tofu.
Finally, don’t try to replicate your favorite meaty foods right away. If you love a juicy hamburger, meatloaf or ham sandwich, you are not going to find a meat-free version that tastes the same. Ms. Voisin advises new vegans to start slow and eat a few vegan meals a week. Stock your pantry with lots of grains, lentils and beans and pile your plate with vegetables. To veganize a recipe, start with a dish that is mostly vegan already — like spaghetti — and use vegetables or a meat substitute for the sauce.
“Trying to recapture something and find an exact substitute is really hard,” she said. “A lot of people will try a vegetarian meatloaf right after they become vegetarian, and they hate it. But after you get away from eating meat for a while, you’ll find you start to develop other tastes, and the flavor of a lentil loaf with seasonings will taste great to you. It won’t taste like meat loaf, but you’ll appreciate it for itself.”
Ms. Voisin notes that she became a vegetarian and then vegan while living in a small town in South Carolina; she now lives in Jackson, Miss.
“If I can be a vegan in these not-quite-vegan-centric places, you can do it anywhere,” she said. “I think people who try to do it all at once overnight are more apt to fail. It’s a learning process.”
What are your vegantips? We’re collecting suggestions on ingredients, recipes and strategies.
The Coca-Cola Company began a new television ad campaign Monday aimed at getting on the healthy side of the national debate over obesity — a novel step for a company built on sugary soft drinks.
“We’d like people to come together on something that concerns all of us, obesity,” began the two-minute ad, which is scheduled to run during prime-time cable news shows. “The long-term health of our families and our country is at stake, and as the nation’s leading beverage company, we can play an important role.”
The ad goes on to promote steps Coke has taken, like putting calorie counts on “the front” of its cans and other packaging and increasing the number of its brands sold in smaller cans, to help consumers make healthier choices.
“There’s a really important conversation going on out there about obesity, and we want to be a part of it because our consumer is telling us they want us to be a part of it,” said Stuart Kronauge, general manager for sparkling beverages at Coca-Cola North America.
This ad is aimed at policy makers, but a second ad, to be broadcast Wednesday during the first episode of the new season for “American Idol,” will focus on consumers, emphasizing the calories in a can of soda and offering ideas about how to work them off, like walking the dog for 25 minutes, doing a victory dance or even laughing.
The ads establish a link between the company and its products and obesity, which could be risky. “We thought about that, but we’ve learned that consumers love more information from us — and we really believe Coke has the power to connect people in a way that can help solve issues,” Ms. Kronauge said.
It is the first time the company has gone on the offensive to tackle widespread criticism that sugary sodas are one of the biggest contributors to the obesity epidemic, and the ads drew criticism even before they were shown.
“This is not about changing the products but about confusing the public,” said Michele R. Simon, a public health lawyer who writes frequently about the food and beverage business and its role in public health issues on her blog, Appetite for Profit. “They are downplaying the serious health effects of drinking too much soda and making it sound like balancing soda consumption with exercise is the only issue, when there are plenty of other reasons not to consume too much of these kinds of products.”
Ms. Simon dismissed the ads as pure public relations and noted that the industry faced an onslaught of public health efforts to curb consumption of sugary sodas, like efforts around the country to impose taxes on high-sugar drinks and Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s move to restrict the sizes of sodas sold in movie theaters and other spots in New York City.
The American Beverage Association, the organization that represents the industry, has filed a lawsuit against New York City and has fought successfully so far to defeat soda tax initiatives. Sales of carbonated sodas in general and sugary sodas in particular continue to slide, however, as consumers choose water, juices and other alternatives.
“They are clearly running scared and for good reason,” said Harold Goldstein, executive director of the California Center for Public Health Advocacy, which led the charge to get sugary sodas out of schools.
Dr. Goldstein said that if Coke really wanted to do something to reduce consumption of sugary sodas, it would sell them for a higher price than its other low- and no-calorie beverages. “Instead of spending millions on a P.R. campaign that will do nothing to combat obesity, diabetes and tooth decay, they would reap profits and change the beverage consumption of Americans in a big and beneficial way,” he said.
John Sicher, publisher of Beverage Digest and a longtime observer of the industry, said he thought soda companies had for too long avoided the issue of obesity as criticism mounted. “Letting the industry’s adversaries define it isn’t smart or in its self-interest,” he said.
CAIRO—
The ruling was a victory for the ailing Mubarak and his Interior minister, Habib Adli, who also won his appeal. Both men, who had been sentenced to life in prison, face other criminal charges and are likely to remain in detention until a new trial in the deaths by security forces of more than 800 protesters.
“The previous ruling was unfair and illegal,” said Yousry Abdelrazeg, one of Mubarak’s lawyers, who accused the judge in the first trial of political bias. “The case was just a mess and there was no evidence against Mubarak.”
No date has been set for the new trial.
The court’s decision comes amid turmoil over an Islamist-backed constitution and outrage over the expanded powers of Islamist President Mohamed Morsi. It means a bloody chapter in Egypt’s 2011 revolt will be revisited with the prospect that Mubarak, whose police state ruled for 30 years, may be absolved in a case that deepened the nation’s political differences and impassioned the Arab world.
Mubarak was convicted in June of not preventing the deaths of hundreds of protesters attacked by police and snipers during the uprising, which began on Jan. 25, 2011, and ended 18 days later when he stepped aside and the military seized power.
Mubarak argued that he had not ordered the crackdown and was unaware of the extent of the violence. A recently completed government-ordered investigation into the killings, however, reportedly found that Mubarak had monitored the deadly response by security forces in Tahrir Square via a live television feed.
The appeals court ruling came a day after prosecutors announced an investigation into allegations that Mubarak, 84, received about $1 million in illicit gifts from Al Ahram, the country’s leading state-owned newspaper. The former president has reportedly been in a military hospital since December after he fell in a prison bathroom and injured himself.
Last year’s trial riveted the nation with images of the aging Mubarak wheeled into the defendant’s cage on a stretcher, his arms crossed and his eyes hidden behind sunglasses.
jeffrey.fleishman@latimes.com
(Special correspondent Reem Abdellatif contributed to this report)
DAVENPORT, Iowa (AP) — An Iowa man has been reunited with his sister 65 years after the siblings were separated in foster care thanks to a 7-year-old friend who searched Facebook.
Sixty-six-year-old Clifford Boyson of Davenport met his 70-year-old sister, Betty Billadeau, in person on Saturday. Billadeau drove up from her home in Florissant, Mo., with her daughter and granddaughter for the reunion.
Boyson and Billadeau both tried to find each other for years without success.
Then 7-year-old Eddie Hanzelin, who is the son of Boyson‘s landlord, got involved.
Eddie managed to find Billadeau by searching Facebook with her maiden name. He recognized the family resemblance when he saw her picture.
Near the end of their tearful reunion Boyson and Billadeau presented Eddie with a $ 125 check in appreciation of his detective work.
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LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – The NBC Sports Network is staying on target with its sponsorship of a major gun show that will take place a little more than a month after the Newtown, Conn., school shootings that left dozens, most of them children, dead.
A spokesman for NBC Sports told TheWrap on Friday that the cable outlet NBC Sports Network will continue to sponsor the Shooting, Hunting, Outdoor Trade Show and Conference, otherwise known as the SHOT Show. The show, a major convention for the firearms industry, will take place at the Sands Expo and Convention Center in Las Vegas from January 15-18.
The Newtown school shootings took place on December 14.
“We’ve participated in the SHOT Show for several years,” the spokesman told TheWrap in a statement, adding that its sponsorship of the show is “part of our commitment to our outdoor programming block.”
The NBC Sports Network, which was known as Versus until a little more than a year ago and had previously been known as the Outdoor Life Network, carries hunting, fishing and other outdoor programming, such as “Gun It With Benny Spies,” along with traditional sports programming, according to USA Today.
The SHOT Show, which is not open to the public, is not just a trade show but “a powerful display of industry unity and its resolve to meet any challenge affecting the right to make, sell and own firearms,” according to the show’s website.
The show is held by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) which, eerily enough, is based in Newtown.
The organization was in attendance Thursday at a White House meeting of Vice President Joe Biden’s task force on firearms.
Since the Newtown school shootings, the topic of gun control has been very much at the forefront of national debate, with some groups calling for tighter restriction, and the National Rifle Association choosing to focus on media violence and mental illness as possible causes of gun-related violence.
Among those urging tighter restrictions is longtime NBC on-air personality Bob Costas, who called for stricter gun control during a December airing of “Sunday Night Football.”
Speaking shortly after Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher killed his girlfriend before driving to the Chiefs’ practice complex before taking his own life, Costas cited a column by Fox Sports’ Jason Whitlock in his call for gun control.
“In the coming days, Jovan Belcher’s actions and their possible connection to football will be analyzed. Who knows?” Costas said. “But here, wrote Jason Whitlock, is what I believe. If Jovan Belcher didn’t possess a gun, he and Kasandra Perkins would both be alive today.”
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With the nation in the grip of a severe influenza outbreak that has seen deaths reach epidemic levels, New York State declared a public health emergency on Saturday, making access to vaccines more easily available.
There have been nearly 20,000 cases of flu reported across the state so far this season, officials said. Last season, 4,400 positive laboratory tests were reported.
“We are experiencing the worst flu season since at least 2009, and influenza activity in New York State is widespread, with cases reported in all 57 counties and all five boroughs of New York City,” Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo said in a statement.
Under the order, pharmacists will be allowed to administer flu vaccinations to patients between 6 months and 18 years old, temporarily suspending a state law that prohibits pharmacists from administering immunizations to children.
While children and older people tend to be the most likely to become seriously ill from the flu, Mr. Cuomo urged all New Yorkers to get vaccinated.
On Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta said that deaths from the flu had reached epidemic levels, with at least 20 children having died nationwide. Officials cautioned that deaths from pneumonia and the flu typically reach epidemic levels for a week or two every year. The severity of the outbreak will be determined by how long the death toll remains high or if it climbs higher.
There was some evidence that caseloads may be peaking, federal officials said on Friday.
In New York City, public health officials announced on Thursday that flu-related illnesses had reached epidemic levels, and they joined the chorus of authorities urging people to get vaccinated.
“It’s a bad year,” the city’s health commissioner, Dr. Thomas A. Farley, told reporters on Thursday. “We’ve got lots of flu, it’s mainly type AH3N2, which tends to be a little more severe. So we’re seeing plenty of cases of flu and plenty of people sick with flu. Our message for any people who are listening to this is it’s still not too late to get your flu shot.”
There has been a spike in the number of people going to emergency rooms over the past two weeks with flulike symptoms – including fever, fatigue and coughing – Dr. Farley said.
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and Mr. Cuomo made a public display of getting shots this past week.
In a briefing with reporters on Friday, officials from the C.D.C. said that this year’s vaccine was effective in 62 percent of cases.
As officials have stepped up their efforts encouraging vaccinations, there have been scattered reports of shortages. But officials said plenty of the vaccine was available.
According to the C.D.C., makers of the flu vaccine produced about 135 million doses for this year. As of early this month, 128 million doses had been distributed. While that would not be enough for every American, only 37 percent of the population get a flu shot each year.
Federal health officials said they would be happy if that number rose to 50 percent, which would mean that there would be more than enough vaccine for anyone who wanted to be immunized.
Two other diseases – norovirus and whooping cough – are also widespread this winter and are contributing to the number of people getting sick.
The flu can resemble a cold, though the symptoms come on more rapidly and are more severe.
TOKYO (Reuters) — Japan Airlines said a Boeing 787 Dreamliner jet undergoing checks in Tokyo after a fuel leak at Logan International Airport in Boston last week had leaked fuel again during tests in Japan on Sunday.
An open valve on the aircraft caused fuel to leak on Sunday from a nozzle on the left wing used to remove fuel, a company spokeswoman said. The jet is out of service after spilling about 40 gallons of fuel onto the airport taxiway in Boston because of a separate valve-related problem.
In Boston, a different valve on the plane opened, causing fuel to flow from the center tank to the left main tank. When that tank filled up, it overflowed into a surge tank and came out through a vent. The spill happened on Tuesday as the plane was taxiing for takeoff on a flight to Tokyo. It made the flight about four hours later.
The causes of both incidents are unknown, the JAL spokeswoman added. There is no timetable for the plane to return to service.
“We are aware of the event and are working with our customer,” a Boeing spokesman, Marc Birtel, said of the leak in Tokyo.
On Friday, the United States government ordered a broad review of the Boeing 787, citing concern over a battery that caught fire last week, also on a JAL plane in Boston, and other problems. The government and Boeing insisted the passenger jet remained safe to fly.
The 787 represents the boldest bet Boeing has made on a plane in more than a decade. Because much of its financial performance is riding on the 787, Boeing is trying to double production to 10 jets a month this year to fulfill nearly 800 orders.
At a time when many residents are grappling with foreclosures and rising rental costs have far outpaced growth in their incomes, the three top Los Angeles mayoral candidates promised Friday to make housing policy a central focus for their administrations.
City Councilman Eric Garcetti renewed his ambitious pledge to end homelessness in Los Angeles, rather than "manage it." Councilwoman Jan Perry said she would try to replicate citywide her achievements getting affordable housing units built in the disparate communities of downtown and South L.A.
And City Controller Wendy Greuel argued that her experience as a former federal housing administrator, as well as an aide to former Mayor Tom Bradley on housing and homelessness issues, would help her expand L.A.'s share of housing funding to reach a broader spectrum of city residents.
Little was left to chance at Friday night's forum, which was limited to candidates who had gathered $1 million in campaign contributions by a September deadline. The event was organized by the Housing for a Stronger Los Angeles coalition and held at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels. The candidates were briefed on the questions in advance. There were few, if any, disagreements as they answered questions from Raphael Bostic, a housing economist at USC. All of the candidates, for example, said that they were committed to restoring the city's Housing Trust Fund to $100 million and that they would have a deputy mayor devoted to housing issues.
Though there was little policy daylight between them, all three candidates said city officials needed to lobby more forcefully for outside resources — each arguing that aspects of their biography made them best-equipped to do so.
The loss of state and federal funds has stalled or jeopardized thousands of projects for lower-income families across the state. Los Angeles and many other California cities were rocked by the withdrawal of $1 billion a year in funding from the state's municipal redevelopment agencies, which were eliminated at the urging of Gov. Jerry Brown to help bring the state back into the black. Under state law, the redevelopment agencies were required to devote a fifth of the revenue that they generated to affordable housing. But a series of scandals made it easier for Brown to argue to get rid of them.
Federal funding has also been dramatically reduced. California received just $131 million from the HOME Investment Partnerships Program in the fiscal year that ended in mid-2012 — less than half the amount that was available in the previous fiscal year. There has also been far less money available from the Community Development Block Grant program, which has often been dedicated to affordable housing.
Garcetti said that as mayor he would try to force Sacramento to pay more attention to the gap between incomes and housing prices in Los Angeles — making the case for an L.A.-specific tax credit.
The former City Council president said he would seek to build more housing projects that bring lower- and middle-income Angelenos together, citing the example of the W Hotel project in Hollywood, where he negotiated for more than 20% of the units to be reserved for lower-income residents. He won over opponents, he said, by explaining the environmental and community benefits of creating housing that would appeal to both lower-income and middle-class workers.
"A housekeeper who works at the W Hotel now has a shot at going home to her own daughter after work on the same block where she works — to help her with homework and make sure that she's more successful in school," Garcetti said. "There's a more stabilized community, and that she's not getting into a car and going to the Inland Empire because that's the only place where she can afford to live. These things are tied together."
Perry, who presided over a development renaissance in her downtown Los Angeles district over the last decade while also overseeing a series of housing projects aimed at revitalizing historic South L.A. corridors like Central Avenue, said she looked forward to wielding three powerful tools at the mayor's disposal: land use and zoning regulations, and three seats on the county's Metropolitan Transportation Authority board.
"Every community has its needs; every community has its populations to be served," Perry said. "Wherever we can find a bit of land on which to build, as mayor I would make sure that we grab it, and find a developer and build on it, and put people back into housing, and make sure that we do it intelligently."
Greuel repeatedly circled back to the central theme of her campaign: ensuring accountability for the dollars spent on housing in Los Angeles. She noted that the controller's office is in the middle of auditing the city's use of funds from the Neighborhood Stabilization Program, federal dollars that are used to rehabilitate foreclosed properties and make them available to lower-income buyers and renters.
The controller also pledged to keep the pressure on banks to make it easier for Angelenos facing foreclosure to stay in their homes. Even though the number of foreclosures is dropping, Greuel said, "it doesn't mean the crisis is over."
"Everyone's dream is to own a home one day. We need to make sure it doesn't become a nightmare, and that we help them in doing that," she said.
maeve.reston@latimes.com
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