Jury selection began on Monday in the trial of Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ), who is accused of taking bribes to wield his influence to benefit foreign nations.  Federal prosecutors have charged Menendez with 16 criminal counts, including conspiracy to commit bribery, conspiracy to commit honest services fraud, conspiracy to commit extortion under color of official right, a charge accusing him of conspiring to act as a foreign agent for Egypt, obstruction of justice, and other related corruption charges. The allegations include claims that Menendez was bribed with hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash, gold bars, and a Mercedes-Benz.  Menendez was the chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee when federal investigators say the bribery scheme took place. After he was first charged in September 2023, he stepped down as chair, though he is still on the committee.  The trial, taking place in Manhattan, and expected to last weeks. Wael Hana and Fred Daibes, two New Jersey businessmen accused of being involved in the bribery scheme, are being tried with Menendez. A third alleged associate of Menendez, Jose Uribe, pled guilty in March to charges of conspiracy to commit bribery, honest services wire fraud, obstruction of justice, and tax evasion. Mendendez’s wife, Nadine, will be tried in July over accusations that she was part of the bribery scheme. During his plea deal, Uribe said that Nandine was given a Mercedes-Benz with the expectation Menendez would use “his power and influence as a United States senator to get a favorable outcome and to stop all investigations related to one of my associates.” CLICK HERE TO GET THE DAILYWIRE+ APP According to federal prosecutors, the alleged bribes were intended to benefit Egypt and protect Hana, Daibes, and Uribe.  “Those bribes included cash, gold, payments toward a home mortgage, compensation for a low-or-no-show job, a luxury vehicle, and other things of value,” the indictment said. Federal authorities reportedly found gold bars and cash stuffed throughout the senator’s home that they traced back to the businessmen Menendez allegedly worked with.  Menendez is also accused of ghostwriting a letter to other senators to urge them to support ending a hold on $300 million in military aid to Egypt, a letter reportedly written in coordination with his wife and the businessmen in question. Other charges say he attempted to use his influence to benefit Qatar.  The New Jersey Democrat has pleaded not guilty to the charges and reportedly plans to blame Nadine. Menendez previously faced federal corruption charges in 2017, but the case ended in a mistrial.

The Hillary Clinton-produced Broadway musical “Suffs,” about the suffragette movement of the 1900s, is turning out to be a bust as the show has failed to sell out seats. The stage play — co-produced by Clinton and Malala Yousafzai — finished in the bottom 23% of all 35 shows on Broadway in terms of filling the theater for the week ending May 5, according to Broadway League.com. According to the Broadway Theatre’s Industry official site, “Suffs” only managed to reach an 81% capacity across eight performances that week.  The play did even worse the following week ending May 12, with the musical only filling 78% of its 7,784 seats across all performances, the New York Post noted. The musical — directed by Leigh Silverman — was written by singer-songwriter Shaina Taub. It is produced by Jill Furman and Rachel Sussman, along with co-producers Clinton and Yousafzai. It is one of the newer shows on Broadway after it officially opened last month. Hillary Clinton-produced play ‘Suffs’ failing to pack seats during peak Broadway season https://t.co/mz7xz6NmmT pic.twitter.com/36yhLRaK3u — New York Post (@nypost) May 12, 2024 The play is nearly 3 hours long and takes place in 1913 when the “women’s movement is heating up in America, anchored by the suffragists — “Suffs,” as they call themselves — and their relentless pursuit of the right to vote,” a description on the show’s website read. “Reaching across and against generational, racial, and class divides, these brilliant, flawed women entertain and inspire us with the story of their hard-won victory in an ongoing fight,” it added. “So much has changed since the passing of the Nineteenth Amendment over a century ago, and yet we’re reminded sometimes we need to look back, in order to march fearlessly into the future.” Speaking to the Associated Press about the play, Clinton said she felt she could relate to ​​“all of” the characters. “I know how important it is to have relationships with the people you’re working for, as you’re taking risks and you’re doing things that have never been done, whether it’s running for president in my case or having a march on Washington in 1913 to try to convince the president and the Congress to adopt the amendment to let women vote,” Clinton told the AP, referencing when she ran for president in 2016 and lost to former President Donald Trump. She also talked about the 2024 election and said she sees this play as “relevant to today. We have a lot of challenges in our country … I think having a play about voting in the election year could not be better timed.” Daily Wire host Michael Knowles recently discussed on his podcast that “despite a concerted promotional effort by the establishment media” and a cast made up entirely of “females or gender non-binary cast,” the musical is failing.

The man whose 2015 photo of a dress caused an internet sensation has pleaded guilty to strangling his wife. Keir Johnston, 38, recently pleaded guilty to attacking his wife, Grace, during an assault that occurred on March 6, 2022, People Magazine reported. He has yet to be sentenced. Johnston was indicted following the incident, which involved him pinning his wife to the ground, straddling her, and choking her. During that incident, he also threatened to kill her and waved a knife. He reportedly told her, “Somebody is going to die,” according to testimony in the High Court in Glasgow, Scotland, on May 9, The Guardian reported. Grace called for help, saying, “My husband is trying to kill me.” Chris Macintosh, prosecutor for the crown, told the judge in the case that Grace had few options since the couple lived on the remote Isle of Colonsay. “There is no permanent police presence on the island, and she was in a situation where she felt trapped,” Macintosh said, according to the Guardian. The incident began after Johnston discovered Grace had gone to a job interview on the mainland, defying his demands that she not go. Prior to the attack, Johnston was reportedly drinking at a pub and texted his wife: “You should support me but you do not.” He then went home and passed out. When Grace returned to their home, he “woke up and said that he was going to leave her,” Macintosh told the court. “She went outside the property to stop him leaving. He followed her and pinned her to the ground.” “[Johnston] placed both knees on her arms, so she was unable to move,” Macintosh added. “He then began strangling her with both his hands. She was initially able to scream and feared for her life and believed Johnston intended to kill her as he was very forceful.” Grace received several severe bruises from the attack but did not require medical attention. Johnston’s defense attorney, Marco Guarino, told the court that his client had accepted responsibility for the attack, but the judge, Lady Drummond, denied bail, saying: “I have no need to tell you that this is a serious and violent offense.” “You repeatedly strangled her, injured her and put her life in danger in what must have been absolutely terrifying circumstances for her,” she added. “I am afraid, Mr Johnston, that your status has now changed, you have been convicted of a very serious crime and you will be remanded meantime.” Johnston is set to be sentenced on June 6. Johnston and Grace became famous in 2015 after he posted a photo of a dress Grace’s mother planned to wear at their wedding. The photo posted online showed the dress as either black and blue or white and gold depending on the viewer. Subsequent images of the dress showed that it was a vibrant blue and black, but the original picture fooled man, including this reporter. From this day on, the world will be divided into two people. Blue & black, or white & gold. http://t.co/xJeR7GldwP pic.twitter.com/i6BwVzPzSZ — Ellen DeGeneres (@EllenDeGeneres) February 27, 2015 New York University neuroscientist Pascal Wallisch explained that people saw the dress differently because of how the brain processes assumptions based on how the dress was illuminated. “The original image was overexposed, rendering the illumination source uncertain,” Wallisch. “As a result, we make assumptions about how the dress was illuminated, which affects the colors we see.” If people assumed the dress was photographed in a shadow, it may appear gold and white, while those who believed it was illuminated by artificial light saw it as black and blue. “This is a basic cognitive function: to appreciate the color on an object, the illumination source has to be taken into account, which the brain does continuously,” Wallisch added.

Actress Olivia Munn discussed how she froze her eggs for the third time following a cancer diagnosis. The 43-year-old “X-Men: Apocalypse” star has been in a relationship with comedian John Mulaney since 2021 and shares a son with him. Munn revealed in March that she had been diagnosed with “aggressive, fast moving” breast cancer last year and had undergone four surgeries including a double mastectomy. The actress said during an interview with Vogue that she had her eggs frozen for the third time in hopes of having more children despite having a full hysterectomy. She previously had the procedure at 33, 39, and again, most recently, at 42. “It’s interesting because my 33-year-old eggs were great. My 39-year-old eggs? None of them worked,” Munn told the outlet. “As you get older, one month can have great eggs, the other not so much.” “Clearly, the month we did at 39 was not a good month,” she added. “After my diagnosis, we decided to try one more round of egg retrievals and hoped it was a good month. John and I talked about it a lot and we don’t feel like we’re done growing our family, but didn’t know if I would have to do chemotherapy or radiation.” “We just wanted a few more eggs,” Munn said during the Vogue interview. “At my age, one in every 10 eggs are healthy, and we were hoping to make one embryo from this retrieval.” “A few hours later, we got the call from my doctor. He shared that we had two healthy embryos,” she continued. “John and I just started crying. It was just so exciting because not only did we get it in one retrieval, but it also meant that I didn’t have to keep putting myself at risk. It was just amazing.” Because she had a hysterectomy, Munn also discussed how she would need to use a surrogate gestational carrier to have any more biological children. CLICK HERE TO GET THE DAILYWIRE+ APP “When you’re pregnant with your own baby, it’s like teamwork—you and the baby working together to make their little life come true,” she told Vogue.  “You’re doing all this work to eat well, try to not have anxiety, just do all the right things during the pregnancy. With a surrogate, you have to try to go find a version of yourself somewhere out in the world. Somebody that you trust as much as yourself to live their life as a pregnant woman the same way that you would. But a surrogate isn’t a scary prospect to me anymore because there’s nothing I can do.” Munn added, “I don’t have the ability to carry a baby anymore, so if we want to build our family, this is our option. This journey has made me realize how grateful I am to have options for not only fighting cancer, but also having more children if we want, because I know a lot of people don’t have those options.”

If you have the Monday blues, you won’t want to miss this adorable video of a hopping baby goat. The clip features a woman running through her kitchen as a baby goat playfully follows her, hopping along. “My baby goat does the cutest hops around the house…” she wrote over the video. You can see the pure joy on her face as she skips about with her little pal. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Pubity (@pubity) The baby goat’s hops are so enthusiastic that many compared the little guy to a bunny. Why Do Baby Goats Hop? Watching the adorable video above, you might be wondering why, exactly, baby goats jump around. According to experts, “Goats’ natural inclination is to jump and climb wherever their hoofs take them. Domesticated goats are incredibly sure-footed, probably a taxonomic evolutionary trait from when they lived in mountains. Just as with people, the kids tend to be more playful and jumpy than the grown-ups,” said Craig Saffoe, curator of the Great Cats, Andean Bears, and Kids’ Farm areas at the National Zoo. Baby goats, like human children, hold lots of energy in their little bodies. Their way of getting it out is through movements like jumping. Not only is it a common habit for them, but it’s also an adorable one to watch. “I could watch this baby goat hop all day ,” pubity captioned the goat video on Instagram. “All the more reasons to buy a goat (I’m broke and don’t have the space),” someone commented. Another person asked, “Why is it hopping like a rabbit?” to which someone replied, “That’s their natural behavior, especially when happy.” It’s even cuter to realize that the little guys hop around when they feel joyful. “The level of happiness I am experiencing from watching this is f–king insane,” another user added. You can find the source of this story’s featured image here. The post Here’s What You Didn’t Know You Needed Today—An ADORABLE Video Of A Hopping Baby Goat appeared first on InspireMore.

'Democracy in name only'

'It's kind of remarkable'

'Bedra also mailed a thumb drive containing 64 videos of monkey torture'

'Today is a win for girls and women'

'No assurance of a majority'