Queerty Crossword: Dec. 17, 2024

The New York Times.The bill now heads to the Republican-controlled Senate. But due to the filibuster, seven Democrats would have to vote with Republicans to meet the 60-vote threshold needed to end debate on the bill before it receives an up-or-down vote.

Cryptocurrencies promise to be central to Donald Trump’s economic policies in his second term as US president. Arguably his most controversial proposal is the creation of a strategic bitcoin reserve (SBR). This would involve the US buying up large amounts of the cryptocurrency over the coming years to hold as a reserve, similar to the country’s strategic petroleum reserve.

The U.S. House of Representatives passed a HR 28 today (Tuesday, Jan. 14) that restricts transgender students from participating in school athletics.

Doctor film series.Amidst his fame and acclaim, it was something of an open secret that Bogarde was gay, despite never publicly coming out, and he spent his latter years living with his “business manager” partner Anthony Forwood.Even though many of his most notable roles had an unmistakably gay sensibility—from neo-noir Victim (the first film to use the word “homosexual”) to the subtextual The Servant to 1971’s Death in Venice, which is all about queer desire—questions around the actor’s sexuality never appeared to impact his life or career in any major way.That is, except for the time Russian spies targeted him in a gay entrapment plot…This week, documents from British intelligence agency MI5 were unveiled which detail an instance in the ’70s in which Bogarde was informed he may have been the target of a sting orchestrated by Soviet organization the KGB.The newly declassified files reveal that the actor’s name was on a list of “six practicing British homosexuals” that was given to the Russians by an unnamed source who had himself been “sexually compromised” while visiting Moscow in the late ’50s.Completely separately, a KGB defector codenamed Kago had at one point informed MI5 that a “young British actor” who had appeared in a movie with a name like “the kingdom of something” was the subject of a Russian recruitment attempt in Moscow in ’58 and ’59. With little else to go off of, British intelligence speculated he could be referring to Bogarde, who had the title role in 1957’s Campbell’s Kingdom.In other words, due to his sexuality, Bogarde was targeted by the KGB, and an attempt was made to arouse suspicion that he was a covert Soviet agent.Because of this, MI5 secretly investigated the actor for a period of time, examining press clippings and other media mentions—anything that might hint if he had, indeed, visited Moscow.

Nancy Mace asked Democratic Texas Representative Jasmine Crockett if she wanted "to take it outside" during a contentious House Oversight Committee meeting on Tuesday.Newsweek reached out to both Mace and Crockett's press teams for comment over email.The argument between the two representatives started as the House voted to ban transgender athletes from women's sports at federally funded institutions. Republicans emphasized the issue of transgender inclusion in sports during the 2024 election, putting Democrats, who have embraced LGBTQ+ rights, on the defense.While many polls shows acceptance for LGBTQ+ rights has generally increased over the past 20 years, most Americans are less supportive of transgender girls and women participating in women's sports. A Gallup poll from May 2023 found that 69 percent of Americans believe transgender people should play on teams that match their sex assigned at birth.The debate between Mace and Crockett came as the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act is set to ban schools receiving federal funding from allowing transgender girls and women playing on women's sports teams."Somebody's campaign coffers really are struggling right now.