After yesterday’s ruling by the California Supreme Court to uphold the Prop 8 ban on same-sex marriage, folks began rallying all around the State in an effort to peaceably protest that ruling. Here in West Hollywood, CA last night, celebs gathered with protesters to voice their displeasure with the court’s ruling and to begin building support for a new ballot initiative that will likely make it to the polls next year (2010) to Repeal Prop 8. Here are a few pics of some of the celebs who took to the streets in protest last night and some info about what went down:

After months of legal wrangling, the California Supreme Court announced on Tuesday to uphold a ban on same-sex marriages. Justices voted 6-1 to uphold Proposition 8, the voter-approved ban of gay marriage, dealing a major legal blow to the gay and lesbian community. California residents passed Prop 8 with 52 percent of the vote last November. The court also ruled that the roughly 18,000 marriages that took place before Prop 8 took effect are still valid. “It would be a shocking, strange thing in California law to essentially divorce those couples against their will,” said Jennifer Pizer, a lawyer from Lambda Legal. The crowd that had gathered outside the Supreme Court in San Francisco was mostly made up of gay rights supporters, and there was a huge outcry when the ruling was released at 10 a.m. After the announcement, the crowd began marching through San Francisco streets chanting, “Shame on you.” Crowds converged in West Hollywood Tuesday at 7 p.m. to oppose the state Supreme Court’s ruling. They marched to the intersection of Hollywood Blvd. and Highland Ave., shutting down the intersection. That crowd was estimated to be approximately 5,000 strong. Five states have already legalized gay marriage, and gay marriage supporters had hoped California would be the sixth. The justices said the people do have the right to change their constitution through the ballot box. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger released a statement shortly after the ruling. “While I believe that one day, either the people or courts will recognize gay marriage, as governor of California, I will uphold the decision of the California Supreme Court,” he said. “Regarding the 18,000 marriages that took place prior to Proposition 8’s passage, the court made the right decision in keeping them intact.” The governor encouraged those responding to the decision to do so peacefully and lawfully … In Leimert Park, the ACLU and several faith-based groups held a news conference to respond to the state Supreme Court’s decision. “This is nothing short of apartheid in our own state, that some people were allowed to be married, and others will never have that right,” said Rabbi Denise Eger from Kol Ama Congregation. Local residents Eric Monriquez and Juan Ribera said the announcement was bittersweet for them. While they were happy their marriage would still be recognized by the state, they said they were very disappointed with the ruling. “We’re very sad for other couples,” Ribera said. Gay rights advocates had argued the ballot measure revised the state constitution’s equal protection clause, thus needing the legislature’s approval before it could be put to voters. Six months before Prop 8 passed, the California Supreme Court had ruled in favor of gay marriage, saying that denying gay marriage amounted to state-sanctioned discrimination. Gay rights supporters say the fight is far from over.

Very true, the fight is FAR from over … in fact, it has only just begun. The site RepealProp8.com was launched yesterday in the wake of the court’s ruling that seeks to put the issue back on the ballot for voters to decide again. Because California allows the amendment of the State constitution by a simple voter majority, the issue can go back on the ballot for voters to decide — again. The vote was so close last November that supporters, me included, believe that another vote would be sure to legalize same-sex marriage here in California. If YOU would like info on how you can help the cause, head over to RepealProp8.com. There is still a long road ahead but if we’ve learned nothing from the 5 States that have legalized same-sex marriage in this country, we’ve learned that true marriage equality for all will eventually come — even in places you’d least expect. Much props and love goes out to the celebs who came out to rally last night … including, Kathy Griffin & her mother Maggie, Deborah Gibson, Haylie Duff, Emmy Rossum, Lance Bass, Eliza Dushku and more. Eliza posted photos on her official Twitter page thruout the night. Props, too, to Governor Schwarzenegger for his support as well … here is a short vid clip of his comments to Jay Leno on The Tonight Show last night:

Marriage Equality will happen for all, I just know it … and now the work begins.

[Photo credit: X17, Splash News; Source]

Last week we learned from a report from TMZ that Mel Gibson’s mistress, Oksana Grigorieva (whom he recently started up a romantic relationship with while he was still married to his wife of 29 years Robyn) is pregs with his child … which resulted in Robyn filing for divorce. Mel appeared on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno last night and confirmed to Jay that his girlfriend is pregs with his child, joking that he can now be called “Octo-Mel” since his mistress will be giving birth to his 8th child — classy, classy guy:

It’s official: Mel Gibson’s girlfriend, Oksana Grigorieva, is pregnant. The actor confirmed the news during a taping of NBC’s The Tonight Show With Jay Leno to air [last night]. “I guess I’m ‘Octo-Mel,’” says Gibson, who already has seven kids with his wife of 28 years, Robyn. Robyn filed for divorce six weeks ago amidst speculation that Grigorieva, a singer on Gibson’s record label, was expecting a child. “My wife and I, our marriage ended three years ago and we’ve been separated ever since then,” Gibson tells Leno. “These things happen. It’s unfortunate, it’s sad, but you know she is an admirable woman — we still got kids together, we’re friends.” “Look,” Gibson continues. “When it’s all said and done, I did a pretty good hatchet job on my marriage myself. I’m to blame. If you’re inclined to judge, put it here.” Gibson also says his separation from Robyn had nothing to do with Grigorieva, whom he didn’t meet until 2008. When asked by Leno if they would wed, Gibson says: “Why would you get married twice?” According to reports, Grigorieva is in her second trimester and due this fall.

As a result of Mel’s confirmation on national television last night, his official rep issued a statement that was released in between the show’s taping (yesterday afternoon) and the show’s airing (late last night):

Six weeks after his wife Robyn filed for divorce after 28 years of marriage, Mel Gibson has some news of his own: his Russian musician girlfriend Oksana Grigorieva, 39, is pregnant, the actor’s rep confirms exclusively to PEOPLE. “He couldn’t be happier,” says a Gibson friend. “He loves being a father.” Grigorieva, who is signed to Gibson’s record label, Icon Records, is in her second trimester and due in the late fall. For those eager to point to Grigorieva’s pregnancy as a catalyst for Gibson’s divorce, they’ll be wrong, says the close source: “This has nothing to do with the divorce. Mel didn’t even know Oksana was pregnant when they filed.”

Ha! Right! There really ain’t much damage control that can be done at this point so I guess saying that Mel didn’t even know his mistress was pregnant when his wife filed for divorce is all they could come up with. You know, even if you buy that “we’ve been separated for 3 years” line he’s trying to feed us, it’s pretty disrespectful to sleep around ON YOUR WIFE and the mother of your 7 children while you’re still married to her. WWJD? The hypocrisy of Gibson’s religiousness just grosses me out to no end. His pious bullshizz turned me off to him years ago, this just seals the deal and shows the man’s true colors, IMHO. I wish Ms. Grigorieva all the luck in the world … I hope that Mel Gibson doesn’t eff her and her baby over in the same way he effed over his wife.

[Source, Source]

Yesterday afternoon was my last visit to The Tonight Show with Jay Leno in Burbank, CA for the third of Prince’s three appearances on the show. As you may recall, I was able to give away 2 sets of 2 tickets for some Pink readers to attend the taping as well and it was my extreme pleasure to meet them all. Here is what the ticket looked like for yesterday’s Prince performance on the outdoor stage of The Tonight Show:

I opted out of going inside for the taping so that I could get a prime spot in front of the stage for the performance. Prince did not disappoint … her performed the song Feel Better, Feel Good, Feel Wonderful from his new album LOTUSFLOW3R on the show and then performed 2 more songs after the cameras finished rolling. We also got to see him perform Crimson & Clover and Play That Funky Music. For Funky Music, he brought a male fan on stage to sing the vocal … and then hand him his guitar to strum on stage. Truly, that Prince fan got the thrill of a lifetime.

After the performance, I was able to meet up with Pink reader Melissa and her friend Lindsay as well as Mark and his wife Kelly:

Mark and Melissa were the lucky readers whose emails I picked at random to win the tickets. They were both so nice as were their guests … I really enjoyed meeting them all and I was thrilled that they were able to attend yesterday’s taping.

After all of that fun was over, I had to jet home to change so that I could meet up with my friend Mike for our Friendaversary date. Mike and I are celebrating our 2 year anniversary as friends this month so last night we did dinner and a movie. We decided to see I Love You, Man in order to honor our own bromance:

I Love You, Man is a great film. It’s funny and sweet and really funny … and really sweet. I loved the whole thing. There is a gay undercurrent in the film (in addition to the fact that Andy Samberg’s character is gay) that was treated respectfully I think. It’s films like this that prove that you can have fun with sexuality and not be offensive to anyone. I wholly endorse this film … Paul Rudd and Jason Segal are so great together. I’m bummed that David didn’t get to see it … I might have to take him to see it later on :)

Tonight is gonna be a big night. I’m seeing Prince perform at the Nokia Theater at 7pm and then at the Conga Room at 9:30pm and then at Club Nokia at midnight. My friend Johnny is joining me for the first show, I’ll be hangin’ with my friend Daniel for the second show and David will be attending the midnight show. I am so excited … so much Prince all at once … I can’t wait. I’ll do my best to have all the deets for y’all tomorrow … here’s hoping I don’t die in the process. I’ve never attended 3 concerts in one night before … hopefully I can hang. We’ll see …

OMG … so yesterday … was seriously, one of the coolest days ever. My friend Daniel, who works for TMZ, and I made our way out to Burbank for the second taping of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno for the express purpose of watching Prince perform his second of three performances on the show (as you may recall, we got to see him perform the day before, too). We were very fortunate to get prime seating at the show, right in front of the performance stage. Prince performed the song Dreamer from his new album LOTUSFLOW3R and pretty much rocked the house …

… and then the unbelievable happened. At the end of his performance, Prince took off his guitar walked right over to Daniel and me and handed us his guitar! We were shocked, Daniel just froze, then we screamed and the crowd went wild:

I’m telling you, the fact that it happened at all was incredible … that it happened on national television is just insane. Daniel posted about the experience HERE on TMZ and news outlets all over the place have been rerunning the footage. Everyone wants to know if we got to keep the guitar … no we did not, it was just an incredible honor to be able to hold and touch the instrument. I was able to strum some of the strings … it was just insane!! Truly, one of the coolest concert moments of my life. After the jump, check out video of Prince performing Dreamer on The Tonight Show and make sure you watch to the very end …

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I want to repost this in case any of y’all missed catching it earlier: Okay, if YOU live in Southern California and YOU can get yourself to the NBC Studios at 3000 W. Alameda in Burbank, CA tomorrow (03/27/09) afternoon by 2:45pm PT then you have a chance to attend the taping of The Tonight Show where Prince will perform the third of his 3 dates on the show. Tomorrow’s performance will be extra special as he will be performing on the outdoor stage. Here are the requirements to enter for the tickets:

You should be 21 and must be able to get yourself to the studio on your own. Bring photo ID as your name will be on a list. Check in is at 2:45pm PT

I have 2 sets of 2 tickets to giveaway, courtesy of LOTUSFLOW3R.com … all you have to do to enter is send me an emale at pinkisthenewblog@gmail.com with the subject line: Prince Tickets and I will randomly select two names to each receive a pair of tickets :) Voila! Much love to the folks at LOTUSFLOW3R.com for this great giveaway. Send in your emails, I’ll pick the winners by 6pm PT tonight. Good Luck!

Yesterday afternoon, David and I were very fortunate to attend the taping of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno at NBC Studios in Burbank, CA. I managed to get a couple tix to the show via Prince’s just launched new website/fan club LOTUSFLOW3R.com and we were able to attend the taping:

I was very pleased to learn that they treated the fan club folks very well … we were seated right in front of the performance stage so we had a great view of Prince’s performance of the song Ol’ Skool Company from his new album MPLSoUND. The taping was pretty straightforward, they filmed everything in the hour that the show airs and we had a blast. I’m not a huge fan of attending TV show tapings but this one was really fun. I remember when I was younger, living in Detroit, and I wondered what it would like to be a part of a live studio audience. It’s a pretty neat experience … living in SoCal has a lot of fun rewards like this. This afternoon, my friend Daniel invited me to go back to the second of Prince’s appearances on The Tonight Show so I’ll be making my way back to Burbank in a few hours for the taping. Cell phones are big no-no inside the studio so I’ll tweet what I can, when I can for those of you interested.

I do have to give a shout-out to Pink reader Wesley who I got to meet at NBC yesterday … it was my pleasure and a nice surprise to meet her :)

Also, I might be able to offer some tickets for YOU to attend tomorrow’s taping of The Tonight Show for Prince’s third and final appearance on the show. I don’t have the info yet but I’ll be updating THIS POST with the deets should tix become available for me to give away. Stay tuned!!

UPDATE! Okay, if YOU live in Southern California and YOU can get yourself to the NBC Studios at 3000 W. Alameda in Burbank, CA tomorrow afternoon by 2:45pm PT then you have a chance to attend the taping of The Tonight Show where Prince will perform the third of his 3 dates on the show. Tomorrow’s performance will be extra special as he will be performing on the outdoor stage. Here are the requirements to enter for the tickets:

You should be 21 and must be able to get yourself to the studio on your own. Bring photo ID as your name will be on a list. Check in is at 2:45pm PT

I have 2 sets of 2 tickets to giveaway, courtesy of LOTUSFLOW3R.com … all you have to do to enter is send me an email at pinkisthenewblog@gmail.com with the subject line: Prince Tickets and I will randomly select two names to each receive a pair of tickets :) Voila! Much love to the folks at LOTUSFLOW3R.com for this great giveaway. Send in your emails, I’ll pick the winners by 6pm PT tonight. Good Luck!

President Barack Obama made his first visit to late night TV since becoming our nation’s 44th Commander in Chief by appearing on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno last night. In a mostly spirited and jovial appearance, President Obama talked about the impending arrival of the First Dog to the White House, he touched upon the current economic troubles that our country is dealing with and, IMHO, made a pretty insensitive remark at the expense of the mentally disabled in order to crack a joke about his bowling game. Here are a couple photos from his appearance on The Tonight Show last night and some deets about his interview with Jay Leno:

President Obama mixed jokes with serious discussion Thursday during an appearance on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.” While presidential candidates have used comedy shows for campaigning as far back as Richard Nixon’s performance on “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In” in 1968, Obama became the first sitting president to appear before a late-night talk show studio audience. Obama complimented guitarist Kevin Eubanks on his suit, and he cracked jokes about the Secret Service and “American Idol” host Simon Cowell. Obama also remarked on his poor bowling skills, which were evident during a campaign stop in Pennsylvania. He told Leno that he bowled 129 in the White House bowling alley and said his bowling skills are “like Special Olympics or something.” Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton said the president’s remarks were not meant to poke fun of the Special Olympics. “The president made an offhand remark making fun of his own bowling that was in no way intended to disparage the Special Olympics,” Burton said. “He thinks that the Special Olympics are a wonderful program that gives an opportunity to shine to people with disabilities from around the world.” Obama later moved on to topical discussions of the economic crisis and the AIG bonus scandal. “The problem with AIG was that it owed so much and was tangled up with so many banks and institutions that if you had allowed it to just liquidate, to go into bankruptcy, it could have brought the whole financial system down. So it was the right thing to do to intervene in AIG,” Obama said. Obama said earlier this week that he’ll “take responsibility” for AIG executives receiving those controversial bonuses — roughly $165 million — while the company took $173 billion in government bailouts. Congress is looking for ways to recoup all or some of that money. “The larger problem is we’ve got to get back to an attitude where people know enough is enough, and people have a sense of responsibility and they understand that their actions are going to have an impact on everybody,” he said. “If we can get back to those values that built America, then I think we’re going to be OK.” Obama also said he was confident in his embattled Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. “I think Geithner is doing an outstanding job. I think that we have a big mess on our hands,” he said. “It’s not going to be solved immediately, but it is going to get solved.” Obama taped the show Thursday afternoon during a two-day swing through the Los Angeles area for town hall meetings focusing on the economy. Obama also discussed the “life in the bubble,” musing over how Secret Service agents would not let him walk 750 yards from Air Force One to the Costa Mesa fairgrounds, where some of the day’s activities were to take place. Obama said flying in Air Force One is “pretty cool,” especially because “they give you the jacket with the [presidential] seal on it,” he said. The only time Leno appeared to stop Obama in his tracks was when he asked the president whether he thought people intentionally lose basketball games when they play with him. “I don’t see why they would throw the game, except for all those Secret Service guys with guns around,” he said. There’s some political risk for Obama, according to Washington Post media columnist Howard Kurtz, who also hosts CNN’s “Reliable Sources.” “He has to be very careful about his tone, because if he yuks it up too much and seems to be having too good a time, it will be quite a contrast there with the pain the people are feeling with the crumbling economy,” Kurtz said.

While I love me some Barack, I was not at all pleased with his Special Olympics “joke”. I absolutely understand that he meant no harm by making the crack but it really goes to show that our culture is so ingrained with the notion that the mentally disabled are easy fodder for humor. Nothing irks me more than the misuse of the word “retarded” as an insult or as a dig toward someone else. Again, I’m sure that 99% of the people who freely use that word “jokingly” don’t mean to offend others but, invariably, they do. In his official apology, I wish the President would’ve said more than just that he respects the Special Olympics. It would’ve been much better, in my opinion, if he had apologized for making the joke at the expense of the mentally disabled and urged others to consider what they are really saying when they do the same. Ack, I don’t mean to get all soap boxy but this sort of “humor” really pisses me off.

Moving on, I thought the whole appearance (absent the insensitive joke) was pretty great tho. Leno didn’t offer any tough questions and it was a general lovefest. President Obama is great on camera and his personality really shows thru in interviews like this. Even with the gaffe (or maybe because of it), he shows just how much of a pretty regular guy he really is. In case you missed it, you can read the full transcript of President Obama’s appearance HERE or watch the full video interview after the jump …

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