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BET Awards 2012 Nominations Are In!

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I was honored to be elected to take part in BET’s Voting committee for the 2012 BET Awards. It was a lot of fun and…

BET Awards 2012 Nominations Are In!

Jonas Brothers’ Secret Boy-Band Weapon: Instruments

‘It’s a rare thing for a boy band. … I don’t know of a whole lot of boy bands that do that,’ Nick Jonas tells MTV News. By John Mitchell Nick and Joe Jonas Photo: Todd Williamson/ WireImage The Jonas Brothers rode easily into the second round of our Battle of the Boy Bands , demolishing Menudo by taking 80 percent of the vote. But they are facing stiff competition from another group of three real-life brothers in round two: Hanson. With the JoBros back in the studio working on a comeback album, and with each brother (Joe, Nick and Kevin) pursuing his own solo effort, they remain one of the most active bands in the competition. So why vote Jonas? Read on. Strongest Chart Achievement Well, it certainly doesn’t get much better than having the #1 album in the country, and the Jo Bros have had two: 2008’s A Little Bit Longer and 2009’s Lines, Vines and Trying Times. Longer is the real jewel in the Brothers’ crown, though, shifting an impressive 525,402 copies in its debut frame. On the strength of the hit single “Burnin’ Up,” the album held on to the #1 spot in its second week of release and continued to sell briskly on its way to going double platinum in the U.S. A Little Bit Longer remains the band’s best-selling album and even earned a spot on Rolling Stone ‘s list of the best albums of 2008. Standout Video Since they didn’t make much of an impression on mainstream audiences with their debut (see below), the brothers started anew when they joined Hollywood Records and amped up their pop sound for their self-titled sophomore album. The album’s first single, “Year 3000,” brought them plenty of mainstream attention, but its second single, “S.O.S.,” kicked things up even further. The song became the group’s first top 20 hit, buoyed by its video, which was filmed on the RMS Queen Mary superliner in the summer of 2007. With well over 93 million views, the “S.O.S.” video is easily the band’s most-viewed clip. Defining Tune For its sheer crossover appeal, it’s gotta be “Burnin’ Up.” The song is the JoBros biggest hit by far, debuting to strong enough digital sales to spur a #5 opening on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, making it their highest charting song to date. This single was a sales smash, moving more than 2 million digital downloads to become the band’s second platinum-selling song after “S.O.S.,” and it became a bona fide radio hit over the summer of 2008. As much as we love our boy bands, they aren’t often embraced by critics. However, this song, like its mothership album A Little Bit Longer, was. The acclaim Longer and “Burnin’ Up” earned helped the JoBros along to their lone Grammy nomination (for Best New Artist) in 2009. Debut Album The Jonas Brothers’ first album as a group — Nick released a solo album before he, Joe and Kevin united to create the band — was 2006’s It’s About Time. The record was pretty low-profile (to say the least), though it managed to make an impression in the Christian market and sell 62,000 copies in the U.S. The lack of interest the album generated for the band led to them being dropped from Columbia Records, though they were snapped up by Hollywood Records almost immediately. While it didn’t generate much heat for the boys in 2006, the album has become something of a collector’s item for fans in the years since, and because it is currently out of print, copies are rare and expensive on online auction sites like eBay. Biggest Competition The Jonas Brothers are currently embroiled in a tough showdown with Hanson, another brotherly threesome with an affinity for playing guitars and penning their own tunes (both boy-band rarities). Hanson is decidedly ’90s and the Bros are very of the aughts, meaning its unlikely they share a fanbase, but Hanson has one thing going for them that the JoBros don’t: nostalgia. People have a way of romanticizing their fond recollections of the recent past, so the Jonases have a real battle here. When we asked Nick Jonas why fans should vote for his group above all other boy bands in our bracket, he went straight for the very thing that sets the Jonas Brothers and their main competition, Hanson, apart. “I think that we are a good one to vote for because we play our own instruments,” Nick said. “It’s a rare thing for a boy band. … I don’t know of a whole lot of boy bands that do that.” Is that good enough to keep them in the competition? Only time will tell. Voting in round two of MTV’s Battle of the Boy Bands runs until noon ET on Monday, April 30. Winners are determined by fan votes, so if your favorite band made the cut, make sure you keep voting. Tune in to AMTV and MTV Hits for their boy-band video takeovers each day and make sure to spread the word on Twitter using the hashtag #BBB and like us on Facebook for updates! Related Videos Battle Of The Boy Bands Related Photos MTV Buzzworthy Blog: Battle Of The Boy Bands!

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Jonas Brothers’ Secret Boy-Band Weapon: Instruments

‘I Go Nuts, Crazy!’ George Clooney’s 1986 Tiger Beat Profile is a Moody, Hilarious Jewel

Everybody knows that George Clooney broke out on The Facts of Life in the mid-’80s. But in the quarter-century before the once and possibly future Oscar-winner and all-around Hollywood royal’s media profile encompassed morning-show house tours and magazine covers from Esquire to Vanity Fair , where was the 25-year-old Clooney developing his public persona? Where else? Tiger Beat ! Just in time for this week’s Oscar build-up, the indispensable film-culture resource Looker points us to the heartthrob repository and its revelatory Clooney feature from February 1986. Parts of it sound uncannily familiar — the Descendants star’s self-effacing charm (“I ran outside in my rabbit suit shouting, ‘What’s happening?’ and I was known as Chicken Little for a long time!”), bachelor swagger (“I’m really bad at a lasting relationship — you can tell because I’ve never had one!”) and bracing humility (“I don’t think I dislike anything about this business except for the fact tat there are so many actors out of work!”) all come through loud and clear. But other parts of it of it are like, “Say whaaaa?” To wit: George Clooney has (or had, anyway) a temper! And a very large car: “The problem is that, especially in this business, you’re always on the edge, everything is so temporary. Sometimes, if I’m driving my car and the guy in front of me wants to turn left when he wasn’t signaling for a turn, I just want to ram into him! I go nuts, crazy! I have this big Oldsmobile that could drive over everything and that’s what I feel like doing. I have this bumper sticker on my car because I broke the dashboard with my fist: ‘Don’t worry about things you don’t have control over.'” Priceless . And this bit about “time for myself”: “I love my new apartment and being there just listening to music or studying my script.” Your move, Brad Pitt . [ Looker ]

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‘I Go Nuts, Crazy!’ George Clooney’s 1986 Tiger Beat Profile is a Moody, Hilarious Jewel

On the End of Uggie

Minutes ago came this terrible reminder from Moviefone: “Good news and bad news: awards season only lasts another five days — which means you’ve only got five more days to bask in the glow of Uggie the dog. He’s the dog you love to love; after all, despite Martin Scorsese’s campaigning, you don’t see Blackie from Hugo with a Facebook fan page numbering nearly 12,000 members .” Or with his own cookies! Anyway, this calls for a slideshow. Bring Kleenex. [ Moviefone ]

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On the End of Uggie

Bookies and Oscar Pundits Put Odds On The Artist, Obviously

The Academy Awards are not a contest, the humble nominees might demur, taking the high road through the gory scrum that is awards season. But do you really think, say, Glenn Close wouldn’t cut a bitch for an Oscar? Alas, the odds are against her, literally; online books have her at as much as 100:1 odds to win her first statuette for Albert Nobbs . Take a peek at how the internet’s enterprising bookies have handicapped the 84th Academy Award nominees and adjust your bets accordingly. Oscar wagering is, of course, a natural byproduct of Hollywood’s biggest night. After all, for some folks the Academy Awards are the sporting event of the season, and this Sunday is moviedom’s Super Bowl – the night our nation gathers around the tube to watch favored players, decked out in uniforms of black tie and couture, nodding gamely at the competition along the red carpet while hoping to be the one holding the hardware aloft in triumph at the end of the night. So whether or not you play along at home with your own Oscar pool or go in for the big bets, these odds should give you an extra leg up on predicting this weekend’s winners. This year the odds made by the experts line up for the most part with the prognostications of the awards watchers who contribute to the Gold Derby Oscar handicap (including Movieline’s S.T. VanAirsdale, whose latest Oscar Index can be found here ). That said, who among us isn’t rooting for at least one or two upsets on the big night? The Artist has had a lock on Best Picture for months, and odds reflect the near-certainty that it’ll take home top honors. Running a distant second, according to the bookmakers and the pundits, is The Descendants , while Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is the near-unanimous choice among betmakers and pundits for last place. Best Picture (Best odds selected from multiple sites via Oddschecker.com.) 1/9 The Artist 28-1 The Descendants 25-1 The Help 25-1 Hugo 50-1 War Horse 100-1 Midnight in Paris 100-1 Moneyball 100-1 Tree of Life 100-1 Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close Likewise, put money on The Artist ’s Michel Hazanavicius to win Best Director (1/6 at Bodog.com) and you won’t get much on a win, but bet on Terrence Malick (66-1 at Ladbrokes) and the dark horse could pay-off handsomely. A little more excitement is to be had in the Best Actor category, where favorite Jean Dujardin is fending off George Clooney in a close-ish race. And over in Best Actress, the ladies are duking it out in the more exciting category of the season, where Viola Davis reigns over Meryl Streep but a winning wager on The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo ’s super, super dark horse Rooney Mara could be huge (303-1 at Betfair). Meanwhile, the pundits and the betting experts differ the most in Best Animated Feature, where the clear favorite is Rango ; Oscar watchers betting with their hearts and minds (and knowledge of Academy voting habits) peg Puss in Boots and A Cat in Paris as the likeliest winners behind Rango , but betmakers put the odds on Chico & Rita in the case of an upset. Want less predictability in your Oscar betting game? You can also bet on which designer will be worn by the Best Actress winner (odds in favor of Stella McCartney, Valentino, and Yves Saint Laurent). For a full look at the odds on the Oscars in multiple categories, head to Oddschecker . [ Oddschecker , Gold Derby ]

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Bookies and Oscar Pundits Put Odds On The Artist, Obviously

Florida NAACP Members ‘Will Not Be Silenced’ By New Voter Laws

‘The rules are setting up minority and young voters to fail,’ University of South Florida NAACP President Vanity Shields tells MTV News. By Gil Kaufman Vanity Shields Photo: MTV News TAMPA, Florida — It’s fitting that 20-year-old University of South Florida junior Vanity Shields, 20, chose to speak to MTV’s Power of 12 in the shadow of her campus’ Martin Luther King Jr. memorial reflecting pond. Nearly 50 years after the Voting Rights Act of 1965 outlawed discriminatory laws that disenfranchised black voters thanks to the tireless work of the civil-rights giant, Shields is preparing for another voting-rights fight in her state. The president of the NAACP chapter on the USF campus and first-time voter is concerned that a new Florida law , ostensibly aimed at cutting down on voter fraud, might leave many young and African-American voters off the rolls this presidential election year . “I personally feel that the rules are setting up minority and young voters to fail,” the health sciences major said of the new law, which carries heavy penalties for third-party organizations trying to register new voters if they fail to comply with the sometimes-byzantine rules. “Now they have 48 hours to fill out this massive amount of paperwork.” A portion of the new law includes restrictions on community-based voter-registration drives that require anyone registering new voters on behalf of organizations such as Rock the Vote or the League of Women Voters to turn all forms in within 48 hours of obtaining a signature or face unspecified civil penalties. Those two groups have been forced to suspend their voter-registration efforts in Florida this year because, according to a press release announcing a lawsuit seeking to block the new provisions, they “include burdensome administrative requirements, unreasonably tight deadlines for submission for completed forms and unnecessarily harsh penalties for even the slightest delay or mistake.” Shields said the USF NAACP chapter has been very active on the issue and planned a general body meeting called “The Colors of Justice” on Monday (January 30) to discuss the new rules and raise awareness about them. There will also be a voter-awareness rally soon, though she said efforts such as the NAACP’s get-out-the-vote “Souls to the Poll” action from years past has been canceled this year because of new restrictions on registering voters on the Sunday before an election. “I am originally from New Jersey, and Hillsboro County in Tampa is a pre-clearance [area]. … What that means is that people who were previously registered are still able to vote, but with this new law, if Hillsboro County were not pre-clearance, I would have to go back to New Jersey to vote,” said Brianna Simms, 20, the second vice president of the USF NAACP chapter. “As a college student, I don’t have the funds or the time to do that, so that would limit my impact on the country in choosing our next president.” Shields said awareness of the voting issue is pretty low at the moment, but she plans to start posting about it on Twitter and Facebook, distribute fliers and ask her fellow students if they know about the changes. “I feel that our demographic is being targeted and that they’re trying to silence us, but we will not be silenced,” she said. “We will speak our minds and keep our right to vote.” MTV is on the scene in Florida! Check back for up-to-the-minute coverage of the primaries and stick with PowerOf12.org throughout the 2012 presidential election season. Related Videos Florida Primary: The Race Is On! Barnstorming The Iowa Caucus With Andrew Jenks

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Florida NAACP Members ‘Will Not Be Silenced’ By New Voter Laws

Race Matters: Federal Judge Decides To Keep Party Affiliation On Voting Ballots So Black People Will Be Able To Find The Democrats

Well this is quite interesting: A U.S. District Court judge has rejected a challenge to Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 — filled when the Department of Justice barred the city of Kinston, N.C. from holding nonpartisan elections — reasoning that lack of access to party affiliation would discriminate against minority voters who otherwise wouldn’t know how to find Democratic candidates on a ballot. The challenge was initiated after the Justice Department rejected a 2008 referendum vote in which the city of Kinston voted to stop listing candidates’ party affiliations on ballots. Under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, the Justice Department must approve changes to election law in regions with a history, however distant, of racial discrimination. The Justice Department prevented the 2008 referendum change, arguing in part that “the elimination of party affiliation on the ballot will likely reduce the ability of blacks to elect candidates of choice.” In other words, they are saying that if the parties are eliminated black people won’t know who to vote for…SMH. Discuss.. Source

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Race Matters: Federal Judge Decides To Keep Party Affiliation On Voting Ballots So Black People Will Be Able To Find The Democrats

Hugo Chavez Suggests America Gave Him Cancer

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Hugo Chavez (Getty) Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez thinks the American government may be behind his battle with cancer . President Chavez made his remarks during a year-end address to troops yesterday, one day after Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner announced she was diagnosed with thyroid cancer . In recent years, several leftist Latin American leaders have been diagnosed with… Broadcasting platform : YouTube Source : The Politicker Discovery Date : 28/12/2011 08:43 Number of articles : 2

Hugo Chavez Suggests America Gave Him Cancer

Romney Playing to Win in Iowa

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Mitt Romney will hold a post-caucus party in Iowa, the Des Moines Register reports. “The next morning, the former governor will do press interviews before flying to New Hampshire, the next state on the voting calendar and a crucial contest for Romney.” First Read : “Folks, that is playing to win. Talk about confidence The safe move — and the one that seemed telegraphed a few weeks ago — would be… Broadcasting platform : YouTube Source : Political Wire Discovery Date : 28/12/2011 15:47 Number of articles : 2

Romney Playing to Win in Iowa

Britney Spears Experts Debate Final Four Videos

BreatheHeavy.com’s Jordan Miller puts his money on ‘Criminal’ as voting continues. By Christina Garibaldi Jason Trawick and Britney Spears in “Criminal” Photo: Jive It’s Final Four time in MTV News’ Britney Spears Tournament: 30 Videos for 30 Years . Hundreds of thousands of votes came in during round three — and that led to some shocking eliminations. Most notably, fan favorite “Toxic” lost out to “I’m a Slave 4 U,” which advanced to round two. “We thought that would be the biggest, tightest competition,” MTV Newsroom blog editor John Mitchell said of the contest between “Slave” and “Toxic.” “And it was the one that was separated by the most [votes].” The closest finish in the third round came down to this year’s “Till the World Ends” and “Lucky,” released in 2000. “Till the World Ends” held the lead for most of the voting, but a last-minute push by fans edged “Lucky” into the next round with a margin of just 128 votes. Now, it’s down to the Final Four. “Lucky” will take its chances against Spears’ latest video “Criminal,” which has a strong shot at the final round, according to BreatheHeavy.com’s Jordan Miller , who runs Britney’s biggest fan site. “I think ‘Criminal’ ‘s made it really far because it’s her latest music video that’s out,” Miller explained. “I think if that music video came out years ago, I don’t think it would be doing so well. It’s being promoted right now on TV and radio, but I think because it’s new to fans, it’s made it this far.” In the Final Four, “Slave 4 U” is facing off against “Hold It Against Me,” and MTV News experts predict “Slave” and “Criminal” will ultimately fight it out for the title of Best Britney Video of All Time. Spears herself recently weighed in on the competition with a tweet , hinting that boyfriend Jason Trawick was supporting “Criminal,” in which he co-stars with Brit. “It’s constantly been the most voted-upon bracket every single round,” MTV News’ Mitchell said of “Criminal.” “I think there’s a lot of groundswell behind that video; [Britney] obviously supports that video. I think that her fans are going to take it to the end.” Voting for the top four clips is open until 7 a.m. Thursday ; the top two will be unveiled at 10 a.m. on Thursday morning, followed by the big reveal of the winner at 10 a.m. ET on Friday, which happens to be Britney’s 30th birthday. Head over to Britney30.MTV.com and vote for your favorite music video in MTV News’ Britney Spears Tournament: 30 Videos for 30 Years. Which Britney video are you rooting for? Let us know in the comments section below! What’s your favorite Britney video? Make sure to vote at Britney30.MTV.com or the MTV Newsroom blog, and share your picks in the comments below! Related Videos Britney Spears: 30 Videos For 30 Years Related Artists Britney Spears

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Britney Spears Experts Debate Final Four Videos