Russia’s biggest gun manufacturer is looking to take on Tesla with its new electric concept car.

Kalashnikov, maker of the AK-47 assault weapon, has gone retro with its new “supercar,” the CV-1, unveiled at a Russian defense show near Moscow Thursday.

According to media outlets reporting at a press event at the expo, a Kalashnikov media rep said the car will “let us stand in the ranks of global electric car producers such as Tesla.”

It certainly looks retro, with the design and body of an old-school IZh 21252 “Kombi” car — the Kombi came from a Soviet era car maker from the 1970s. It’s a bold design decision, a vintage throwback akin to the Fujifilm Instax camera.

Aside from making guns, Kalashnikov had previously built electric motorcycles and electric “Ovum” vehicles that were used at the World Cup in Russia this summer. The electric motorcycles had been used last year for police patrolling roads. But mostly the company builds weapons. And the occasional salt-and-pepper shaker.

So, will the company’s CV-1 “supercar” stand up to Tesla’s electric empire?

A limited number of Tesla vehicles have been sold in Russia in the past few years.

Kalashnikov didn’t give any pricing details for the potential vehicle, but the specs that the company provided didn’t exactly stack up with Tesla.

Tesla’s electric vehicles boast much more impressive stats. The CV-1 claims to have about a 200-mile range and go from 0 to 60 mph in 6 seconds. Tesla’s newest affordable sedan, the Model 3, has a 220-mile range and a long-range battery that reaches 310 miles. The Model 3 can reach 60 mph in 3.5 seconds.

If the concept car isn’t that impressive to you, check out the gun maker’s walking robot named Igoryok, also unveiled at the defense show this week. 

Lancashire reached T20 Blast Finals Day after a fine bowling display laid the platform for a nervy six-wicket victory over Kent at Canterbury.

Impressive young spinner Matt Parkinson took 3-27 as the hosts struggled to a modest 133-9 from their 20 overs.

Lancashire then lost England star Jos Buttler to a first-ball duck – just two days after his maiden Test century.

But international team-mate Keaton Jennings’ 46 proved key as they made their target with eight balls left.

The England Test opener, batting at four for Lancashire, struck five fours, square cutting superbly, as he put behind him a string of low scores during the current series against India.

By contrast, Buttler failed to back up his superb innings on Tuesday with a meaningful contribution for his county, stumped by England white-ball specialist Sam Billings.

However, after Jennings had kept the visitors in contention, a 50-run fifth-wicket partnership between Dane Vilas (30 not out) and Jordan Clark (29 not out) dragged them across the line and on to a joint record seventh appearance at Finals Day.

The match had looked to be heading for a tighter conclusion before Clark smashed a six off the final ball of the 18th over and then successive fours during the penultimate over to complete victory.

Captain Billings had earlier top-scored with 37 for Kent, who had to recover from having Daniel Bell-Drummond run out without facing from the second ball of the match.

Lancashire, T20 winners in 2015, are the first side to book their place at Edgbaston on Saturday, 15 September.

In the other quarter-finals, Durham host Sussex at Chester-le-Street on Friday (18:30 BST), Worcestershire face Gloucestershire at New Road on Saturday (15:00 BST) and Somerset then meet holders Notts at Taunton on Sunday (15:00 BST).

Kent captain Sam Billings told BBC Radio Kent:

“A huge frustration to lose a home quarter-final. A sad end to our T20 campaign after looking the best side in the country.

“Our worst batting performance of the year. Batting first was the right decision but we batted terribly. We were 10 or 15 runs short.

“On a flat pitch, we’d back ourselves against anyone. But this wasn’t really the pitch you want to prepare against Lancashire with their five spinning options.

“At least at Beckenham we know we’re going to get a flat pitch. The only time we come unstuck is on snotheaps like this one.”

Man of the match Matt Parkinson told BBC Radio Lancashire:

“You can see the effort and the class is there when we all perform. We hope we can take this momentum into Finals Day.

“As a unit, we bowled well, and to get three wickets in the powerplay eased our nerves a bit.

“It spun a bit more than we thought it would. That enabled to take more wickets and, from there, they had nowhere to go.

“We don’t like to do things easy and it was a bit nervy, but credit to Keaton Jennings, Dane Vilas and Jordan Clark for seeing us home.”

The decision to end “The Big Bang Theory” doesn’t add up in dollars, but it makes perfect creative sense.

CBS was interested in a deal to extend the hit comedy, with the stars under contract just for the coming season. However, the network, studio and Chuck Lorre Wednesday announced that the series will end next May. Entertainment Weekly reported that breakout star Jim Parsons put the brakes on a deal because he was ready to leave.

Whatever the reason, it’s the right move. After more than 250 episodes, “Bang” is still TV’s top-rated comedy – “Roseanne” briefly took that honor, but look where that is now – and likely will remain so. There was plenty of money to be made for everyone involved and the departure will leave CBS, which successfully launched “Bang” prequel spinoff “Young Sheldon,” with a huge scheduling hole. (Don’t shed any tears. Although fans will soon be Penny-less, nobody connected to this money machine will leave penniless.)

Creatively, however, “Bang” is showing its age. Although long defying the decline that eventually afflicts long-running comedies, it started to flounder last season.

More: ‘The Big Bang Theory’ will end with Season 12 in May 2019: ‘A true labor of love’

More: Jim Parsons shares lengthy goodbye to ‘The Big Bang Theory’ fans, cast and crew

For almost its entire run, “Big Bang,” created by sitcom master Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady, has been a well-oiled laugh factory. The initial story of two awkward scientific geniuses and their apartment neighbor, a Cheesecake Factory waitress with much sharper social skills, began with promise and took off from there, growing into a larger, talented ensemble that wove in character depth and emotion, without getting maudlin, while still delivering the jokes.

The initial cast – neighbor Penny (Kaley Cuoco) was on her own dealing with across-the-hall roommates Sheldon (Jim Parsons) and Leonard (Johnny Galecki) and their scientist pals Howard (Simon Helberg) and Raj (Kunal Nayyar) – was male-centric, but the show brought more balance introducing two brilliant women, a female scientists: microbiologist Bernadette (Melissa Rauch) and neuroscientist Amy (Mayim Bialik).

They weren’t just grafted on for appearances. The writers and actors brought depth to Bernadette and Amy, integrating them smartly into the cast and creating new opportunities as the eternally immature guys took baby steps to grow up. Leonard eventually married Penny; Bernadette and Howard got hitched and became parents; and Amy and man-child Sheldon took their marital vows in last season’s finale.

Over the years, as Steven Molaro took a more prominent role as an executive producer, the show added a layer of emotion that gave the humor more depth. Fans strongly bonded with the characters, a great sign, with laughs coming from their idiosyncratic personalities as well as the jokes.

I remember being on set for a Season 6 episode where the band of friends tried to soften the blow of Howard’s feelings of abandonment by his father. There was a sweetness to their support, punctuated by a hilarious and ridiculous effort from emotionally dense Sheldon. 

“Big Bang” maintained that balance over the years as its longevity surpassed most other sitcoms, especially those shot in front of a studio audience. By the time it closes shop in May, the series will have racked up a record 279 episodes for the studio-audience format, more than classics “Frasier” (11 seasons, 263 episodes), “Friends” (10 seasons, 236 episodes) and “Seinfeld” (nine seasons, 173 episodes). 

Past hits have ended for various reasons; stars and producers are eager to pursue other opportunities or the financial factors no longer make sense. 

But, there’s an underlying, unavoidable reason why all these shows end. Over time, they all lose some creativity, often simply resulting from repetition. What was once fresh can seem stale.

“Bang” upheld its quality for many episodes past a sitcom’s expected sell-by date, but it hit a wall last year. The season-long lead-up to the “Shamy” wedding, a truly joyous union of two great characters, started seeming more like a meandering walk than a wedding march. It just felt like “Bang” was spinning its wheels. Repetition and sameness may please obsessive Sheldon, but they don’t do much for comedy.

With one and especially two more seasons beyond the upcoming one (Sept. 24, 8 EDT/PDT), “Bang” was in danger of veering toward comedic entropy (a term Sheldon and Leonard would understand), degrading and losing energy and moving toward flatness.

With just one season to go, however, I have faith the talented producers, writers and actors can generate a funny sprint, with pratfalls, to the finish line. “Big Bang” writers are famous for not plotting too far ahead, so there’s time to plan a satisfying conclusion and there’s no longer any danger of the dreaded penultimate season, a deadening period for many otherwise stellar series as everyone anticipates the grand finale.

“Big Bang” hasn’t received its awards due over the years; Jim Parsons has been an Emmy magnet, winning four trophies as lead actor in a comedy, but the series has never won for best comedy. It was worthy of that honor.

But, awards don’t determine a show’s quality and “Big Bang” stands with the best in its genre. Now, without being weighed down with two extra seasons (and, yes, the accompanying stacks of money), it has a chance to go out with … a sharp, funny flourish. (Did you think I’d say bang? Bazinga!)

Read or Share this story: https://usat.ly/2o6tdvO

Image: Jeffrey Hamilton/getty

Well this is disturbing. 

Apparently not content to merely meddle in the 2016 U.S. election, Russian trolls now stand accused of spreading a type of misinformation that could have literal deadly effects: anti-vaccine propaganda.  

So finds a new study published Thursday in the American Journal of Public Health, which found that Russian trolls pushed vaccine-related misinformation on Twitter in the run up to the 2016 election. 

“Content polluters seem to use anti-vaccine messages as bait to entice their followers to click on advertisements and links to malicious websites,” explained Sandra Crouse Quinn, study co-author and University of Maryland professor, in a press release. “Ironically, content that promotes exposure to biological viruses may also promote exposure to computer viruses.”

According to researchers from George Washington University, the University of Maryland, and Johns Hopkins University, among the Twitter accounts studied were those “now known to belong to the same Russian trolls who interfered in the U.S. election.”

“These trolls seem to be using vaccination as a wedge issue, promoting discord in American society”

While the specifics of this misinformation may be shocking, the playbook the trolls followed is not. Much like the Internet Research Agency pushed for race-based violence and posted both pro-Trump and pro-Black Lives Matter content, the tweets coming from Russian troll-operated Twitter accounts both cast doubts on the efficacy of vaccines and promoted them. 

“These trolls seem to be using vaccination as a wedge issue, promoting discord in American society,” study co-author Mark Dredze said in a press statement. “However, by playing both sides, they erode public trust in vaccination, exposing us all to the risk of infectious diseases. Viruses don’t respect national boundaries.”

And, according to the study, the trolls’ disinformation “was effective for propagating news articles through social media in the context of the 2015 Disneyland measles outbreak.”

In other words, those posting the anti-vaxx content were able to weaponize an outbreak that resulted in 125 confirmed measles cases for propaganda purposes. 

It turns out that the accounts on Twitter arguing that vaccines cause autism may not all be operated by idiots — some may also be helmed by paid Russian trolls attempting to subvert democracy. Which, well, doesn’t make me feel any better.  

During his tenure on American Horror Story from 2014 to 2016, Finn Wittrock very notably got to roll around with Lady Gaga in a haunted hotel room in the throes of passion. It’s a series highlight for sure. But one thing Wittrock has never had the opportunity to do is venture into the realm of romancing vampires — namely via Bella Swan herself, Kristen Stewart.

If anyone ever wanted to see these two make out — or, say, involve pasta in some kind of humiliating roleplay in the middle of a smoky cocktail club — they had to use their imaginations. Until today! The latest music video from New York post-punk lifers Interpol features Stewart and Wittrock doing exactly that, and somehow even more.

The song’s called “If You Really Love Nothing,” and its smoke-tinged opening credits bill it as a film (from director Hala Matar). It’s really just five minutes of Stewart doing whatever the hell she wants around a bar/restaurant, and most of those actions are hazardous to the folks around her, including Wittrock. By the end, let’s just say he’s not really in a good place.

But before that, it’s a party! They greet each other outside (after she rolls up in the trunk of a vintage car) and immediately start making out before she eventually feeds him spaghetti and meatballs, makes him chug whiskey, and abandons him pretty flagrantly. It’s a wild ride, man, and because it’s all led by Stewart, it’s obviously engrossing as hell.

Real-life, non-video Stewart stars alongside Chloe Sevigny (who appeared with Wittrock in AHS: Hotel) in the upcoming murderous Lizzie Borden retelling, Lizzie; plus, her breakout series Twilight is celebrating 10 years on the big screen with a new bundled home release.

Wittrock, meanwhile, appears in If Beale Street Could Talk, the new project from Moonlight director Barry Jenkins, set to premiere next month at the Toronto International Film Festival. If this is indeed the only occasion these two work together, well, at least we’ll always have the memories.

England wing Chris Ashton has been banned for seven weeks after his red card for a tip tackle in Sale Sharks’ pre-season friendly against Castres.

The 31-year-old did not accept the charge for the tackle on Castres scrum-half Rory Kockott, but was found guilty by the independent panel process.

Ashton, who joined Sale from Toulon this summer, will miss the first six rounds of the Premiership campaign.

He was named in an England squad for the first time since 2016 on 2 August.

England head coach Eddie Jones will select a further training squad on 20 September, during Ashton’s suspension, although he will be available as he is only suspended from matches.

Ashton was given an extra week on top of the usual six-week penalty for his “poor disciplinary record”.

His previous suspensions include a 13-week ban for biting and a 10-week suspension for eye gouging, both of which occurred while at Saracens.

“It is an important principle of rugby regulation to prevent injury to others,” said independent panel chair Richard Whittam QC.

“Provocation is not a defence to foul play and lifting a player and dropping that player such that his head makes contact with the ground has the potential to cause serious injury.

“While in this case the panel accepts no injury was caused, it still amounted to foul play that clearly met the red card threshold.”

The former Northampton three-quarter’s first appearance for his club side could come in the European Challenge Cup against French Top 14 side Perpignan on 12 October.

Speaking ahead of the verdict, Sale boss Steve Diamond defended Ashton’s actions, saying he was fully justified as his behaviour was in “self defence” amid suggestions of eye-gouging.

“I’d take a red card for any other Sale player if they defended themselves the way Chris Ashton did,” he said.

“If you’re defending yourself on a rugby pitch when things go on and are over and above what we expect, then red mist doesn’t come into it.”

WASHINGTON – Anxiety and uncertainty.

Those are familiar feelings for aides to Donald Trump, a president who seems to relish combat and controversy and whose inner circle has been increasingly rocked by revelations stemming from federal investigations.

This week, White House staff members experienced a new level of turbulence after a guilty verdict was announced for Paul Manafort, the president’s former campaign chairman, while in a separate case, Michael Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer, pleaded guilty to criminal charges.

In interviews with a half-dozen Trump aides and people close to the White House, many described rising concerns about federal inquiries underway, including special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

“I think people are genuinely shaken,” said one official, who like others spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal matters. “They’re still trying to digest it – process it.”

In the latest sign of the potential dangers for Trump and those close to him, The Wall Street Journal and Vanity Fair reported Thursday that David Pecker, CEO of American Media Inc., had been granted immunity by federal prosecutors in a deal in which he has been discussing Trump’s role in hush agreements ahead of the 2016 election to women who  said they had sexual encounters with the president.

Pecker, a close Trump ally, has been accused of helping silence negative stories about the president, including purchasing the rights to stories, then quashing them in a practice known as “catch and kill.” 

As the developments unfolded this week, television screens in the West Wing played cable television programs dominated by the news about Manafort, Cohen and the Mueller investigation. Aides sought to go about their business, focusing on tasks such as planning Wednesday’s Medal of Honor ceremony in the East Room and the effort to shepherd through the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.

Trump himself went on the attack.  

“I’ve always had controversy in my life and I’ve always succeeded,” Trump said in a Fox & Friends interview broadcast Thursday. “I’ve always won.” 

The president also has been tweeting, denying wrongdoing and attacking Cohen. In one post, Trump praised Manafort because, unlike Cohen, “he refused to ‘break’ ” to prosecutors and “make up stories in order to get a ‘deal.’ “

He has also lashed out at Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who recused himself from the investigation of Russian election interference, which paved the way for Mueller’s appointment.

Of the two bombshells that dropped this week – the Manafort guilty verdict and the Cohen guilty plea – aides said their biggest concern right now was about Cohen and his claim that the president directed him to pay the women to buy their silence. Prosecutors say the payments violated campaign finance laws because they were made to prevent information from coming out that could have damaged Trump’s campaign.

Throughout the course of Manafort’s trial, aides said they more or less expected Trump’s former campaign chairman to be convicted on financial fraud charges. As they did so, they echoed Trump’s claims that charges against Manafort stemmed from long-ago allegations and had nothing to do with the president’s campaign or Russians who sought to influence the race in Trump’s favor.

One concern of aides is the suggestion by Cohen’s attorney that his client is eager to provide information about Trump and Russia to Mueller. Cohen is a longtime associate of the president who had long been known as his “fixer.”

In a somber yet tense briefing with reporters on Wednesday, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders declined to get into the “back and forth” on the Cohen and Mueller investigations and repeatedly said Trump “did nothing wrong.” At one point she said, “Just because Michael Cohen made a plea deal doesn’t mean that implicates the president in anything.”

Disputing the idea that the administration needs to make changes to meet its new legal challenges, Sanders said Trump and his team would “continue to focus on the things Americans care about,” particularly the economy,

Longtime allies said Trump and the staff were holding up well.

“It’s a huge distraction to many in the media,” said Boris Epshteyn, a former White House aide who is now chief political analyst for Sinclair Broadcast Group. “But it’s not a huge distraction to the president and his staff, who continue to work very hard for the American people.”

Some aides predicted that Trump will be increasingly aggressive as the investigations roll on into the fall, along with high-stakes political campaigns for control of Congress. 

Echoing those feelings, former Trump campaign adviser Michael Caputo said Cohen is not a trustworthy witness and the president should continue to speak out against him.

Caputo also said the legal actions against Manafort and Cohen clarify something that has been obvious for awhile: Democrats will push for impeachment, and the White House should be prepared to deal with it.

“It’s very clear now – if it wasn’t clear before – that the 2018 midterm elections are a referendum on the impeachment of the president of the United States,” Caputo said. 

Some aides to Trump noted that they have been through tense times before: the firing of FBI Director James Comey in May 2017, the appointment of Mueller as special counsel that same month, Trump’s tweeted admission this past May that he reimbursed Cohen for hush payments to former adult film star Stormy Daniels, and Cohen’s release in July of a taped conversation with Trump.

These latest revelations? “To be honest,” one official said, “it’s kind of like … whatever.”

Read or Share this story: https://usat.ly/2o2d9uK

Everyone who’s already in love with Noah Centineo’s Peter Kavinsky from Netflix’s To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before has a different moment where they fell in love. 

Some people say it’s when he twirled Lara Jean around in the cafeteria. Some say it was when he bashfully splashed the hot tub water when she didn’t realize she liked him, but others point to what is known as The Popcorn Save as the moment they knew Peter Kavinsky was truly a good egg.

The Popcorn Save is pivotal because the simple action of Peter moving a bowl of popcorn from the couch before going in for a pillowfight with Lara Jean’s little sister shows in action that Peter is a thoughtful, conscientious person — he showed up for a movie night and didn’t mind spending time with his date’s little sister, he was kind enough to include said little sister in the fun instead of making her feel like a third wheel, and most importantly he didn’t want to make a mess in Lara Jean’s house in the name of said fun. 

To make this little moment even better, Netflix’s official “See What’s Next” Twitter account confirmed to a Popcorn Save enthusiast that the adorable moment between Peter and Lara Jean’s little sister, in which he moves a bowl of popcorn off the couch before going in for a pillow fight, was completely improvised by Noah Centineo. 

Noah improvising that moment means that not only is his character a spatially aware king, but that Noah is one himself! That’s one step closer to the 22-year-old actor literally being the Peter Kavinsky of everyone’s dreams. 

US President Donald Trump drew a sharp rebuttal from his attorney general after giving a scathing assessment of Jeff Sessions as being unable to take control of the Justice Department.

Trump intensified his criticism of the Justice Department in a Fox News interview broadcast on Thursday as the White House grappled to respond to the conviction of former Paul Manafort, Trump’s former campaign chairman, on multiple fraud counts and a plea deal struck by Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal lawyer, that implicated the president.

Trump reprised a litany of complaints about the Justice Department and the FBI, attacking both without providing evidence they had treated him and his supporters unfairly.

Trump also renewed his criticism of Sessions, blaming him for what he called corruption at the Department of Justice.

“I put in an attorney general who never took control of the Justice Department,” Trump told Fox.

Sessions, in a rare rebuttal to Trump, issued a statement defending the integrity of his department.

“I took control of the Department of Justice the day I was sworn in,” he said. “While I am attorney general, the actions of the Department of Justice will not be improperly influenced by political considerations.”

Sessions, a longtime US senator and early supporter of Trump’s presidential bid, drew Trump’s ire when he recused himself in March 2017 from issues involving the 2016 White House race.

That removed him from oversight of the federal special counsel’s investigation of Russia’s role in the election and whether Trump’s campaign worked with Moscow to influence the vote. Trump has repeatedly called the investigation a witch-hunt and maintained there was no collusion. 

Trump told Fox that Sessions should not have recused himself from Russia-related matters. 

“He took the job and then he said, ‘I’m going to recuse myself,’” Trump said. “I said, ‘What kind of a man is this?’”

However, Trump told “Fox & Friends” he would “stay uninvolved” in department matters.

Al Jazeera’s Heidi Zhou-Castro, reporting from Washington, DC, said that Trump has “long held over Sessions’s head this final option of firing Sessions, which the president has absolute power to do”. 

She added, however, that “getting rid of Sessions may not end the Russia investigation and would certainly increase this political firestorm surrounding the president this week”. 

Political problems deepen

In the Fox interview, Trump also said that he respected Manafort for work he had done for prominent Republican politicians, adding that “some of the charges they threw against him, every consultant, every lobbyist in Washington probably does.” 

The former Trump campaign chairman was found guilty on Tuesday of eight financial crimes, including tax evasion and bank fraud. The charges stemmed from the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election. 

Tuesday’s verdict came as Cohen pleaded guilty to campaign-finance violations and other charges, saying he made payments to influence the 2016 election at the direction of a candidate for federal office. 

Trump said Manafort and Cohen were charged with matters unrelated to his presidential campaign, although Cohen implicated Trump, saying he had paid sums of $130,000 and $150,000 each to two women who claimed they had affairs with Trump, acting at his boss’s request, in a bid to buy their silence “with the purpose of influencing the election”. 

Cohen did not name Trump on Tuesday, but said one payment was made “in coordination and at the direction of a candidate for federal office”, and the other was made “under direction of the same candidate”.

Asked if he directed Cohen to make the payments, Trump said only that Cohen made both deals. He attacked Cohen, who once said he would “take a bullet” for Trump, for agreeing to a plea deal with prosecutors that made the president look bad.

“It’s called flipping and it almost ought to be illegal,” he said. 

Trump was asked whether he thought Democrats would move to impeach him if they won control of the House of Representatives in the November midterm elections. 

“I don’t know how you would impeach somebody who’s done a great job,” he said. “If I got impeached, I think the market would crash.”

Shawn Zeller, a deputy editor with the Congressional Quarterly Magazine, said at this point, “Trump’s problem is more political than impeachment”. 

“With the election coming in November, all this news about his former associate, Michael Cohen, and former campaign manager, Paul Manafort … threatens Republicans positions in the November elections.” 

National Enquirer execs ‘corroborate’ Cohen’s account

Meanwhile, reports surfaced on Thursday that the CEO of the publisher of the National Enquirer was granted immunity by prosecutors investigating the payments made by Cohen. 

According to the Wall Street Journal,  American Media Inc’s (AMI) Chief Executive Officer David Pecker met prosecutors to describe Trump and Cohen’s involvement in hush-money deals. 

Pecker, a longtime friend of Trump and Cohen, and Dylan Howard, another AMI executive who also reportedly received immunity, corroborated Cohen’s account, according to Vanity Fair magazine. 

Cooperation with authorities by Pecker and Howard could further implicate Trump in connection with the payments, which prosecutors have said violated campaign finance laws.

Federal prosecutors in New York and the White House declined to comment. AMI’s general counsel, Eric Klee, did not respond to a request for comment. 

Nicki Minaj, Travis Scott, and Kylie Jenner are the best Mad Libs pairing of celebrities in recent memory. During episode five of her Queen Radio show, Minaj cleared the air about Kylie after a video of the mogul reportedly avoiding her on the MTV Video Music Awards red carpet surfaced.

“I fucking love Kylie and that’s not going to change,” Minaj said. “This is not real life, this is entertainment. I love Kylie and so do my fans. Kim was on my first episode of Queen Radio — fucking love her. We’re not going to make something that it’s not. We’re not going to start any dumbass cat fights for your entertainment. This is strictly music, between musicians.”

Kylie potentially avoided Nicki Minaj at the VMAs because of tweets the Queens rapper posted a day before the awards ceremony. On Twitter, Nicki detailed why she felt she deserved the No. 1 album over Travis Scott’s Astroworld, after it secured the top spot on the Billboard 200.

“Travis sold over 50K of these,” Nicki wrote. “With no requirement of redeeming the album! With no dates for a tour, etc. I spoke to him. He knows he doesn’t have the #1 album this week.”

In a second tweet, Minaj doubled down on her assessment that Travis didn’t truly have the top album in the country.

“I put my blood sweat & tears in writing a dope album only for Travis Scott to have Kylie Jenner post a tour pass telling ppl to come see her & Stormi,” she continued. “I’m actually laughing. #Queen broke the record of being number 1 in 86 countries. Thank Jesus & thank you to my fans.”

Thankfully, it seems like the competitive spirit only pertains to the music. Listen to the entire episode on Apple Music.