Hip-hop star Kanye West is still feeling the pain over his ambush of Taylor Swift last year — and he's expressing his pain all over Twitter.

West unleashed a torrent of emotions on his official Twitter account Saturday, acknowledging once again that he was wrong for jumping on stage, grabbing the microphone from Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards and saying her trophy should have gone to Beyonce.

But the rapper-producer said that he has experienced enormous pain, been the subject of death wishes and suffered tremendous setback to his career.

"How deep is the scar ... I bled hard ... cancelled tour with the number one pop star in the world ... closed the doors of my clothing office," he tweeted.

The multiplatinum, Grammy-winning superstar had been one of the decade's most successful and critically acclaimed stars, despite sometimes boorish behavior and meltdowns at other awards shows when things did not go his way.

However, when he upstaged Swift — the then-teenage darling of pop and country music worlds —the public had had enough. There was tremendous backlash against West — even President Barack Obama was caught calling him a "jackass."

At the time, he went on Jay Leno's prime-time show to apologize and said he still had not recovered from his mother's death two years prior. He said he would be taking time off from the public eye.

That time off came sooner than expected. He canceled a joint tour with Lady Gaga that fall, apparently due to low ticket sales. On Twitter, West talked about the backlash.

"I'm the guy who at one point could perform the Justin Timberlake on stage and everyone would be sooo happy that I was there," he wrote.

After the incident, he said, "People tweeted that they wish I was dead ... No listen. They wanted me to die people. I carry that. I smile and take pictures through that."

West said he's now "ready to get out of my own way. The ego is overdone."

He also apologized to Swift again, and said he has written a song for her that he hopes she will perform.

"If she won't take it then I will perform it for her," he said.

West is working on a new album that is supposed to come out sometime this fall. A recent member of Twitter, West has been an active user, posting not only his feelings, but new songs and other updates. He has over 900,000 followers since he joined earlier this summer.

"Man I love Twitter ... I've always been at the mercy of the press but no more ... The media tried to demonize me," he tweeted Saturday.

Lab tests on suspected illegal drugs taken from rapper T.I.'s car Wednesday night should be completed by Friday, according to a Los Angeles County Sheriff's spokeswoman.

Police arrested T.I., whose real name is Clifford Harris, and his wife, "Tiny" Tameka Cottle, during a traffic stop on Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood on Wednesday night.

Harris, 29, and Cottle, 35, allegedly possessed a controlled substance, the spokeswoman said.

During the stop, police said, they smelled an odor of marijuana coming from the couple's car.

Harris and his wife were released Thursday morning on $10,000 bail, according to his lawyer.

Their mug shots will not be made public until investigators confirm through lab tests that the seized substance was an illegal drug, sheriff's spokeswoman Nicole Nishida said,.

Steve Sadow, the Atlanta, Georgia, lawyer who represented Harris in his federal firearms case in 2008, was coincidentally in Los Angeles, where he is the lead defense lawyer in the Anna Nicole Smith drug trial.

He and Christopher Smith, his Los Angeles co-counsel in representing Smith defendant Howard K. Stern, will also represent Harris and his wife in the newest case, he said.

"It was a late night," Sadow said at one point in the Smith trial Thursday morning.

Harris will have an initial hearing in November since he has already posted bond, Sadow said.

Sadow would not comment on what affect the drug arrest might have on Harris' probation in the federal conviction.

In 2008, Harris was sentenced on charges of unlawfully possessing firearms as a convicted felon. The charges came after an arrest by federal agents a year earlier while Harris was buying three machine guns in the parking lot of an Atlanta grocery store.

Harris was released after serving nine months in prison and three months in a halfway house.

Usher's marriage to Tameka Foster may have ended in divorce, but the singer doesn't consider the relationship a failure.

"I appreciate the relationship for what it was," he says. "Even though it didn't work out, I'm glad we got together. I love her as the mother of my children; we just couldn't be married."

So what went wrong? Usher says that shortly after the birth of their second child, he and Foster started to disagree over everything from parenting style to his busy schedule.

"We're two different people," he says, "and we have two different goals. It just was never going to work out 100 percent."

The singer, 31, who sat down with PEOPLE in his Atlanta-area home, says that the couple's priority continues to be their children. (He and Foster share custody of Usher V, who turns 3 in November, and Naviyd, who turns 2 a month later.)

"We had to put our issues aside and focus on raising them," he says. "There will never be another mother for my sons, and I'll always be their father."

Like Father, Like Sons

Raising two boisterous boys can be challenging, especially when they take after their famous dad. "Usher [V] is always in everything," he says. "He's an instigator. He's the one who leads his brother astray. I was like that when I was his age."

Naviyd is more of a follower, doing whatever his big brother does. "So if one gets in trouble, the other one does, too," says Usher. "They both have a lot of energy. They can wear me out."

Fortunately, Usher has a babysitter nearby -- his mom, Jonetta Patton, lives around the corner. "She spoils them," Usher says with a sigh. "She lets them do everything that she wouldn't let me do. Sometimes, when I'm scolding the kids, I sound just like my mom. I'm like, 'how did Jonetta get in here?' "

His Career

Usher, who released his new EP "Versus" last week, says that his work continues to evolve as he evolves in his own life.

"My music is about where I am at the time," he says. "In 'Raymond vs. Raymond,' I was going through a lot of things, and it came out in my music. My marriage fell apart and I was suddenly a single father. But now, with 'Versus,' I'm singing about being adating father."

And will he sing about falling in love again? "I still believe in love," says Usher. "I believe in marriage. When I fall in love again, everyone will know. I'll sing about it."

A Chicago-based comedian and radio personality who said he was denied the right to buy a house in Bridgeport because of race Thursday sued the homeowners and real estate agents involved in the deal.

George Willborn and his wife, Peytyn, filed the discrimination lawsuit in federal court, charging that homeowners Daniel and Adrienne Sabbia refused to sell them the home because the Willborns are black. The suit contends the couples had a verbal deal last January for $1.7 million on a five-bedroom home at 3300 S. Normal but that the Sabbias then declined to sign contracts.

George and Peytyn Willborn (pictured) leave the Federal Building after their attorneys filed a discrimination lawsuit Thursday.

The suit also names Prudential Rubloff Properties and Jeffrey Lowe of Lowe Group Chicago Inc., Realtors who were representing the Sabbias.

This month, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development filed a discrimination complaint against the Sabbias and the real estate agents. The Willborns have exercised their right to transfer that administrative hearing to federal court, requiring the Justice Department to seek damages on the couple's behalf.

The HUD case hinges on testimony Lowe gave to a federal investigator in which, according to the complaint, he said the Sabbias decided they would rather not sell to a black family.

Willie Gary, an attorney for the Willborns, said it is likely the separate cases will be consolidated. For now, the two-track legal process provides pressure for a financial settlement.

An attorney for the Sabbias could not be reached. Lawyers for the Realtors vociferously denied that their clients did anything wrong. Edward Feldman, an attorney with Miller Shakman & Beem LLP representing Lowe, said his client supports fair housing laws. "He wanted very much for the Sabbias to sell to the Willborns" and doesn't believe race led to the ultimate denial, Feldman said.

Lowe afterward "helped the Willborns by showing them other houses," Feldman said.

Attorney Ben Heller of the firm said the HUD case shows the agents took no part in discrimination. "There is simply no evidence that Jeff or Prudential acted inappropriately at any time," said Heller, of the firm Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker LLP.

The Sabbias refused to close the sale despite protracted negotiations with the Willborns, the HUD complaint said, then took their home off the market. They re-listed it a couple of months later for $1.799 million, but have withdrawn it from the market again.

Willborn co-hosts the syndicated "Michael Baisden Show" on WSRB-FM (106.3) and formerly worked at WVAZ-FM (102.7).

The Bridgeport neighborhood, cradle of the Daley dynasty, has been known for hostility to blacks, although many think bigotry in the neighborhood has declined.

Asked why he would want his family there, Willborn said, "I didn't care where the home was. It was a specific type of house that my wife and I felt that we had earned the right to live in. . . . It just happened to be in Bridgeport."

A birthday fit for a king! Michael Jackson's native Gary, Ind., will hold a tribute outside the pop star's boyhood home Saturday.

Jackson, who died last year after overdosing on sedatives, would have turned 52 on Sunday.

He grew up in Gary, Ind. before he and his family struck it big as the Jackson 5. His family moved to Los Angeles in 1969.

Jackson's mother, Katherine, will be in attendance at a tree planting outside the family's home at 2 p.m., according to a press release. She also particpated in an event marking the one-year anniversary of her son's death in Gary, Ind.

August 26-29 also marks the first MJFanvention, www.mjfanvention.com , which will be held the Radisson Hotel and Star Plaza Theatre in Merrillville, Ind. Members of Jackson's family are expected to attend the four-day event. Tickets start at $78 and packages range into $2,000.

Jackson's niece and first cousin will be performing.

A federal appeals court has upheld a jury's verdict that actor-screenwriter Tyler Perry didn't steal material for his 2005 movie "Diary of a Mad Black Woman."

Two years ago, jurors in East Texas found actress and writer Donna West failed to support her copyright infringement claim.

West appealed the verdict. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Monday there was nothing improper in the way the trial was conducted.

West wrote a play titled "Fantasy of a Black Woman" that was performed three times in 1991 in Dallas. She claimed Perry could have seen the script when he presented his plays at the Dallas Black Academy of Arts and Letters in 1998.

Perry testified his screenplay was an original work. The $5 million film grossed more than $50 million.

Rapper turned actor Ice-T has been cleared of allegations he was caught driving without insurance last month in New York City after a Manhattan prosecutor acknowledged his arrest stemmed from a clerical snafu at the Department of Motor Vehicles.

The current star of " Law and Order: Special Victims Unit" was heard shouting, "That's what I'm talking about - dismissed!" as he exited the courtroom.

The incident occurred on July 20, when the 52-year-old rapper, whose real name is Tracy Marrow, was apparently caught driving with a suspended license, invalid insurance and without his seat belt. At the time, Morrow claimed he had both valid insurance and an up-to-date license.

He even took to his Twitter page to prove he was innocent and even called the officer who arrest him a "punk."

In court, prosecutors said the state's Department of Motor Vehicles suspended Morrow's license two years ago on the basis that he had failed to obtain insurance. However, according to research, Marrow's records were up to date. The clerical error came about when the entertainer switched his license and plates to reflect he had moved to New Jersey -- a change that was apparently never registered in the DMV's computer records.

"I knew I didn't do anything wrong," Morrow said outside the courtroom. In addition, he said he didn't plan to sue over the matter.

A decision on who is eligible to run for president in Haiti has been postponed until Friday, leaving hip-hop artist Wyclef Jean and the other presidential hopefuls in limbo, said Berto Dorce, Jean's lawyer.

Haiti's election commission was scheduled to make a decision Tuesday night.

Jean's eligibility was under question after claims that he has not lived in Haiti for five consecutive years before the election; a mandate in the nation's Constitution.

Jean's lawyer said his client meets that criteria.

"His candidacy has been contested and we went to court and proved that he is legally entitled to run for president," Dorce said. "Jean's position is pretty strong. He should be on the list."

Dorce said Wyclef has been paying taxes in Haiti, which makes him eligible.

"Wyclef has been a shareholder of the local TV corporation called Telemax, and was paying taxes at least for five years; this was sufficient for the Justice of the Peace to issue a certificate of residence for Mr. Wyclef and confirm his residency," Dorce said.

Jean announced August 5 on "Larry King Live" amid fanfare that he had filled out the paperwork to run for president.

But since then, Jean's announcement has met with some criticism.

Pras, who once performed alongside Jean and Lauryn Hill in the '90s group The Fugees, said he supported Jean's opponent.

Actor Sean Penn, who has lived in Port-au-Prince for months helping displaced Haitians, also questioned whether the Haitian-born musician could make moves to lead the devastated nation.

And now, Jean said he has received multiple death threats.

"We have been getting threats since last night telling me if I know what's good for me, I would get out [of] the country," Jean wrote in an e-mail to reporters late Tuesday.

Jean's lawyer also talked about the alleged threats.

"Wyclef has been repeatedly getting anonymous threats from people who are saying that he should think twice before running for the president. We cannot tell who are sending these threats, but the closer the announcement, the more threats Jean is getting," Dorce said.

Just hours after DMX was released from LA County lockup yesterday, he was pulled over by cops on Sunset Blvd. for a minor traffic violation.

According to TMZ, the rapper was coming from a recording studio around 11:20 p.m. when police stopped his rented Mercedes-Benz on Sunset Blvd for a minor traffic violation.

Once officers asked for X’s information, they learned that he didn’t have a valid driver’s license, the website reported.

DMX wasn’t taken into custody, but he was issued a citation and is due to appear in court sometime in the near future. According to TMZ, cops allowed a passenger in the car to drive the rapper home.

DMX was released from jail Thursday after serving 18 days of a 90-day sentence stemming from a reckless driving conviction in 2002.