ACCORDING TO LIZ - One day after a Proud Boys Trump supporter tried to break into an FBI building in Ohio and died after fleeing and shooting at the police pursuing him, the Republican messaging was… you can’t trust the FBI.
This week I lost my best friend and mentor. Ken Draper passed away at the age of 89.
THE DOCTOR IS IN - Maybe Congress thinks we're just stupid, and maybe we simply ARE just as stupid as they think we are.
HOUSING CRISIS - Recently an op-ed appeared in the neoliberal, Hearst-owned San Francisco Chronicle that proclaimed, “Yimbyism is as progressive as it gets.”
LA TRANSPO - The August 10, 2022, edition of the Los Angeles Times ran an article on a ballot proposal to require bike and pedestrian lanes in the City of Los Angeles when the city's roads are paved.
CD 10 FILE - In February of this year I wrote for this publication an article entitled “Nury Martinez’ Power Grab on The Backs of South LA Residents Must Be Stopped.”
ERIC PREVEN’S NOTEBOOK - As a writer who has been experimenting with ridiculously long rambling articles intended to keep folks who do not have the time to attend these dangerous public meetings apprised about what is going on,
SFV CRIME - Oh, the irony of this question coming from my fellow Angelenos is almost beyond my comprehension. Is it safe?
OUR TAXES - Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Commissioner Charles Rettig vowed in a recent letter that the agency would “absolutely not” use the 87,000 new employees funded by the Inflation Reduction Act to target middle-class Americans.
GUEST COMMENTARY - Could somebody please get an extension ladder to help Senator Schumer down from the ceiling?
ANIMAL WATCH - A real dog-bite “accident” is offering a treat to a dog who unintentionally nips your finger.
GELFAND’S WORLD - It is my considered opinion that the City of Los Angeles is about to open itself to a libel action based on the conduct of the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment.
THE VIEW FROM HERE - The nation faces an unrecognized dilemma. Who is more dangerous to America – Donald Trump who is definitely a narcissistic histrionic or Nancy Pelosi who is probably a narcissistic psychopath?
A HOUSING - With interest rates and home prices at record highs, the homeownership dream feels less attainable these days.
GUEST COMMENTARY - “On Monday, July 18 at 7:00 a.m., I heard a loud noise like a rapid and continuous breaking of concrete.
ACCORDING TO LIZ - “Originality is dangerous. It challenges, questions, overturns assumptions, unsettles moral codes, disrespects sacred cows or other such entities.
GUEST COMMENTARY - It all started in March of 2020 when Mark Ridley-Thomas couldn't gather enough votes to win in the primary election and was forced into a contentious runoff with attorney Grace Yoo.
THE EASTSIDER - Our politicians have been either demonizing or pretending to ‘help’ the homeless in LA for quite a while.
LA WATCHDOG - Carmel Partners, a multibillion dollar San Francisco based private equity firm specializing in multifamily real estate, has proposed to develop a 28 story residential tower with 290 units at 1050 South La Cienega Boulevard, just south of Olympic Boulevard.
GUEST COMMENTARY - I wish to call your attention to what I believe to be the improper noticing of meetings by the City Tourism Commission, especially a detailed proposal to place advertising structures on public sidewalks and parkways.
THE REPUBLICAN REPUBLIC - If this was just routine political corruption by a few rogue politicians, it would be a problem but not a crisis—however—this cynical embrace of strongman oligarchy has put America itself at risk.
ALPERN AT-LARGE - There are a few of us lucky to have known, written for, and worked with the late, great Ken Draper, founder of CityWatch (CityWatchLA.com).
Across CityWatch
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This Is the Hill To Die On, Despite Evidence So Pulverizing It Eviscerates Any Notion of Innocence
- Details
- Written by Abby Zimet
SAY WHAT? - Hoo boy. In the wake of an FBI search (not raid) that apoplectic MAGA-ites are hysterically, simultaneously likening to the KGB, Gestapo, Stasi, unsavory antics of Third-World thugs and "the worst attack on this republic in modern history," the guy who's repeatedly said "only the mob takes the 5th" just took the 5th over 440 times for six hours when asked by prosecutors reportedly armed with "pulverizing" evidence about his (pretty sordid-sounding) business practices. Still, furious if ignorant fans are shrieking that "if they can do that to a former president" - search his trashy McMansion - "imagine what they can do to you," and besides the IRS is coming for you and the FBI will probably plant something so now it's finally - finally! - time to bring out your guns for a shiny new civil war. One typical response among a gazillion came from gonzo Trumpy Arizona nominee for governor Kari Lake who feverishly charged "this illegitimate, corrupt Regime hates America," which is why, that "darkest day," "our Government, originally created by the people, turned against us." "Our Government is rotten to the core," she railed about a law enforcement agency doing its job. "These tyrants will stop at nothing. If we accept it, America is dead." Note to self: If clueless zealots like her gain power, she may have a point.
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OUR TAXES - Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Commissioner Charles Rettig vowed in a recent letter that the agency would “absolutely not” use the 87,000 new employees funded by the Inflation Reduction Act to target middle-class Americans.
GUEST COMMENTARY - Could somebody please get an extension ladder to help Senator Schumer down from the ceiling?
THE VIEW FROM HERE - The nation faces an unrecognized dilemma. Who is more dangerous to America – Donald Trump who is definitely a narcissistic histrionic or Nancy Pelosi who is probably a narcissistic psychopath?
GUEST COMMENTARY - The recent provocative and unnecessary visit to Taiwan by Democratic Congresswoman Pelosi may well be a turning point the US (and potentially, the world) will regret.
NUCLEAR DETERRENCE - 77 years ago, the U.S. nuclear bombing of Hiroshima, Japan on August 6, 1945 and three days later, Nagasaki, resulted in immediate deaths of approximately 120,000 majority civilians and by year’s end over 210,000.
CLIMATE WATCH - Gas prices hit an all-time high in June, with the national average surpassing $5 per gallon.
CANNABIS WATCH - California is significantly overhauling its cannabis tax structure, including entirely eliminating a tax on growers, in an effort to boost a struggling legal industry begging for relief.
420 FILE - Working regular overnight shifts has distorted Samantha Kadera’s sleep schedule, so the emergency room doctor smokes cannabis a few times a week to relax before bed.
POT WATCH - Since legalization and the light shining on cannabis and its benefits, the cannabis industry has grown rapidly in a short space of time.
HEALTH WATCH - Hundreds waiting hours for a monkeypox vaccine only to be turned away.
HEALTH WATCH - The study of epidemics has routinely centered around what medical historian Charles Rosenberg calls a “dramaturgic structure”:
HEALTH EMERGENCY - In early May, Massachusetts General Hospital confirmed that it was treating a patient with monkeypox – the first case of the rare virus in the United States in 2022.
POLITICAL WATCH - It’s The Ronald Reagan Memorial Competition: which Republican can make the rich richer and the poor poorer the fastest?
GUEST COMMENTARY - Former President Donald Trump's criminal use of lies and mob violence to steal the 2020 election failed, but it's not the only recent coup attack on our democracy.
GUEST COMMENTARY - Regardless of anyone’s views on abortion, the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson took away a reproductive right that a half-century of hard-fought judicial precedent had determined was constitutionally protected.
DC DISPATCH – (This interview was conducted in 2020 before the untimely death of my husband Anthony Schinella, aka Spooky.
You may be counting the hours and minutes until August 31, 2021, but a word of caution in what you wish for.
VOICES-In response to an October 29, 2020 CityWatch opinion piece about DxE, counsel of DxE informed us of the following: No grooming allegations have ever been made against DxE or anyone in its leadership, neither in the Berkeleyside article referenced in CityWatchLA’s piece nor anywhere else, apart from a single, not credible allegation by what is termed as a ‘high-profile accuser.’
