LOS ANGELES

DEEGAN ON LA-If you ever got happily buzzed with friends sitting around the famous “horseshoe bar” in Tom Bergin’s Irish bar on Fairfax Avenue just south of Museum Row you may want to always be able to drive past the now-shuttered pub, glance at it, and smile at the memories. If it’s torn down for future development your memories may be crumbled, along with the walls. 

POLITICAL FOLLIES-My friends Joe and Pete — we all grew up in neighboring little towns, on what could have been the same cul-de-sac, somewhere out there in the endless ocean of the American dream — both have the proverbial crazy, racist uncle.

MY TURN-We are all children of immigrants. I remember hearing my father tell the story of my grandparents coming over from Ireland.

CONNECTING CALIFORNIA--California has a peculiar peril: Our state is becoming too rich for its own good.

SPECIAL TO CALBUZZ--California’s history has been defined by visionary public works, from the world’s largest port to the nation’s first freeways to pioneering aqueducts to best in class public universities.

NEIGHBORHOODS AT STAKE-Most people have zero interest in talking about planning. Until a developer decides to build something big and stupid in their neighborhood.

BCK FILE--Millennials, together with Gen X voters, are poised to take over Baby Boomers as a powerful voting bloc.

GELFAND’S WORLD--It's time for a little quiet payback, quiet being the operative word. I'm going on the assumption -- currently about an 80% chance -- that the Democrats will take control of the House of Representatives in Tuesday's election.

VOICES--Los Angeles County Measure W, the Safe, Clean Water Program tax,  represents another government tax intended to improve water quality and increase water supplies.

HOUSING CRISIS-Los Angeles, one of the nation’s leading cities, has fallen dangerously behind when it comes to protecting affordable housing. Our city’s housing stock continues to drop daily as more apartments and homes are converted into short-term rentals.

IN RHYME--Each stanza is a different personality profile of an American voter.

ELECTION--Charter Amendment B would allow Los Angeles to pursue the option of a public bank.

ALPERN AT LARGE--It's November now. YOU decide.  

PROPOSITION REVIEW-Before I start this article, I thought it useful for me to lay out some of my personal beliefs about Ballot Measures and Propositions at every level.

EASTSIDER-This parcel tax was around before, in 2013. That time, it failed to go on the ballot in a 3-2 vote.

VOTING IN THE VORTEX-Remember Sliding Doors, the 1998 Gwyneth Paltrow movie in which the heroine’s fate heads in different directions depending on whether she does or doesn’t make it onto a subway train?

GUEST WORDS--Dana Rohrabacher, the Republican congressman from Orange County, California's 48th District, is in for the fight of his congressional life.

COSTA HAWKINS HAS TO GO-Since its founding in 2015, one of the main ongoing areas of focus of the Los Angeles Tenants Union has been the repeal of the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act, a 1995 law authored by a Democratic State Senator from Fresno and a Republican Assembly member from Bellflower and signed into law by Republican Governor Pete Wilson.

PLATKIN ON PLANNING - The universe that Angelinos live in. If you live, work, or visit Los Angeles, you have undoubtedly witnessed the following, and can add other categories of your own: 

GUEST COMMENTARY--The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (DWP) building in Los Angeles, Calif. on June 7, 2015. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

TREE OF LIFE--We knew it could happen here — any here, anywhere — when we learned that nine people were killed three years ago in the historic Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, S.C. We knew it could happen here — any here, anywhere — when we learned that six were killed in the Islamic Cultural Centre of Quebec City last year.