One of the most irritating memes I confront in the discourse that surrounds my work goes something like this: “If blogs continue to overtake the professional mainstream media, who is going to be left to keep a watchul eye on the government?” Right. What a scary thought. Just imagine: If bloggers ran the world we’d [...]

Bad news from Honduras where the military has staged a coup, deposing and sending into exile the democratically elected President Manuel Zelaya.  This is the first Central American coup in more than 15 years and must be roundly condemned. President Obama has done just that and so has every other hemispheric leader. Even when I [...]

I spent the entire day on jury duty and then drove out to the desert, so I was spared the CNN/Cable TV marathon eulogy for deceased pedophile Michael Jackson.  Thank God. OK, Andrew Sullivan has a decent but if somewhat overwrought take on the sudden death of Jackson. I would agree tht there’s a certain [...]

How are you supposed to be blog something like the Mark Sanford saga? One more religious hypocrite caught, literally, with his pants down.  Yawn. What can one possibly add to such a sordid little drama? You can’t make this stuff up? Only two quck thoughts: This joker ought ot be IMMEDIATELY tossed out on his [...]

I am a bit Iran-ed out so I thought I would change up my game and drop a few lines about a potpourri of local Los Angeles stories. If you don’t live in So Cal, feel free to tune out. *** Tony Rap Says No Our recently re-elected Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announced today he was [...]

As much as anyone, I’ve been trying to make sense of what is actually happening in Iran.  I very much like what Jeff Weintraub has been aggregating on his stie. But I don’t think we can know much with any certainty from afar.  There persists what is now being politely called a “tense calm” on [...]

I write this at about 1 a.m.  PDT on Friday night. That puts us at about 4 hours shy of the possible showdown in Tehran–the scheduled and now outlawed opposition demonstration in the streets of the Iranian capital. The latest reports coming out of Iran say that all social network communication remains shut down and [...]

A few weeks ago I ws pleasantly pleased to link to my daughter Natasha’s first report from the scene of the murder trial  of Jesse James Hollywood, the character memorialized in the film “Alpha Dog.” Now, she publishes her second installment, reflecting on her friendship with the victim, Nick Markowitz as well as on the [...]

In all the coverage of the recent uptick in shootings carried out by right-wing fringe lunatics in the past few weeks, the blood curdling dual murder carried out in the Arizona borderland town of Arivaca two weeks ago has gotten little notice in the press. Raul Flores, 29, and his 9 year-old daughter were shot [...]

I was thinking of just posting these pictures from Reuters and the London Times with no comment whatsoever.  Not quite, but close. I will only say that my friend Tim might just be right when he refers to this era as that of a Biped Twilight.  Can you just imagine the centuries’ of accumulated crud [...]

Check out my latest opinion column in the L.A. Times.   It begins: At this point in the recession, you’ve probably become familiar with the term “zombie bank,” a financial institution that can continue operating, thanks to government support, even though its debts outweigh its assets. Now it’s time to add a related descriptor to our [...]

I don’t know much anything about Creigh Deeds, the guy who just won the Democratic nomination for Governor of Virginia. I also declare that I am delighted that he won — whatever his politics. I am delighted for a simple reason.  Creigh Deeds is not Terry McAuliffe. And that’s good enough for me.  Apparently, also [...]

I love this.  As the Obama admin begins its full court press on national health care, key congressional Republicans are already lining up to oppose any so-called “public option.” Makes no difference to them that the largest, most successful and I might say most popular health care programs in America — medicare and medicaid– are [...]

Our randy L.A. Mayor, it seems, has a thing about foxy anchorwomen. His affair with Telemundo anchor Mirthala Salinas two years ago wrecked her career, ripped up his marriage and blew a hole in his political popularity. And now Hizzoner is back at again, going out rather publicly with a local weekend anchor-lady for the [...]

The editor former editor of L.A. Weekly, Laurie Ochoa, took over the paper in 2001 voicing her dream of turning America’s largest metro weekly into “a New Yorker.” She leaves today with the Weekly reduced to little more than a Pennyshopper. The official statement from “corporate” is that she and the paper will now “part [...]