LOS ANGELES

LIVING WAGE DEBATE-Missing from the Congressional debate over raising the $7.25 federal minimum wage to $15 an hour is any acknowledgement that poverty-level wages are integral to a class system that rewards the rich and punishes the poor.

GETTING ON THE BALLOT-Georgia is the new Florida, but California is ole Miss. Ken Chenault, the former CEO of American Express, was one of the Black executives who organized a public letter opposing the Georgia law.

DIEDRA’S LA-Former assembly member Sydney Kamlager-Dove eased through a victory to occupy former Senator Mitchell’s seat, leaving her assembly seat up for grabs.

PLANNING WATCH-Los Angeles is a city of neighborhoods, and the Los Angeles Times has mapped 114 separate communities.

JOBS POLITICS--Faced with the closing of five stores in the Los Angeles area, including South Los Angeles in predominantly Black neighborhoods and two in Long Beach, unions, community groups, seniors and shoppers rallied April 3 at the Slauson Avenue Ralphs grocery store.

EASTSIDER-I think the headline says it all. Recently, there are signs the LA City Council may be headed in the right direction, but it’s on a small scale and the question is whether the developers who own the Council can allow a good thing to thrive. 

COMMENTARY-As former president Donald Trump’s cruel and inhumane policies towards immigrants are rapidly dismantled by new humanitarian leadership in the White House, one of the most high-profile law firms in our county has become a refuge for Trump administration castaways. 

THE DOCTOR IS IN--Most people reading this are not medical professionals...but they have heard about this little thing we call the COVID-19 coronavirus.

PLAYTIME POLITICS-Echo Park is no stranger to me. As a boy in the early 1960s, my family would go there, a favorite of my dad who worked downtown and knew the park.

VIEW FROM HERE--When discussing the Monetization of Hate, we must include its sidekick Fear. 

CLIMATE POLITICS-Grandiose plans to cool Earth, saving the planet from overheating by utilizing low-tech balloon flights sprinkling particles into the atmosphere to reflect solar radiation back into outer space have been delayed, nobody knows for sure when, or if, it’ll proceed. 

GELFAND’S WORLD--Major League Baseball just announced that it is moving this year's All Star game away from Atlanta, Georgia due to the new law that changes election rules.

THE CITY--Norman Mailer famously said, "If a person is not talented enough to be a novelist, not smart enough to be a lawyer, and his hands are too shaky to perform operations, he becomes a journalist."  

@THE GUSS REPORT-William Stoughton was a son-of-a-bitch, albeit an accomplished one if context and the era in which he lived can be considered. 

MEMO TO: City Council, City of Los Angeles (CD 1: Gil Cedillo, CD 2: Paul Krekorian, CD 3: Bob Blumenfield, CD 4: Nithya Raman, CD 5: Paul Koretz, CD 6: Nury Martinez, CD 7: Monica Rodriguez, CD 8: Marqueece Harris-Dawson, CD 9: Curren D. Price Jr., CD 10: Mark Ridley-Thomas, CD 11: Mike Bonin, CD 12: John Lee, CD 13: Mitch O’Farrell, CD 14: Kevin de León, CD 15: Joe Buscaino)

DEAR MITCH-I stand in firm solidarity with protesters fighting for our unhoused siblings.

NEW GEOGRAPHY--Over the past few years California’s plight has taken on mythic proportions — a cautionary tale of progressive woe among conservatives, but a beacon for a future enlightened capitalism among its woke supporters.

VIEW FROM HERE--America will not become the first empire to die.  Most recently, the Soviet Union went from 286,730,819 people in 1989 to Russia with 145,934,462 in 2020. 

 LEANING RIGHT--A funny thing just happened...except it was not, and is not, so funny.

GELFAND’S WORLD--One day a year, the nearly 2000 neighborhood council activists in LA have a chance to come together under the same roof and share their war stories.

CONNECTING CALIFORNIA--California has a huge problem that it can’t remove with a recall election.