The combination of the above has reduced me to a quivering puddle of exhaustion. (Particularly the lost, elderly wolf-dog—now thankfully found—who had me frantically hiking through neighbors’ backyards with a flashlight Tuesday Monday* night, then driving around the area until 4:30 in the morning. The neighbors were nice enough not to shoot at me when I was prowling on foot, which I genuinely appreciated. At daybreak Loup-Loup emerged from a hiding place a mile away, wet, disoriented and shivering. A kind person saw her, read her tag and called me. Poor dog. Poor me. All better now.)

As a consequence, I’ll post later in the day.

In the meantime listen to Father Greg on on Patt Morrison’s show.

Back soon.

*I’m clearly having trouble telling the days apart. Sad. Very sad.

WOMEN PRISONERS AT CHOWCHILLA AIM TO HELP VICTIMS

The best research (and my own anecdotal observation) suggests that one of the essential components to transforming one’s life away from gangs and/or a similar law-breaking past requires that one face squarely the harm that one has caused and then give back in some way to one’s community.

Here’s a story from the Fresno Bee about women who are taking a step in that direction.

They’ve robbed. They’ve stolen. They’ve murdered.

But despite their past crimes, nearly 100 women gathered in a prison gym Wednesday to hear how they can help victims of serious crimes. Some wanted to know how they could help the very people they hurt.

The inmates are part of a club at Valley State Prison for Women that focuses on raising money for charitable groups and, as they describe it, repay their debt to society. One of the women in the club, called the Long Termers Organization, sent a three-page letter in August to the Victim Compensation and Government Claims Board — a state agency that distributes about $100 million a year in funds to crime victims in need of health care, therapy or other services as a result of the crimes committed against them. The inmate, Crystal Potter, wanted to know whether the board would be willing to let her club know how they could help.

“We may never gain the trust or the forgiveness of our victims, but to do now what we should have been doing from the very beginning in providing community services would teach us further the morals and values so necessary as a productive member of society,” Potter wrote.

Read the rest.

AN EARLY RELEASE ISSUE? OR A MENTAL HEALTH ISSUE?

Much was made last week over the early release of a 22-year-old man named Kevin Peterson from Sacramento County Jail. Peterson was supposed to serve a four month sentence for whacking a family member in the face with a broom. Instead he was released 18 days early as part of the budget-cutting measures that California counties have put into place since January 1st. (Many counties, however, most notably Los Angeles County, had been shaving time of short jail sentences for the last several years in order to reduce overcrowding at a county level.)

Anyway, within hours after his release, Petersen allegedly attacked a female counselor and attempted to rape her.

And within minutes of Peterson’s rearrest, commentators and partisans were shrieking about the crime wave to come that he represented.

However one enterprising TV station—FOX40 News—bothered to look a little deeper into the story. Most notably, they interviewed Peterson in jail. And guess what? Even Peterson admitted he should be locked up—but not in a jail. He needs to be in a psychiatric facility, he said..

(On the right side of this page, you’ll find a longer version of the video.)

A confused Peterson says he doesn’t remember attacking anyone. He does however remember hearing voices.

“I’m a paranoid schizophrenic,” he said to the TV reporter.. He was hoping to get taken to the Sacramento Mental Health Evaluation Center so that he could get some help. He should be off the street, he said—but in a mental institution, not in jail.

Bottom line: Peterson’s alleged near rape has everything to do with the inadequate mental health screening and treatment inmates receive in county jails.

…But exactly zero to do with the issue of early release.

PS: On the issue of prison population reduction, the Press-Enterprise had a remarkably sane Op Ed on the matter.

THE FIGHT OVER DE-CLAWING CALIFORNIA’S CATS: IT MAY NOT BE OVER .

Annenberg grad student Chris Pisar of Neon Tommy reports that the much ridiculed rush last year by the LA City Council to pass a cat declawing ordinance wasn’t so ridiculous after all. The rush had to do with getting the damn thing passed before a brand new state law went into effect that would have prevented cities and counties from passing their own such regulations.

The California Veterinary Medical Association, which provided the main opposition to the LA ordinance, still wants to do away with the ban. Critics say the vets opposition to the ban is for monetary reasons not for moral ones. (Declawing is a pricey procedure.)

Here’s the rest.

A LOUSY BANK ROBBER BUT GREAT JAILHOUSE LAWYER

In Tuesday’s New York Times Adam Liptak has a story of a mediocre bank robber who, during his decade in prison, made good use of the prison library and transformed himself into a stellar jail house lawyer.

Here’s how it begins:

Shon R. Hopwood was not a particularly sophisticated bank robber.

“We would walk into a bank with firearms, tell people to get down, take the money and run,” he said the other day, recalling five robberies in rural Nebraska in 1997 and 1998 that yielded some $200,000 and more than a decade in federal prison.

Mr. Hopwood spent much of that time in the prison law library, and it turned out he was better at understanding the law than breaking it. He transformed himself into something rare at the top levels of the American bar, and unheard of behind bars: an accomplished Supreme Court practitioner.

Read the rest.

WANT TO READ SOMETHING REASONED AND SENSIBLE ON THE ISSUE OF TRYING KHALID SHEIKH MOHAMMED IN NY?

Try Jane Mayer’s excellent article on the controversy in next week’s New Yorker.

Photo of jailhouse lawyer Shon Hopwood by Alyssa Schukar for The New York Times

HBO has a new movie for television debuting this weekend. It is a bio pic of sorts based on the life and memoirs of writer/biologist Temple Grandin.

If you’re not familiar with Grandin, she is an autistic woman who is considered to be one of the nation’s top animal biologists. She credits her exceptional facility for understanding animals’ fears and needs and actions to the perceptual lens her own autistic condition has—for better and for worse— uniquely provided.

Her 2004 book, Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behavior, was easily my favorite book I read that year.

Terry Gross has interviewed Grandin three different times on Fresh Air (once for the release of each one of Grandin’s books). This past Friday, Fresh Air played a compilation of the interviews to coincide with the launching of the HBO movie.

The movie, which would have been all to simple to wreck, is thankfully reported to be excellent. Mary McNamera at the LA Times said it was:

Utterly and gorgeously unsentimental, “Temple Grandin,” arriving Saturday, clomps across the screen with all the wild-eyed grace of its main character, chronicling the life of a woman who not only overcame a host of physical, mental and social obstacles but actually used her autism to create a career for herself in animal husbandry.

The film stars, of all people, Claire Danes, who in the clips that I have heard, is stunningly good.. The Huffington Post says of Danes:

Finally, she has a found a role where she is beyond great, she is stupendous. Claire Danes is revelatory as Temple Grandin animal behaviorist, best-selling author, autistic and expert in autism. This is a fascinating movie and I learned so much about this woman and about autism. Temple did not speak until she was four and if not for her mother would have probably ended up spending her life in an institution. What a loss that would have been.

I’ve got it TiVOed and plan to watch it tonight.. (It is playing off and on during much of the week.)

But, whether or not you watch the movie, at the very least, if you don’t know about Temple Grandin, do yourself a favor listen to the interview mash-up. Her unique and entirely unsentimental ability to feel into an animal’s perspective tells us a great deal about our fellow creatures and also, frankly, about ourselves.

UPDATE:

I saw the film late last night, and it’s so, so incredibly good. Claire Danes is spectacular. She utterly vanishes into being Grandin.

Please, just see it. You’ll thank me. If you don’t have HBO, wait until it’s on DVD and go for it then. But if you miss it, you’ll be missing out. So don’t.

Thursday has been one of those days.

* The stock market tanked Thursday morning based on the newest perception of a stumbling global economy.

*Thursday afternoon Mayor Villaraigosa did what the City Council would not and ordered the layoffs of 1,000 city employees to help balance the city’s budget. (Naturally, the layoffs will pretty much apply only to the poor schlubs who are not represented by a union.)

*And also, Thursday, Scott Brown was sworn in as U.S. Senator meaning, according to the AP’s Laurie Kellman (and run in, among other places, the Washington Post) that “Obama and the Democrats, who still enjoy big majorities in both the House and Senate, can do virtually nothing between now and the November elections without the GOP’s say-so. ” (You know what, AP & WaPo? Screw you. If you can’t say something more insightful than that stale toast, just STFU.)

So…..ahem, now that it’s Thusday evening, I recommend we all take a brief mental health break. Let us all pause and think about….. whales, Nice, big, intelligent whales— leviathans. Actually one whale in particular, a baby who has been hanging around the Malibu Pier for the last few days. (And, yes, I know that whales kill penguins and all that. So don’t leave a comment informing me of this fact. Call me Ishmael. At least whales don’t have lobbyists.)

As of this afternoon, it seems that the little gray whale, who was providing photo ops for anyone who could manage to make the drive to see the seemingly friendly (or at the very least, curious) creature, has wandered off back into the deep blue (in a swimmy kind of way).. But he (she?)—everyone’s been calling the beast Willie—left behind many snapshots like the one below taken by the concessionaires at Malibu Pier.

Okay, now back to the regularly-scheduled dour and fractious stuff we call news.

PS: One more thing: in addition, on Thursday it was reported that a group of 18 scientists from Australia, France and New Zealand are steaming by boat toward Antarctica to challenge—philosophically, not physically—the Japanese scientists who have weaseled around the 1986 international whaling ban and manage to kill around 1000 whales a year in the name of research. The 18 consortium researchers aim to disprove the supposed necessity of whale hunting in the name of science. “We don’t have to kill whales to learn about them,” said one of the Australians.

Indeed. Go scientists. Go whales.

Photo—-and whale updates—by Malibu Pier.

Today, Tuesday, the Supreme Court will hear a very intriguing and important case on whether videos of dog fighting—and other depictions of animal cruelty— should be protected under the First Amendment….or not.

To get a feel for the nuances of the case, listen to the rundown by NPR’s Nina Totenberg. (While Totenberg can at times get on one’s nerves, she is a wonder at taking a court case and explaining it in clear, detailed and lively terms that allow her listeners to form their own informed opinions.)

Here are some clips:

[The case] asks whether the government can make it a crime to sell or possess any depiction of animal cruelty.

The case is about dogfighting videos, but critics argue that it could apply to anything from photos in Field and Stream magazine or hunting videos, to Arnold Schwarzenegger punching a camel in Conan the Barbarian.

In 1999, Congress passed a law aimed initially at “crush videos.” These are videos of women typically in high heels crushing small animals, like mice and kittens — apparently a sexual fetish.

The law, however, has broad language. It makes it a crime to possess or sell any depiction of animal cruelty — specifically the killing, wounding, torturing or mutilation of an animal — as long as the conduct is illegal in the place where the prosecution is brought.

Enter Robert Stevens, a pit bull lover — or exploiter, depending on who is telling the story. He did not make any dogfighting films or stage any fights. Instead, he compiled films made by others of pit bulls fighting mainly in Japan, where it is legal.

Stevens sold the films commercially. He says it was to promote the proper use and training of pit bulls. His critics say it was to make money.

Read the whole thing. It covers the waterfront.

For the record, as much as I am a devoted lover of critters, and as much as I loath and revile practices like dogfighting, I think think the law is too broad and therefore unconstitutional. It should be struck down. And then, I hope, rewritten with more care so that it bans the kind of cruelty it intends—not, say, films of dove hunting or Spanish bullfights.

(And, yes, I did intentionally find one of the cutest and most manipulative possible cat pictures.)

Last October, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to wade into the battle over whether then president George Bush should be able to override a federal judge after that judge ruled that the US Navy would have to modify its use of sonar in training exercises held off the Southern California coast because of compelling evidence that the sonar did harm to whales.

Yet, despite mounds of data showing that sonar was causing whale deaths, in a 6 to 3 decision, the Supremes decided for the Navy and against the whales, the most recent version of centuries worth of conflict between whales and humans.

Still, in the view of many naturalists, the fact that the Supreme Court had been willing to hear the case at all was a welcome step forward. Moreover, after the decision the Navy agreed to do more to protect the whales when conducting its exercises.

Now, says Charles Siebert, writing for the NY Times Magazine, some biologists are beginning to believe that whales might be rewarding the more benign attitude that our species has had toward theirs in the past string of decades by consistently seeking us out in a way that seems…..relational. The huge creatures seem to want contact.

The phenomenon is most notably occurring, writes Siebert, in a particular area of Baja California.

I should note that Siebert occasionally tends to romanticize the great cetaceans that are considered to be among the planet’s most intelligent non-human mammels. But the story he tells of biologists perplexed by this suddenly friendly whale behavior is nonetheless fascinating.

Here are a few clips.

Scientists have now documented behaviors like tool use and cooperative hunting strategies among whales. Orcas, or killer whales, have been found to mourn their own dead. Just three years ago, researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York discovered, in the brains of a number of whale species, highly specialized neurons that are linked to, among other things, the use of language and were once thought to be the exclusive property of humans and a few other primates. Indeed, marine biologists are now revealing not only the dizzying variety of vocalizations among a number of whale species but also complex societal structures and cultures.

Whales, we now know, teach and learn. They scheme. They cooperate, and they grieve. They recognize themselves and their friends. They know and fight back against their enemies. And perhaps most stunningly, given all of our transgressions against them, they may even, in certain circumstances, have learned to trust us again.

[HUGE SNIP]

“I don’t anthropomorphize,” [marine mammal behavioralist named Toni Frohoff] told me. “I leave it to other people to do that. What I do is study gray whales using the same rigorous methodologies that have long been used to study the behaviors of other species and interspecies interaction. Those who would reject out of hand the idea that whales are intelligent enough to consciously interact with us haven’t spent enough time around whales.”

[BIG SNIP]

I thought of another bit of interspecies cooperation involving humpbacks that I recently read about. A female humpback was spotted in December 2005 east of the Farallon Islands, just off the coast of San Francisco. She was entangled in a web of crab-trap lines, hundreds of yards of nylon rope that had become wrapped around her mouth, torso and tail, the weight of the traps causing her to struggle to stay afloat. A rescue team arrived within a few hours and decided that the only way to save her was to dive in and cut her loose.

For an hour they cut at the lines and rope with curved knives, all the while trying to steer clear of a tail they knew could kill them with one swipe. When the whale was finally freed, the divers said, she swam around them for a time in what appeared to be joyous circles. She then came back and visited with each one of them, nudging them all gently, as if in thanks. The divers said it was the most beautiful experience they ever had. As for the diver who cut free the rope that was entangled in the whale’s mouth, her huge eye was following him the entire time, and he said that he will never be the same.

It is worth reading the rest of this enchanting article.

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UPDATE: Both Siebert and biologist Toni Frohoff are interviewed by Terry Gross on today’s Fresh Air. The audio just now went up. I’m listening as I type. Give yourself a treat when you have time. It’ll cheer you up, I promise.

Hearing about members of two different species reaching out to each other makes the world and all of its problems seem like a slightly more manageable place.

Monday on the LA Times animal blog there is a story that manages to combine a holy trinity of favorite WitnessLA issues: gangs, foolish laws….and critters.

(Sadly no wolves or bears are involved, but one cannot have everything in a single story. And while we’re on the subject, are we happy or despondent that the same local newspaper that saw fit to eliminate the Homicide Report and four fifths of the book review section, now has an animal blog? Tough call.)

It seems that the city of Lancaster has decided that a swell way to crack down on gangs is to go after the gang members’ dogs. Or the gang members who have dogs. Or those gangsters who have certain dogs.

Anyway, with this fuzzy notion in mind, Tuesday the city council will vote on a proposed ordinance that would impose harsh penalties on the owners of dogs labeled “potentially dangerous” or “vicious”—namely Rottweilers and Pitt Bulls. Even more controversial is the part of the ordinance that requires all Rottweilers, Pit Bulls and mixed-breeds with the physical characteristics of either Rotts or Pits, to be spayed or neutered.

*************************************************************************************

UPDATE: They indeed passed the thing. The LA Times has the story here along with some more…uh… notable quotes from the mayor.

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“I want gangs out of Lancaster,” Mayor R. Rex Parris told a local interviewer. “I want to make it uncomfortable for them to be here. Anything they like, I want to take it away from them. I want to deliberately harass them….”

Alrighty then. And a happy civil liberties day to you too, Mister Mayor. (So, is it me or does the concept of a mayor named R. Rex Parris strike you as a bit Batman comic books-ish?)

It seems, however, that not all the good citizens of Lancaster are quite as enthusiastic about Mayor Parris’s new gang strategy as he is. In fact, many law abiding residents also have Rotts and Pits and don’t like being told what they may or may not do with their family pets.

As the devoted owner of a breed that could arguably make the “potentially dangerous” list—namely Loup-Loup-the-wolf dog—I can understand the Lancasterites disgruntled position on the topic. (When we were deciding whether or not to adopt one of my neighbor’s part wolf puppies I ran into all manner of literature, plus a slew of well-meaning “experts,” that warned us against the ghastly dangers of wolf hybrids. We are still waiting for Loup-Loup to turn on us. Thus far, it’s been a 14-year wait.)

Part of the ordinance makes good sense in that it would levy heavy penalties against anyone owning a dog that bites or repeatedly menaces people.

Personally, I have exactly zero tolerance for people who allow dogs that bite to roam free. Ditto for idiots who think it’s cool to train household dogs to be vicious, a practice that all too often involves mistreatment of the creatures.

Mandatory spaying and neutering has much to be said for it too. But designations of “potentially dangerous,” plus enforced sterilization, levied against only certain breeds regardless of training and temperament is….stupid. And a legal slippery slope—especially when, under the ordinance, a single officer can determine whether or not a dog should be destroyed.

Viewing all of the above as a good gang suppression tactic is….what’s the term I’m looking for?…Oh, yeah…..moronic.

When a crowd of dog owners showed up to a recent Lancaster City Council meeting, pets along with them, according to the LA Times there were some memorable exchanges.

For instance, at one point dog trainer A.J. Listman asked the mayor (who is also a personal injury lawyer) what he would do “when these gang members that you’re trying to target move on to Dobermans or German Shepherds? You going to restrict them too?”

“If they move on to cats,” the Times reports Parris responded, “I’m going to take their cats.”

(sigh.) Some people parody themselves.

PS: NOTE TO MAYOR REX PARRIS: I don’t want to trigger a brand new ordinance or anything, and maybe it’s just my luck, but I seem to know an inordinate number of gang members, or former gang members with kids and families, who have Chihuahuas as pets. Do you also have plans for the Chihuahuas? Just curious.

Photo by Susan Beveridge

Can this paper last a full term?

*Who cares? Move on!

I’m not one to obsess over the recent past in the local journalism world. For me, the main problem is figuring out a viable model for an online news site that would inform Los Angeles residents about the top issues of the day, and hold public officials accountable.

Such a site would advocate for what people need: Better public schools, better public transportation, cleaner air free of those microscopic particles that are sickening and killing more people than L.A.’s worst smog of the 1950s. It would regularly take D.A. Steve Cooley to task for not ridding Southeast L.A. cities of public corruption, and keep the heat on him to announce whether he will ever bring pedophile protector Cardinal Roger Mahony to justice.

This news site would initially alarm people who believe in the fiction of objectivity and so-called fairness; in time, even the skeptics would be won over by the divergent voices that would appear along the way to taming unmanageable Los Angeles and California. This news site would play an activist role.

Right now, it would mobilize parent-student groups around the state to storm the offices of Republican legislators who refuse to raise taxes to keep public schools from losing billions of dollars. It would be full of local news: stories about L.A. City Council meetings, committee meetings. Every week, public schools that work and don’t work would be featured. There would be listings every year for the 100 worst lawyers in town; the 10 best and worst judges.

Every legislator in the state would be interviewed and pressed to fix Proposition 13, the 1978 property-tax-slashing measure that devastated the state’s commitment to providing public services. The key players who run Los Angeles behind the scenes, like the DWP’s union boss Brian D’Arcy, would be exposed. Too bad we wouldn’t have subpoena power to force every member of the City Council to disclose their dealings with him.

Oh, I almost forgot to say a word about the CityBeat piece. All of this is more important than righting a few wrongs. But really, it should have said that L.A. Weekly’s star investigative reporter Jeff Anderson left the paper voluntarily in 2007. And if CityBeat wants to blast the L.A. Weekly for canning theater critic Steven Leigh Morris and film critic Ella Taylor, then it should also disclose in the same piece that this week CityBeat dumped its own legend, the inimitable movie reviewer and office scholar and comedian Andy Klein. The article amounts to propaganda; otherwise, it would have told you that similar cuts and carnage render CityBeat’s own future uncertain and bleak.

And, yes, this news site will have room for all three critics!

Photo credit: Ted Soqui

Four-year-old Roberto Lopez is the latest symbol of a dying newspaper. The little boy was shot and killed as he walked with his sister to a community center near their Angelino Heights home around 4:30 p.m. Tuesday.

Where did the Los Angeles Times play the story? Page B3 in my edition. It should, at least, have been the dominant story on the cover of the California section and knocked off a timeless feature about a fire-gutted Montecito monastery’s efforts to rebuild.

Instead, we get a short story, with no photo of the boy. No interviews with family, friends or neighbors. No neighborhood scene. Times’ editors should have followed the example of LAPD’s Assistant Chief Earl Paysinger, who told their reporter: “We’re throwing everything we have at this investigation.”

I’m so over blaming Sam Zell for every shortcoming of our once stronger daily; rarely great, just stronger. Reporters and photographers out to save their jobs from impending layoffs should have carpooled to the scene and produced an in-depth series of stories and hoisted them on their editors in time for today’s paper. Too bad a tipster couldn’t have phoned in an erroneous report of a celebrity spotted in the neighborhood. Maybe the sleepyheads on Spring Street will recover in time for Thursday’s paper. To its credit, the paper’s Web site shows some progress on the story, with video from Tribune’s KTLA. Still, it seems like their overdosing on sedatives in the Times newsroom again.

The criminal enterprise known as L.A. Unified, which should be overseen by a panel of federal judges, took steps to can 2,300 teachers if the nightmarish budget comes true. Where did the story run? Page B-4.

The Times should run front-page stories every day on the latest news of the budget debacle. Include email addresses, home phone numbers and home addresses of every GOP legislator who refuses to act responsibly and raise taxes. (OK, I hear you on the home addresses.) Interview the constitutents of these backward-thinking lawmakers to see if these cavemen really represent their views.

Even the governor, who continues to steal transit money, is calling for tax hikes. The same governor who would have billions more to spend today had he not slashed the car tax upon taking office in 2003.

Forgive me, L.A. Times, for suggesting you step up your game. You probably think what I’m calling for sounds like advocacy journalism and would force you to surrender your objectivity, an outdated term that only provides an excuse for your failure to inform a community about the meaning of events and issues.

Tell me, what’s your objective view of a bankrupt state that fails to meet the needs of its young and its most needy residents?

And what does your objectivity say about the sad end of 4-year-old Roberto’s life? How are we to cope when you don’t tell us more about him, our city, our struggles and our future?

While you think about it, leave a red rose on Roberto’s shrine. It’s OK to mourn while you ponder questions for Chief Bratton and the mayor.

A secretary of the interior who actually likes nature….? What a novel idea! We hope that’s who we’re about to get.

With his choice of Colorado Senator Ken Salazar as interior secretary, Barack Obama has named a moderate. Yet, conservationists think—or at least many of them hope—that, with Obama’s environmental leanings shaping the agenda, Salazar will oversee a big shift n the Department of the Interior.

Salazar, as the New York Times puts it, will inherit a department “riddled with incompetence and corruption, captive to industries it is supposed to regulate and far more interested in exploiting public resources than conserving them. ”

(I wrote about Bush’s outgoing interior secretary, Dirk Kempthorne, and his antipathy toward the Endanged Species Act here and here.)

Here’re are some clips from this morning’s NY Times editorial on the mess made by Kempthorne and his predecessors that Salazar will soon have to clean up.

No cabinet post is as critical to the integrity of the nation’s parks, its open spaces and its animal species. Mr. Obama, and his environmental adviser in chief, Carol Browner, must be prepared to offer Mr. Salazar full support, especially in fending off the ranchers and the oil, gas, mining and other special interests who have always found the Interior Department to be a soft target, never more so than in the Bush administration.

Mr. Salazar’s most urgent task will be to remove the influence of politics and ideology from decisions that are best left to science.

Just as Mr. Salazar’s name was surfacing for the job, Earl Devaney, currently the department’s inspector general, reported to Congress that on 15 separate occasions the department’s political appointees had weakened protections for endangered species against the advice of the agency’s scientists, whose work they either ignored or distorted.

This sort of meddling has become standard operating procedure. Julie MacDonald, a former deputy assistant secretary for fish and wildlife and parks, resigned last year after an earlier report found that she had run roughshod over agency scientists and violated federal rules by giving internal documents to industry lobbyists.

It will be a nice for a change that those charged with protecting our precious natural resources will not be the ones actively assaulting them.