Right.
Well, this note from LA Times National Editor Scott Kraft is suddenly a teensy bit beside the point now isn’t it?
Edwards is to appear on Nightline tonight.
(So now that he’s admitted to having an affair, he can still be AG, right? Or something?)
I’ll be watching my beloved and brilliant nephew get married then. (Okay, he’ll be married by the time that Nightline comes on, but I’ll still be feting him.) So that’s two things I have to TiVO. (Olympics, Edwards.)
And a happy 8-08-08 to all of you, too.
http://ronkayela.com/
“Here’s one of the many reasons newspapers are dying: They have lost connection with the public”
“One of the hottest topics around town is the crime and violence associated with street gangs who terrorize so much of the city, and the current specific hot topic is the senseless murders of innocent victims by illegal immigrant gangbangers. The Daily News has six stories today about LA. city government, including photos and prominent display to opening of nine three-way crosswalks, while the Times has two on local government. Neither paper has any stories about how the people and their dealings and view of city government. There is no coverage of KABC radio talk show host Doug McIntyre’s protest rally and broadcast in support of Jamiel’s Law although radio and TV stations did cover it. The focus on government and not people and community activism is a subject Barbara Osborn and I will be talking about this afternoon at 3:30 p.m. on KPFK 90.7FM and taking calls from listeners.”
“The focus on government and not people and community activism is a subject Barbara Osborn and I will be talking about this afternoon at 3:30 p.m. on KPFK 90.7FM and taking calls from listeners.”
Good one, LC. I’ll be sure to download the podcast and maybe post it over the weekend. You know my stand Jamiel’s law, but why in the world would no one in print cover the rally? Wish I’d been there myself.
There are great grassroots things going on all over this city and very little of it is covered. WLA needs to do more of it.
Hmmmmm. You’re giving me some ideas…..
As a former Edwards supporter I have to say we’ve dodged a bullet. But this is a one day wonder unless McCain really is stupid and wants to talk “Family Values”.
Alas – like VP Wes Clark (shitcanned for speaking the truth) I’m afraid that AG John Edwards is alos now inoperative.
How about Connie Rice? AKA as the good Rice?
Celeste, you knew for weeks that the L.A. Times had muffled its bloggers and staff on this story, but you didn’t say anything then. Don’t you think it was important given the role that Edwards was playing in Obama’s campaign and in his unlikely administration?
As I said over at Cooper’s, let John Edwards go on the Maury Povich Show for a DNA test to prove that he is not the father.
Lost Res, I never thought I’d come off as the liberal relative to the conservative/ Republican view you’re echoing from RonKaye’s blog, but Jameil’s Law just happens to be more than a teensy bit UNCONSTITUTIONAL, as even Zine’s motion does. (I;m really apolitical, opposed to stupidity and blind political bias on any side — since that’s what’s obstructing this country discussing the issues fairly and coming together in some sort of agreement.)
Jamiel’s Law calls for LAPD to actively “hunt down suspected gangmembers,” and in practice, that means profiling: going after brown and black youths who dress or act a certain way, and that means that lawsuits from ACLU are inevitable both to 1/ overturn the law IF it were passed by Council (costing $$ for that lawsuit) and 2/ lawsuits against the city for allegations of profiling.
Only part of Zine’s motion that is useful is to demand that ALL law enforcement agencies involved in letting Pedro Espinoza out of jail account to the Council — he mentions by name Baca’s Sheriff’s dept., but not DA Cooley’s office, which is in charge of felonies and felons, and identifying and turning illegals in the jails over to ICE — and especially where they intersect in the person of illegal felons committing felonies who are in jail.
Zine won’t mention Cooley because he’s sucking upto him for political reasons, trying to cozy up to the Cooley/Antonovich/ rightwing candidate for City Attorney triumverate. (As we see from Knabe’s breaking free of Antonovich’s bullying on the MTA vote and agreeing to let the public decide rather than blowing $10 million for an extra ballot, Knabe’s more of a moderate Republican than a demagogue.) Ron Kaye is very openly and unabashedly in that camp: openly anti0-metroLA on everything from Transportation/ MTA issues to anything to do with the Mayor, Jack Weiss, Garcetti or “rich people” on the westside, as much as he’s against “the Mexican Mafia” as they call them.
(The so-called “people’s revolution” he’s been fomenting turns out to be, if you read his blog and see who shows at his meetings, really the political and geographical fringes of both right and left, what are called the old blue-haired, provincial whites and the radical left in East L A, especially Lincoln Heights, Glassell Park, Boyle Heights – leaving out the middle of the city geographically and politically. That’s been a revelation to me, anyway, since the commenters see themselves more as middle class citizens vs. illegals, but it’s very much class-geographical, too.)
In the process, Zine’s been antagonizing Bratton and the Mayor’s office at every turn, on everything from S040 to the paparazzi issue, and he’s ticking a lot of people off and marginalizing himself. Maybe that makes him even more desperate to suck up to the Cooley/ McIntyre’s.
But although Zine won’t mention Cooley by name for political reasons any more will any of the rightwing rabblerousing talkshow hosts like McIntyre or KFI’s screamers, his motion demanding a report from law enforcement agencies involved puts Cooley’s office dead and center. (Baca’s prison staff available for immigration issues is far smaller than the DA’s.)
If the print MSM has ignored McIntyre’s PR op, it’s for good reason. How dumb and manipulative of the Balogna and Shaw families is it, to dump the whole problem literally on the doorstep of an LA Councilman — as though he’s responsible for the Balogna murder in San Francisco and everywhere in the state? How mind-numbingly stupid is it, to literally equate L A and San Francisco as identical “sanctuary cities” in both Walter Moore’s version of Jamiel’s Law, AND in all their rallies and rabble-rousing?
Significantly, after hearing this nonsense, I tuned into KABC for once and heard Larry Elder putting Walter Moore in his place, pointing out that Weiss and the City Attorney’s office are likely not endorsing Jamiel’s or Zine’s measures because they’re unconstitional, demanding that cops engage in profiling. Walter Moore got whiny and flustered (as he always does when challenged) and yelped, no, they’re not endorsing the laws because “they are bad people.” (
Celeste, you’ve got to put the KABC link up for the Elder interview, soon as it’s up on KABC in a day or two — you’re always saying that the only problem with SO40 is that it’s not clarified, not that it doesn’t require cops to “hunt down suspected illegal gangmembers,” and if the alternative is these idiot, mind=bogglingly dumb talk show hosts, Bratton and his side look like legal geniuses by comparison.
Will look into all after my darling nephew is married. Off to throw rice. (Or whatever it is one does.)
Throw grits–uncooked, of course.