The News is Dead in L.A. Long Live the News.

If Mainstream News in Los Angeles Is Burning, What Should Rise from the Ashes?

Shriveling advertising revenue, circulation death spirals, rounds of layoffs, bankruptcies—it’s hard to read a story about the newspaper industry in Southern California these days that isn’t a dirge of doom and gloom or at least a tragicomedy. Local radio and television news stations seem to be doing better, but they’re under financial pressure, too. Cue the rending of garments and gnashing of teeth. But, as the Byrds and Ecclesiastes know, with every time to die, there is a time to be born. In advance of the Zócalo event, “What Kind …

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The Kardashians Did What?!

What Sort of News Drives You Crazy?

There is some news we can’t escape. Flip on the TV at 6:00 p.m., and you’ll be confronted with every sordid detail of the latest political sex scandal. Read the …

Africa Is Not a Country

And Other Shocking Things Americans Would Be Better Off Knowing About the Continent

Not to pick on Sarah Palin, but it’s troubling for all Americans when there are rumors that a vice presidential candidate thinks Africa is a country, not a continent. Africa …

Meet Your Meat

What You Ought to Know About What You’re About to Eat

Visit your local supermarket and an array of packages of shrink-wrapped meat glints from refrigerated cases. Meat in America is typically cheap and plentiful, delivered to your plate through an …

You Call That Art?

Yes, and It’s in Unexpected Places All Over the Central Valley

Art is all around us in California—whether it’s whizzing by on the side of a city bus or brightening the facade of a once-dingy building.
Thanks to new technology and …

America’s Got an Undergraduate Problem

Higher Education Needs to Be More Inclusive ... So Where Do We Start?

In 1996, California voters banned affirmative action in public universities. Since then, the state’s public universities have struggled to enroll black and Latino students–and to keep them on campus.  Over …