SCHOOL POLITICS - School board meetings have been in the news lately, with parents and community members taking aim at board members and the policies they’re trying to implement.

HOMEOWNER RIGHTS - For the last 20 years, I have lived and thrived in a mobile home community. I loved where I live — right up until Wall Street bought the park and threatened the well-being of myself, my neighbors, and my family.

CONNECTING CALIFORNIA - Are you a Californian who wants to make your state a better place?

RACIAL RECKONINGS - Hidden in the stories surrounding the racist and homophobic emails between now former Las Vegas Raiders head coach Jon Gruden was an interesting tidbit about ESPN Insider Adam Schefter’s communication with Gruden and Bruce Allen, the then-president of the Washington Football Team.

COMMENTARY - Activists harass White House officials and senators as they eat dinner at restaurants.

DIGITAL MISDEEDS - The enthusiasm with which much of the media and political establishment have characterised Frances Haugen as a “Facebook whistleblower” requires that we pause to consider what exactly we think the term “whistleblower” means.

RACIAL CONSERVATISM - Out on the dusty prairie west of Houston, the construction crews have been busy.

VIRTUAL UNREALITY - Three years ago, my wife and I moved from a spacious apartment. What we couldn’t fit into our new digs, we gave away.

LGBTG NATION - A viciously anti-LGBTQ pastor was arrested on the tarmac as he exited a plane in Canada after touring the U.S. to spread COVID-19 misinformation on a contempt of court charge.

COMMENTARY - The historic center of Puebla city, where I live, is a World Heritage site.

U.S. UNINTELLIGENCE - The jokes regarding the “I” in “CIA” are familiar and predictable. The middle letter in the initialism might stand for imbecility, ignorance, or incompetence – essentially anything other than “intelligence.”

NEW GEOGRAPHY-Many of us have spent the last week glued to our televisions watching the fall of Kabul to the Taliban.

COMMENTARY - We know Republicans lie. We know they are racist.

RANDOM LENGTH NEWS - Several years ago I was standing in front of the art deco Palais de la Porte Dorée in Paris, France and was admiring the block-long park across the street with lush palm trees and cascading water feature.

LGBTQ POLITICS - The state of Texas just declared that gender affirmation surgery for minors is child abuse and that teachers, doctors, and other mandatory reporters in the state are legally required to tell the Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) if they have “cause to believe” that a child has undergone the procedure under the threat of jail time.

Alexander Vindman, the former U.S. Army lieutenant colonel, provided testimony to the Congress in 2019 that framed the charge of abuse of power in the impeachment trial of former president Donald Trump. 

SB10 WATCH-Scott Wiener styles himself an environmental legislator. In February 2017, the then-rookie state senator averred that “having good, well-planned, transit-oriented, compact housing…[is] one of the most critical things we can be doing to meet our climate goals.

SPACE TRAVEL-Three of the richest billionaires on Earth are now spending billions to exit Earth’s atmosphere and enter into space. The world is watching — and reflecting.

GUEST WORDS-In the 38 years that I have worked in the City of Los Angeles (at two chambers of commerce), I have never seen anything quite like the rollout of RecycLA. It is fair to say that it has been nothing short of a disaster. 

GUEST WORDS—(This Insider look at Vladimir Putin was made available to CityWatch through the auspices of our Washington DC Bureau Chief, Sara Corcoran.)  When I look at coverage of Vladimir Putin in the American media, I’m regularly shocked and puzzled by what I see.  Russia’s authoritarian, mobbed-up president is commonly portrayed as an authoritarian superman: Putin the uber-politician; Putin, the commanding figure of power and puissance on the world stage; Putin, the Machiavellian master schemer whose tentacles stretch from the Kremlin to the Trump White House, where he has skillfully managed to collude with, if not the president, then almost certainly those around him.

VIEW FROM HERE--According to Donald Trump, the American economy is bigger and better and more beautiful than it has ever been. So why did the stock market take a tumble, losing more than 10 percent of its value in the space of a couple of weeks? It continues to bounce up and down by a few points, not moving decisively in one direction or another. Clearly, traders are not heeding the Donald’s warning about letting the Dow Jones decline.