LOS ANGELES

ALPERN AT LARGE--Contrary to what the Mayor and his erstwhile City Council allies are promoting, affordable housing and related issues, such as homelessness and mobility, are getting worse under their watch. 

EASTSIDER-On August 30, ballots go out for an important election for Retiree Member of CalPERS Board of Directors.

WORLD WATCH-Much has been said and written about Trump’s disgraceful pointed “advice” to Prime Minister Netanyahu not to allow two duly elected Muslim Democrat congresswomen, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar, to enter Israel.

ELECTION POLITICS--Members of the youth-led Sunrise Movement protested at the Democratic National Committee's summer meeting after the Resolutions Committee voted against holding a climate-specific 2020 debate.

PLATKIN ON PLANNING-For Angelenos who are true believers in the supposed “law of supply and demand,” LA’s worsening housing crisis remains a mystery.

ONE MAN’S OPINION-After mass murders occur, a lull is to be expected. Wall Street’s swings and the blathering about tariffs on China permit the average person to slumber.

@THE GUSS REPORT-A friend in the health field wrote last week to advise of a gnarly encounter on the way to work: 

OTHER WORDS-When I teach about race in sociology classes, I often begin by asking students how and when the idea of race came about. 

DIGITIZED NEIGHBORHOODS--The most recent meeting of the Planning and Land Use Management Committee of the City Council did not move the ball forward.

DEEGAN ON LA-Several days ago, an iconic figure in American life and lore turned 75: Happy Birthday, Smokey the Bear!

PERSPECTIVE--Donald Trump has kept his promise, reportedly made to Xi Jinping in June, that Washington would “tone down” its comments on the spiraling HK protests. “Very tough situation” Trump tweeted on August 12. “I hope it works out for everybody, including China.”

CLIMATE POLITICS-Environmentalist and famed TV science educator Bill Nye is speaking out against President Donald Trump’s repeated dismissals of global warming, sounding the alarm on his refusal to act before it’s too late. 

ALPERN AT LARGE--Suddenly, Greenland is in the news. Trump raised the idea of buying Greenland but wasn't too serious.

GUEST WORDS--The debate on solving California’s housing affordability crisis has reached a fever pitch, and the level of noise is drowning out solutions.

GELFAND’S WORLD--It's easy to find comments by the dozens about who is leading in the polls or nitpicks by the hundreds about small differences among health care proposals. 

METRO’S FOLLIES--Metro and I have a problem. Maybe it is because Metro has dropped the word Transportation from its name as well as Authority.

PUBLIC SECTOR ACCOUNTABILITY-Imagine your business could treat borrowings as revenues, avoid cost recognition by not paying expenses and report less debt than actually owed. 

MY TURN-What has become endemic to large dysfunctional organizations like the non-profit Cedars Sinai Medical Center, is that they don't have enough staff to accomplish even their most basic functions.

ONE MAN’S OPINION-Duh. What’s prodromal? As we all recall from our high school Greek class, prodrome is derived from the Greek word prodromos, meaning "running before." (Yeah, like I took Greek in high school.)

CHATMATES-As we move toward Election 2020 (in about 444 days), much has been made about this current president. 

ENERGY POLICY-The California Public Utilities Commission’s (CPUC) plans to make all homes and businesses use electricity only means electricity will need to take up the duties that natural gas has been performing, and provide continuously uninterruptable power as California is on a path toward 100% renewables and “zero-carbon” sources in electricity by 2045.