SAY WHAT?

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--I was on the phone the other day with my sister, who lives in the Bay Area, and she said she had to get ready to deal with a planned power outage at the house we grew up in.

She also had to pick up a few items at the store, she said, but that was going to be a nightmare because the markets were flooded with shoppers stocking up on supplies in anticipation of the blackout.

What the heck has gone wrong here in California?

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--Everyone in our country that has a semblance of conscience and humanity has gone through the last years in a constant state of horror and disbelief. Every single day we have witnessed a madman who blackmails those around him so that they comply with his demand for loyalty to him (and not the country), rude and obnoxious behavior, bullying, racism, bigotry, sexism, and a litany of actions and nonsensical words that have made our jaws drop. 

INTEL REPORT--Monday, Oct. 7. marks the start of what the British-based group Extinction Rebellion is calling the International Rebellion. Thousands of people will occupy the centers of some 60 cities around the globe, including Madrid, Amsterdam, Paris and New York, to stage nonviolent occupations of bridges and roads for at least a week. The goal is to paralyze commerce to force the ruling elites to respond to the climate emergency. I will be at Battery Park in New York to join them Monday morning. (Photo above: "It is our sacred duty to rebel in order to protect our homes, our future, and the future of all life on Earth." (Photo: Mr.Fish)

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--If any president is deserving of impeachment, it is Trump. (Photo: YouTube screen shot)

The impeachment inquiry aimed at Donald Trump has elicited a near-palpable sigh of relief among many Americans deeply anxious about the damage he has done to the presidency and country.

OPINION----My favorite photograph of the La Brea Tar Pits was taken in 1910, before it was in any way recognizable as what it would become. In the foreground, not far from what is now Wilshire Boulevard, a cluster of men stand in front of a small tar pond. Behind them, oil derricks rise against the backdrop of the Hollywood Hills. (Photo above: The fiberglass mammoth trio at the corner of Wilshire and Curson is entertaining fakery, reconstituted history and a science lesson all rolled into one. Stuart Palley / For The Times )

INTEL REPORT-The latest issue of Time magazine depicts President Donald Trump painting himself into a corner — an artistic response to Trump asking Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to do him a favor. 

Artist Edel Rodriguez created the illustration on the cover of the Oct. 7 issue, a Time spokesperson told HuffPost. The cover story concerns Trump having asked Ukraine to investigate political rival Joe Biden and allegedly threatening to withhold military aid if Zelensky did not comply.

INTEL REPORT--Are we on the road to another world war? I woke up to a lunatic President threatening Iran…again. This time, because (hold on, your eyes might glaze over) Yemeni rebels attacked the Saudi oilfields with cruise missiles and drones. (LOL, wait what?

Believing that Yemeni rebels have cruise missiles and drones is a little bit like believing Saddam had WMDs or that a bunch of dudes in Afghanistani caves were scarier than the combined armies of the world. It’s another lie. But I digress.) You’d be forgiven for shuddering. Deep down, I’d bet you’ve thought it at least a few times over the last year or several. World war. Is another one coming?

INTEL REPORT--A U.S. District Court judge yesterday rejected motions by attorneys representing Ed Buck and L.A. County District Attorney Jackie Lacey to dismiss a civil lawsuit filed against them in the 2017 drug-related death of 26-year-old Gemmel Moore in Buck’s West Hollywood apartment.

INTEL REPORT--Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar once again clarified her remarks about 9/11 on Sunday, days after a family member of a 9/11 victim alluded to the Muslim congresswoman at a remembrance ceremony.

Appearing on CBS’ Face the Nation, Omar was asked by host Margaret Brennan if she knew why people would find remarks she made about 9/11—taken out of context in a speech about Muslim Americans’ civil liberties—offensive.

INTEL REPORT--When Genie Harrison talks, it’s hard not to sit up and pay attention. Harrison ― an employment attorney based in L.A. who represents survivors of discrimination, retaliation and sexual assault ― has a cool and commanding voice honed by years of addressing courtrooms. And when I bring up recent comments from Harvey Weinstein’s legal team that the disgraced media mogul feels “railroaded” by the accusations against him, her voice deepens almost to a growl.

“He is the victimizer. He is the perpetrator,” Harrison seethes, before taking a swipe at Weinstein’s legal team for co-opting the concept of victimization for their client’s benefit. “They’re trying to go with ‘up is down and down is up.’”

 INTEL REPORT--There should be a word to describe the thing that happens when you have a new favorite word for a month or so and you become so enamored with it that you inject it into as many conversations as you can. For instance, right now that word for me is zeitgeist. I’ve always had a deep affinity for words with prominent “Zs” and when I say zeitgeist it feels like my mouth is getting a foot massage. I even caught myself, during a conversation last night, referring to a thing as (sigh) zeitgeisty.

INTEL REPORT--Hear me out: 6ix9ine, the rainbow-haired Brooklyn rapper who has the sex number “69” tattooed all over his face and body, and Kylie Jenner, the youngest of the Kardashian brood, who got career-defining lip fillers well before her 18th birthday, became famous for basically the same reason.

INTEL REPORT--Hear me out: 6ix9ine, the rainbow-haired Brooklyn rapper who has the sex number “69” tattooed all over his face and body, and Kylie Jenner, the youngest of the Kardashian brood, who got career-defining lip fillers well before her 18th birthday, became famous for basically the same reason.

Also known as Tekashi69, 6ix9ine grew up poor in the Bushwick neighborhood of Brooklyn, dropped out of school at 13, and eventually achieved online infamy for his appearance before he even decided he wanted to become a rapper. “I didn’t really want to be a rapper or whatever,” he said in a podcast interview. “I just thought of making music because everybody was like: ‘You look mad cool.’” Now in federal prison for gang-related crimes, which he has said he committed largely to cultivate his tough guy persona, Tekashi69 reached the Billboard charts because he was so committed to looking insane on the internet that the world was forced to notice. Speaking about the charges he faced for using a child in a sexual performance — he posted a video on his Instagram wherein other men had sex with a 13-year-old girl while the rapper touched her and paraded in front of the camera — he admitted, “I was doing it for my image.”

INTEL REPORT--Scarlett Johansson threw her support behind Woody Allen, who has been accused of sexual abuse. (Photo above: Scarlett Johansson, Woody Allen. “I love Woody,” the Jewish actress told the Hollywood Reporter in an article published Wednesday. “I believe him, and I would work with him anytime.” 

In 1992, Allen’s daughter Dylan Farrow accused him of sexual abuse. The Jewish filmmaker denies the claims.

INTEL REPORT--A Washington, D.C., doctor is accusing Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar of being the reason her husband left her, in explosive divorce papers she filed in D.C. Superior Court.

According to BuzzFeed, which credits the New York Post for first reporting on the filing, Dr. Beth Mynett said that as a result of her husband, political consultant Tim Mynett’s, “shocking declaration of love” for the freshman congresswoman, she is seeking a divorce.

INTEL REPORT--An insulting social media post by Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro aimed at French First Lady Brigitte Macron offered a window into the worldview of powerful men whose destructive policies show no regard for vulnerable populations and the plant at-large, Canadian author and activist Naomi Klein observed Monday.

Bolsonaro remarked on Macron's appearance while she and her husband hosted the G7 summit and as thousands acres of the Amazon rain forest burned as a result of Bolsonaro's pro-deforestation policies. Climate action groups have pointed to the president's encouragement of farmers, loggers, and ranchers who want the forest cleared for their own use, as primary reasons for the blazes.

INTEL REPORT— On Wednesday morning, President Donald Trump quoted a conservative talk show host named Wayne Allyn Root to defend comments he had made the day before that angered many in the Jewish community: that Jews who vote for Democrats show “a total lack of knowledge or great disloyalty.” 

“Thank you to Wayne Allyn Root for the very nice words,” Trump said before quoting something Root has said previously about the president. (Photo above: Wayne Allyn Root appears on Larry King's "PolitiKING" show in 2015. (Screenshot from YouTube) 

INTEL REPORT--Planned Parenthood will no longer be part of the federal Title X program because of new Trump administration restrictions.

Planned Parenthood will no longer participate in the federal Title X program, which provides family planning services such as contraception to low-income individuals.

INTEL REPORT--Like most people, I have spent the last 18 months or so trying to make sense of Donald Trump. The real questions are whether he is actually clever in some way — after all, he beat the system and became President — and what is the thing with Russia?

This week we learned some fundamental truths about Donald Trump.

1. Trump is not a genius

INTEL REPORT--One of the nation’s most extreme antigay pastors has called for the death of comedian Sarah Silverman and the actress isn’t about to let it go unnoticed.

Adam Fannin, formerly of the Stedfast Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Florida, now preaches at the Law of Liberty Baptist Church. Stedfast is best known for being the home of radical preacher Donnie Romero who called for God to “finish the job” after the Pulse Nightclub mass shooting that killed dozens of mostly young gay Latinos.

INTEL REPORT--President Donald Trump’s Facebook page ran approximately 2,200 ads earlier this year stoking xenophobia and warning of an “invasion” by immigrants ― a revelation receiving attention in the wake of the mass shooting in El Paso, Texas, in which the gunman may have been acting on a white supremacist manifesto.

One set of video ads ― of which there are three versions ― urges social media users to help fund a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, flashing all-caps warnings that the U.S. is in a “state of emergency” and that “America’s safety is at risk.”

Above the visuals are messages claiming it’s “CRITICAL that we STOP THE INVASION” and guard the border to protect the nation.