Unemployment in the San Jose metro area fell dramatically last month, by nearly 1%, the Silicon Valley Business Journal reports. The drop was driven largely by hiring in government and health care, and brings the area’s unemployment rate down to 5.4%–“close to
Gov. Jerry Brown defended his record in a meeting with the San Francisco Chronicle editorial board last week. In addition to touting his record on job creation, defending the troubled high-speed rail project, and claiming that Toyota’s departure from the state
Willie Brown, the charismatic former mayor of San Francisco, has penned a column for the San Francisco Chronicle in which he expressed his fervent wish that the city would be destroyed. “This weekend moviegoing America will watch Godzilla stomp the daylights out
The race for governor in California has become a joke–one told by the local media at the expense of the GOP. On the one side is Assemblyman Tim Donnelly, a Tea Party conservative whose enthusiasm for the Second Amendment is
State Senate candidate and free-birth-control activist Sandra Fluke lost a key endorsement this week, as the Santa Monica Democratic Club endorsed local school board president and Harvard graduate Ben Allen instead as its candidate for the 26th district in the
Dean Baquet, the new executive editor of the New York Times following the ouster of Jill Abramson, was himself ousted as editor of the Los Angeles Times in 2006–on Election Day. Baquet was reportedly removed because of his strong–and public–stance against cuts to
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA — Hundreds of professional dominatrices began arriving in Los Angeles Wednesday for the eleventh annual DomCon, one of the largest conferences of bondage professionals in the United States. Held every year since 2004, DomCon is less about
A cat has saved a young boy from a vicious dog attack in a spectacular fight caught on surveillance video. The boy is making his way up a driveway on a toddler’s balance bicycle, struggling with each step, when a
On Tuesday, legislators, business groups and tax reformers reached a compromise to change part of California’s Proposition 13, the legendary restriction on property taxes passed by referendum in 1978. At the time, Prop 13 heralded the beginning of an economic
Republican gubernatorial candidate and Tea Party favorite Tim Donnelly was in second place in the latest poll, with a net favorable rating. California’s newspapers, however, seem determined to change that. The Los Angeles Times has focused on comments Donnelly made
Shelly Sterling, the wife of controversial Los Angeles Clipper owner Donald Sterling, has found a new ally in her bid to retain control of the team, in the event that the National Basketball Association ousts her husband as the owner:
The California State Bar is not commenting on whether it would discipline a California attorney who gave an electric shock to a witness during testimony in a Utah state court. The attorney, Don Howarth, gave an expert witness a trick
Politifact Texas hit Republican gubernatorial candidate Greg Abbott May 6 with its worst rating–“pants on fire”–for claiming that Democrat rival Wendy Davis raised money for a member of the Democratic Socialists of America. That member was Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL),
Retiring congressman George Miller, a Bay Area Democrat and lieutenant to House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, told a local NBC News reporter May 9 that his roommate, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), “has not made his bed in 30 years.” Miller
The extended drought in California–one of the worst in the state’s history–is hitting the Central Valley farming region, and several key crops in particular. The Sacramento Bee reports that almonds, the state’s largest farm export in dollar terms, are in danger
Brent Roske, a television producer and director who was running as an independent, has dropped out of the race for the congressional seat held by retiring Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) and endorsed fellow independent Marianne Williamson. The Williamson campaign released
Republican Neel Kashkari is still blasting rival Assemblyman Tim Donnelly’s claim that he was involved in encouraging sharia-compliant finance–that is, banking in accordance with Islamic law–in his role overseeing the Wall Street bailout at the U.S. Treasury, and specifically through
Debate over sharia, or Islamic law, has suddenly seized California in the midst of an election year. In Beverly Hills, Hollywood A-listers are boycotting the Beverly Hills Hotel to rebuke the owner, the Sultan of Brunei, for harsh anti-gay laws
South Africa’s leading opposition party, the Democratic Alliance (DA) made historic strides in that country’s national and provincial elections this week, reaching record high of 22% support nationally and nearly 60% in the Western Cape province, where it governs. However,
President Barack Obama’s fundraising pilgrimage to California included all the liberal stations: Hollywood, Silicon Valley, and La Jolla. Two patterns stood out: first, that Obama continues to be heckled even by friendly audiences; and second, that America’s richest political donors
The Sultan of Brunei, Hassanal Bolkiah, is consistently ranked among the richest men in the world. When he last visited Los Angeles in December 2011, police halted traffic on the 405 freeway–normally one of the busiest roads in the U.S.–during
President Barack Obama told donors at an exclusive Hollywood fundraiser for the Democratic Party that he needed their help to undo the “frustration” of politics in Washington. There is “an anxiety, and a sense of frustration,” the president–now in his
In accepting the “Ambassador for Humanity” award from Steven Spielberg and the USC Shoah Foundation in Los Angeles Wednesday evening, President Barack Obama recounted his 2009 trip to the concentration camp of Buchenwald–the camp his maternal grandfather helped liberate–with Nobel
Hollywood mogul Steven Spielberg praised President Barack Obama’s creation of the Atrocities Prevention Board in 2012 in awarding Obama the “Ambassador for Humanity” prize, the highest honor of the USC Shoah Foundation, in Los Angeles Wednesday evening. The Atrocities Prevention
Hollywood superstar and power broker Steven Spielberg has recognized President Barack Obama with the USC Shoah [Holocaust] Foundation’s highest award, the “Ambassador for Humanity.” It is an odd award to present to a president who has been called “dangerously silent
The bandwagon for professional football cheerleaders suing their teams just got another member. According to an NBC Bay Area report, New York Jets cheerleader “Krystal C.” has filed a class-action lawsuit against the team “seeking damages for unpaid wages and
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Was Golden State Warriors head coach Mark Jackson fired for his Christian views on gay marriage? That’s what Ann Killion is asking at sfgate.com, noting that Jackson’s lukewarm reaction to the coming-out of Jason Collins last year was something of
President Barack Obama is visiting California this week–and that promises to make traffic even worse than usual in Los Angeles. Drivers are being urged to avoid Century City and Bel Air, as the president’s visit will see portions of West
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously Tuesday to explore regulations that would screen ice cream vendors for criminal records for violations “such as molestation, sex offenses, pornography or abuse,” the Los Angeles Times reports. Because ice cream
Democrat Wendy Greuel, running to succeed 20-term Democrat Rep. Henry Waxman (D), has released her first campaign ad of the 2014 primary as early voting starts ahead of the June 3 primary. The ad, according to the Greuel campaign, “highlights
The majority of UCLA students running for undergraduate student government officer positions–though none from the inclusive, centrist “Bruins United” coalition–have signed a pledge drafted by radical groups and several ethnic organizations promising never to travel to Israel on student trips sponsored
A controversial assignment given to eighth-grade students in the Rialto Unified School District in San Bernadino County that asked them to evaluate whether the Holocaust actually happened or was a myth created for “political and monetary gain was designed in a
The California State Assembly passed a bill Monday nearly unanimously that would prevent state agencies from selling the Confederate flag “or any similar image.” The bill, AB 2444, was sponsored by Assemblyman Isadore Hall (D-Compton), who was offended to learn from
Republican gubernatorial candidate Neel Kashkari is slamming GOP rival Tim Donnelly for his inconsistent position on “redevelopment,” a policy the California state legislature ended in 2011 with strong Republican support. “Tim Donnelly says he’s for redevelopment projects. Then he says
On the heels of 2013’s highly successful “Thanksgivukkah,” and following the drunken revelry of “St. Purim’s Day” this past March, comes the latest in Jewish holiday mashups: “Cinco de Iyar,” which is a combination of Mexican-American “Cinco de Mayo” and
