Ever since LA Times' major slash of staff this summer (and a bunch more coming soon), little factual typos have appeared in the paper more often than usual. This is the most blaring and we hope it didn't make the print edition. Sooooo, Prop 4 will change the state constitution's language in regards to abortions and minors; it will not provide mortgage funds for veterans--that's Prop 12's job. Talk about a major burn from......

Fans arrive outside Wrigley Field before the National League divisional series baseball game between the LA Dodgers and the Chicago Cubs this afternoon in Chicago (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast) So, get this. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Chicago Mayor Richard Daley just made a friendly fun bet. If the Dodgers win the playoff series against the Chicago Cubs (the first game is going on right now), Chicago will hand over their 2016 Olympic bid that......

The Los Angeles Times yesterday editorialized against Proposition 4 (parental notification for minor's abortion). The Times addresses concerns that Proposition 4 would limit access to safe abortion care, and that it's passage could lead pregnant teens to harm through illegal abortions, not receiving prenatal care, or worse.......

Today, former LA Times music columnist Kevin Bronson began blogging at his new website, buzzbands.la: "Here I am, digging Buzz Bands out of the trash bin at 2nd and Broadway, where my former employer, the Los Angeles Times, deposited it a few months ago," he wrote in his second introduction to the site. "Either out of obstinacy, or passion, or vanity, or a weird cocktail of the three, I will undertake sharing my thoughts and......

Reverend Donald Ashman, who "leads a small congregation at the Anglican Church of Our Saviour on the Westside of Los Angeles, where he has been for a quarter of a century [and] teaches Latin and world history at Hoover High School in Glendale," was on board Metrolink Train 111 on Friday, September 12th at 4:23 p.m. when it crashed head-on into a Union Pacific Freight Train. Despite his own back injuries sustained in the......

It was a sad day back in July when Buzz Bands columnist Kevin Bronson was let go from his near six-year LA Times post amid massive cutbacks. He wrote one of the LA Times' more notable blogs called Buzz Bands before it was folded into the paper's Soundboard blog. Today, we stumbled upon his new venture -- a website called Buzz Bands (obviously) at www.buzzbands.la. It's not fully operational yet, but it does act as......

Noting that it is not perfect, but would take some of the politics out of drawing legislative districts, the LA Times today endorsed Proposition 11, the November ballot initiative that would allow the redrawing of state district boundaries overseen by an independent commission after the 2010 census. As the Times put it, "Voters are supposed to choose their representatives, but in California, political parties select their voters. That kind of power is destructive and inherently......

A study by a journalist from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch on her personal blog shows that news agencies are finding Twitter more and more important to their work. Erica Smith (here's her Twitter) observes that CNN anchors and the Chicago Tribune have used the service to great success. "[The Chicago Tribune] recently picked up a tip from a Twitter follower about a bomb threat, and was able to share information through Twitter and the Tribune’s......

If you've been following the Ed McMahon foreclosure story (the latest is that Donald Trump is helping out), the mainstream media has been saying that his now $4.6 million home is located in Beverly Hills. Even our our local paper, the LA Times continues to say Beverly Hills when talking up the TV icon's home. But where does McMahon live within Beverly Hills? He lives on Crest Court in a gated community called The......

Photo by brainchildvn via Flickr When the LA Times' editorial board makes decisions on endorsements for propositions, they invite both sides into separate meetings. When they were with supporters of Prop 8 who seek to ban gay marriage, they had a couple of those awkward turtle moments: According to one of the Prop. 8 reps, that 1948 ruling [saying that bans on interracial marriage were unconstitutional] was OK because people are born to their......

Yesterday, the LA Times' editorial board endorsed the opposing side of Prop 8, which would ban gay marriage in California. "Civil rights are commonly hard-won, and not the result of widespread consensus... Fundamental rights are exactly that. They should neither wait for popular acceptance, nor be revoked because it is lacking."......

Screenshot by K. Moriarty via Flickr Whether it was the shaking or a surge of readers checking the LA Times' website, it was shut down temporarily after the 5.4, 11:42 a.m. earthquake in Chino Hills.......

Direct to our e-mail inbox, one pubic relations person at a well known firm got a little sassy about what she found in Sam Zell's LA Times today: "I thought it was hilarious. Even though the LA Times is going to hell and laid off a ton of people last week, I am so glad it doesn't mean that I will be deprived of 'The Hills' coverage that helps me get through the day. (You......

This image made from video provided by WWW.HOLLYWOOD.TV shows the overturned vehicle of actor Shia LaBeouf in Los Angeles on Sunday, July 27, 2008 (AP Photo/WWW.HOLLYWOOD.TV) Actor Shia LaBeouf (Indiana Jones 4, Transformers) was arrested on suspicion of a DUI early yesterday morning after he and two others were hurt in a crash at Fountain and La Brea in West Hollywood. According to LA County sheriff's deputies, the actor made a left turn instead......

The last stand-alone LAT Book Review, on July 27, 2008, with Doris Lessing on the cover In the spring of last year, we lamented the shrinking of the LA Times Book Review. We waxed poetic about waking up on Sunday mornings to get our paper. We lovingly detailed thumbing through the big hulk of Sunday newsiness and adverstising to pull out our favorite part of the paper: the Book Review. We were deeply saddened,......

Today some LA Times staffers decided to tell owner Sam Zell what they think of his stewardship -- with a three-story banner. On the LA Times building. Which takes some kind of balls. The website at the bottom of the sign -- tellzell.com -- has been chronicling the paper's downsizing from the inside. This summer 250 jobs will be eliminated, 150 from the newsroom (that's editorial to you and me). Tell Zell's proprietor --......

This LA Times video demonstrates the differences between krump, hip hop, and break-dancing and features choreographer, Shane Sparks who is currently a judge on America's Best Dance Crew.. Tonight on America's Best Dance Crew the b-boys from Riverside, Super Cr3w, once again escaped elimination. Fanny Pak rocked their geek chic style and are still in the game too. Need to see more dancing? Watch our local favorites battle it out in the Missy Elliott challenge......

Cable network Current TV has recently launched this pod that features the LA Times' Homicide Report, which happens to be the only blog of its kind in the country. Although the Times is struggling these days, the Homicide Report is one of the best things about our city's biggest newspaper. The documentary focuses on reporter Ruben Vives, who believes the victims are people who deserve to have their stories told.......

Oh Those Dangerous Girl Scout Cookies | Photo by aka_kath via Flickr Girl Scouts got a rude awakening in March when Claremont Mayor Ellen Taylor told them to scram after they'd setup shop on the street corner outside her office. While Taylor claims she was merely worried about their safety, the Girl Scout troop leader, Maia West, was furious that Taylor had taken what is usually such a positive, empowering, entreprenurial skill-building experience and......

Today on Kevin Roderick's weekly LA Observed spot on KCRW, he talks up the latest lay offs at the LA Times. In addition to "the paper also began saying goodbye to 150 editors, reporters, designers, photographers and other journalists." The publisher was also fired. And that's not all as Roderick predicts that this was not the end of it: "the cruel truth is that this week was probably just a mid-step on the way to......

"There's a lot of wailing in journalism right now. I want to show people that there is a future, even if it's not working at a newspaper," explained Chrys Wu (via IM), a journoblogger at Ricochet, about the recent spate of layoffs, especially the LA Times. She's started a list of what Los Angeles area journalists are doing after the print life. "The core skills of journalism are the same, but the job is evolving.......

After hearing about music blogger Kevin Bronson leaving the paper amid the many staff cuts, we find out another great blogger is slated to leave. Jesus Sanchez was one of the paper's online reporting staff and has been writing at LA Now this past year. "I'm not sure what it means when the breaking-news blogger is laid off at a time when Blogging Will Be The Paper's One And Only Salvation. Hrmph," snapped one commenter.......

Sad news today for the local rock music reporting scene. Early last night, Kevin Bronson from the LA Times sent out an e-mail titled "Yeah, it's true." The body of the e-mail broke the news. "I'm history. My last day at the Times is Friday." He then linked to Kevin Roderick's post about the massive amounts of layoffs at the paper. Bronson was a huge asset to the Times and had a wonderful blog called......

Nam Le was recently in town to read from and sign The Boat, a wildly diverse and intense collection of short stories that did not immediately strike us a short stories and which prompted an interesting dialogue. While we make a point in our author interviews to ask questions that would be of interest to our readers, we found that in this case, we were compelled to ask some pointed questions about our own reading......

UPDATE: Further down the page, I refer to Jonah as an idiot. That's not really fair, and I apologize. He's a fu an incredible idiot: One small point in response (I know, I know: Why bother?). The 13th amendment lists involuntary servitude and slavery as different things. If they were the same, the founders wouldn't have wasted the ink repeating themselves. In case you're curious, here's a brief description of just how much of an......

Photo by Omar Omar via Flickr Late last month, Tribune Company chairman and CEO Sam Zell said in a memo that he was considering selling the iconic Times Mirror Square (along with the Tribune Tower in Chicago). If it does sell, Zell says moving out won't be immediate (they could sell and lease back some of the space), but come five years down the road, moving day may arrive. So the question remains, what......

In another round of job cuts for the LA Times, the paper announced today the planned sacking of 250 jobs across the company which includes 150 editorial ones. The paper will also reduce the number pages it prints by 15%. This is due to a declining revenue, some which is blamed on the internet (which is also a blessing, depending on how you look at it). "You all know the paradox we find ourselves in,"......

Ed Park is in town this week to read from and sign Personal Days, his funny, frightening & frighteningly spot-on novel about modern-day office life in this time of mergers, acquisitions, and business books full of empty platitudes that encourage workers to "do whatever it takes" and "put the customer first." Employees go missing without reason and a rogue element shakes things up, all while they troubleshoot Excel and navigate tedious office parties. Think Office......

Denis Johnson, author of several books including Jesus' Son and the National Book Award-Winning Tree of Smoke, has the first of a four-part serial installment in Playboy's July issue. Playboy is playing it oh-so-smart and isn't providing the highly-anticipated Nobody Move work of fiction online. What's a Johnson fan to do? You can pony up and buy Playboy, or you can head on over to Jacket Copy, the lit blog at the LA Times, to......

The much-maligned, oft-hated James Frey, author of the fictional memoir A Million Little Pieces and the man most well-known for being dissed on national TV by Oprah Winfrey, is back. While many now agree that blame for the whole Frey-affair rests with both Frey and his publisher, Frey got the bad end of the deal and has been vilified ever since. This time, he's sticking with fiction instead of peddling fiction-as-truth. His new novel, Bright......