Mayor Sam's Hotsheet for Tuesday

Score one for Antonio Villaraigosa and Eli Broad and one against Zev Yaroslavsky and the taxpayers.  Tom Christie writes at the LA Weekly blog that Tuesday Villaraigosa and Broad will join to announce the selection of a new CEO for LA's Museum of Contemporary Art and that the troubled MOCA has rejected a proposed merger offer with the more solid LA County Museum of Art, a plan supported by the County Supervisor as well as art lovers concerned about a potential Broad takeover of MOCA. Also figure on more CRA subsidies for the free-spending MOCA.

Two Mayoral candidates have unveiled websites encouraging voters to take positions they are supporting.  Zuma Dogg has created LAVotersforChange.com offering up endorsments of candidates for other offices and information on various issues.  Meanwhile, Walter Moore has launched VoteNoLA.com expressing opposition to three measures on the March primary ballot.

LAPD Police Chief William Bratton, the United Teachers of LA and even the City Council of Carson and others support the naming of a new high school for slain LAPD Officer Randal Simmons who was an active volunteer within the community but now one Council member and Carson's Mayor Jim Dear have reversed their earlier decisions and want the school named after late labor leader Cesar Chavez.  Though supporters of the Chavez name deny it, some are suggesting that racial politics are at play; that many residents of the heavily Latino neighborhood opposed the naming for Simmons who was African-American.

If anyone thought that former Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin was going away anytime soon they were sadly mistaken.  A recently launched social networking site dedicated to the Alaska Governor has garnered nearly 70,000 members.  Back from the dead Republican Senator of Georgia Saxby Chambliss says he owes his come from behind victory in this month's special election to Palin's campaigning. And local columnist Sandra Tsing-Loh says a pit bull with lipstick PTA mom like Palin is exactly who the LAUSD needs for it's new superintendent (instead of recently deposed Admiral David Brewer or recently coronated Villaraigosa toadie Ray Cortines).

Mayor Sam's Hotsheet for Monday

Sacramento Bee columnist Dan Walters writes about Mayor Villaraigosa's bait and switch with his garbage tax increases for "more police."  With respect to this and the many other tax hikes the Mayor has planned for you Walters opines that we "would be better served if they (politicians like Villaraigosa) were upfront about their purposes, rather than constructing elaborate fictions that imply voters are too stupid to understand reality."  Gee, ya think?



The new Beckford Parents blog reminds us why a potential $10 billion LAUSD construction bond on the November ballot (the fifth such in the last decade) must not be passed: Belmont Learning Center.  It's laughable that the Mayor is calling this latest dollar sinkhole a "reform minded" bond.  Let's put the same energy into breaking up LAUSD, creating more charter type schools while holding parents, students and educators accountable.



Under the Nahai regime at the Department of Water and Power it sure seems like there are a lot more random power outages throughout the City.  This time, nearly 10,000 customers were without power in Koreatown on Sunday. In the meantime, the rate hikes keep coming.



Writer Sandra Tsing-Loh dressed as the Statue of Liberty talking about her menopause may have been amusing for some of those in attendance at Ron Kaye's Bastille Day Storming of City Hall but I don't know.  There is definitely a place and a call for a protest movement in Los Angeles, however to gain traction I believe it needs a central rallying point and needs to be done somewhat without theatrics or maybe a different type of theatrics.



Is superstar pop diva Britney Spears on the way back to good looks and good health? I don't know, I'll let you decide.