Cable News Network

5 Offbeat Things To Do in L.A. This Week

See also: *10 Best L.A. Art Galleries For Partying *Our Calendar Section, Listing More Great Things to Do in L.A. *10 Best Stand-Up Comedy Shows in Los Angeles Tired of frequenting the same routine haunts for entertainment? Suffer no longer with these fantastically quirky events, from Kathy Griffin ... More >>

Escape from the D-List

Trail Blazing: Eight Great Pioneers of Pot

Tommy ChongBy Michael Goldstein Tommy Chong is perhaps the biggest celebrity on this list, as a longtime comedian, movie star and half of the still-working duo Cheech & Chong. He is both a hero, as a longtime marijuana advocate, and a martyr, as a veteran of nine months in federal prison for ru ... More >>

For Once, Someone Got An L.A. Food Show Right: Bourdain's Parts Unknown Koreatown Episode

For the second installment of his new CNN show Parts Unknown, which aired last night, Anthony Bourdain explored L.A.'s Koreatown. The show was insightful, revealing and pretty much spot-on, giving an accurate depiction of both the fraught history of K-Town and its current status as one of our city's ... More >>

Cheech and Chong Tell Us About Their New Animated Movie, the Duo's First Feature in 29 Years

Anthony Bourdain Debuts Parts Unknown on CNN

Anthony Bourdain's new CNN show Parts Unknown debuted last night on CNN. The show, which is very much like his Travel Channel show No Reservations, which ended in November of last year, took us last night to Myanmar, a country that only recently began allowing outsiders in, let alone western film cr ... More >>

Boston Marathon Explosions Injure Several Runners; Race Called Off

Many updates at the bottom: Three are now reported dead; L.A. authorities are on heightened alert. First posted at 12:23 p.m. See also: L.A. Witness In Boston: 'We Were Caught Between 2 Explosions.' About a half-dozen people were injured in two mid-race explosions at the Boston Marathon today, acc ... More >>

The Top Ten Awesomely Absurd and Absurdly Awesome Clutch Lyrics

Throughout two decades and ten albums, D.C. rock outfit Clutch has evolved into one of the mightiest blues-rock bands around. One of the tangibles that make Clutch stand out is the lyrical output and delivery of vocalist Neil Fallon, whose lyrical output reflects his obsessions with conspiracy theor ... More >>

Anthony Bourdain's Reddit Q & A

A little over an hour ago, Anthony Bourdain jumped on Reddit to answer fan questions. A lot of familiar territory was covered -- why he left the Travel Channel for CNN, why he decided to do The Taste, what his favorite thing to eat in a multitude of places was.

Five Artsy Things to Do in L.A. This Week, From Battling Curators to Banana Splits

This week, there's a game show-style showdown in Santa Monica, a print fair at LACMA and a film that tours through facets of pre-invasion Baghdad showing in Eagle Rock. 5. Justin Bieber's leftovers Art Is Shit Editions, a fairly young, L.A.-based art publishing company that produces objects as well ... More >>

Assembly District 50 Election Results: Richard Bloom's Lead Over Betsy Butler Shrinks In Latest Vote Count

In the hotly contested California Assembly District 50 race, which still yet to be called, Santa Monica Mayor Richard Bloom's lead over Assemblywoman Betsy Butler has shrunk from a little over 200 votes to 103. Every few days, the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder updates the AD 50 vote count o ... More >>

SWATting, a Deadly Political Game

DA Patrick Frey's enemies called 911, saying he'd shot his wife

Assembly District 50: Facing Tough Political Battle, Betsy Butler and Friends Point Fingers and Slam L.A. Weekly

We always know we're sounding the right notes on a story when a politician and her "friends" start crying foul in such an over-the-top way that it makes us laugh out loud. Such is the case with California Asseblywoman Betsy Butler, who's running for Assembly District 50 in a tight race against Santa ... More >>

When a Video Artwork Showed the Presidential Debate, the Audience Tried to Change the Volume. But Is That Like Drawing on a Picasso?

See also: *5 Artsy Things to Do in L.A. This Week *Our Best of L.A. issue and our Best of L.A. app Last night's presidential debate didn't get nearly as heated as the firestorm that erupted during it at the Hammer Museum. Within the My Land/Your Land exhibit, a performance art piece by Jonathan Ho ... More >>

Porn Condom Ballot Measure For L.A. County Sees Campaign Kickoff

The folks behind a ballot measure that asks you, the L.A. County voter, to make condoms mandatory in porn, officially kicked off their campaign this week. Measure B will be on the November ballot, and the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which has been pushing for mandatory condoms in adult video for ye ... More >>

Scientists Create Low-Fat Chocolate With Juice

Juice and chocolate seem like a decidedly unpalatable combination. But, through some complicated chemical mumbo-jumbo, British scientists have figured out a way to cut the fat content in chocolate by half by adding fruit juice, CNN reports. They claim their new concoction tastes pretty much the same ... More >>

I Had Zero Interest in Celebrity Home Tours...Until I Went on One

When I moved to Los Angeles a year ago, I swore that I would never be caught dead on a celebrity-homes tour. I couldn't care less whether the Kardashians lived in a mansion with an infinity pool or a gingerbread house constructed by sugarplum fairies. The buses cruising the streets reminded me o ... More >>

Justin Combs, Diddy's Rich Son, Defends Taking UCLA Scholarship

Following our viral coverage of Justin Combs' full-ride scholarship to UCLA (despite his father Diddy's wealth and his own $300,000-plus car, and at a time of dire state cuts and rising tuition costs), Justin Combs took to Twitter yesterday to defend his rich self. He said: Regardless what the cir ... More >>

Diddy's Son Justin Combs Gets Full Scholarship to UCLA as Many Students Struggle

Updated at the bottom with UCLA noting that its athletic scholarships come from non-taxpayer funds. First posted at 8:05 a.m. Should a multimillionaire's son be able to get a free-ride scholarship to a state school that has been struggling with budget cuts and raging student protests? If that son ... More >>

Flock of Seagulls Prompts Scary Emergency on LAX-Bound Delta Flight 1063: VIDEO

Updated and edited, with freshest info at the bottom. A flight en route to LAX turned around and landed at JFK airport in New York after striking dozens of birds on takeoff, prompting some to compare the episode to the "Miracle on the Hudson" that made pilot Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger an inter ... More >>

Food News Roundup: Food Fraud, Defining "Gluten-Free" Starbucks as Third Largest U.S. Chain

Huffington Post: Olive oil, milk, honey, saffron, orange juice, coffee and apple juice are among the most-adulterated food products. With this kind of food fraud, even careful label-reading won't help. The Washington Post: What is truly "gluten-free?" The FDA has been trying to decide for seven yea ... More >>

Jason Russell, Invisible Children Co-Founder, Reportedly Detained for Public Masturbation, Vandalizing Cars in Underwear

Updated on second page with exclusive details from the San Diego PD. (Correction: Russell wasn't arrested, only detained. Headline has been changed.) Also, Invisible Children responds. According to NBC San Diego, cops caught the "storyteller and dreamer" behind the Kony 2012 campaign running around ... More >>

Israel's Shimon Peres Joins Facebook, Makes Dubstep Music Video on Wild Trip to California

Unlike Israel's stodgy old prime minister, President Shimon Peres is one with Gen Y. On his wild trip to California, Peres has far surpassed the call of duty to schmooze with rich Jews. (Though he's done plenty of that, too.) Apparently unphased by Occupy San Francisco protesters and a vandalized ... More >>

7 Camp Pendleton Marines Killed in Helicopter Collision Over Arizona

Horror at the Yuma, Arizona training range: Two helicopters reportedly collided around 8 p.m. last night during a training exercise, killing seven marines from SoCal. Though reports originally indicated that the marines were based out of Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, located just east of La Jol ... More >>

Food News Roundup: Oysters, Foodie Pick-up Lines Why We Infantilize Our Food

Flickr/julesjulesjules moysters​Tasting Table: Slurping oysters at L&E Oyster Bar, newly opened in Silver Lake. ecosalon: 50 pick-up lines for foodies. ("I can last as long as a Le Creuset.") Daily Dish: 5 Questions for Tim Goodell. Zester Daily: The Infantilization of American Taste, or wh ... More >>

L.A. Arson Fires: Suspect Under Arrest, LAFD Says

Updated at the bottom with an official arrest (the third since Thursday). Fire officials now count 53 blazes in the arson spree. First posted at 2:48 a.m. Monday. The L.A. arson fires have sated the city's everlasting expectation for the criminally bizarre, but so far there's no Michael Connelly en ... More >>

Assaults on L.A. Cops up Nearly 27 Percent in 2011, Even as Crime Went Down

​Strange days in the world of policing, especially in L.A. While violent crime continued its downward slide in 2011, with the FBI's latest stats indicating a 6.4 percent decline nationwide, attacks on cops in the City of Angels were up. Way up. Last week LAPD Chief Charlie Beck reported that ... More >>

Occupy L.A. Eviction: The View From the Inside

Editor's note: Freelance journalist Skylaire Alfvegren has been attending Occupy L.A. general assemblies since they first began two months ago. She previously covered the Nov. 17 arrests of 46 occupiers for the Weekly and was there last night as police moved in. On the 60th day of Occupy Los Angele ... More >>

Stephanie Miller's Sexy Liberal Comedy Tour

Countering the right wing's fury with humor

Sesame Street's YouTube Fans Treated to Porn Thanks to Hackers

Sesame StreetBig Bird, perplexed by the letter 'X.'​Poor kids who dialed up the YouTube channel of Sesame Street yesterday looking for their favorite Elmo and Big Bird videos were instead treated to content said to have been brought to them by the letter "X." As in porn, of the variety mostly ... More >>

Anna Bjorn, Miss Iceland 1974 and Hollywood B-Lister, Outed Whitey Bulger for $2 Million

Oh, Santa Monica -- where former Boston mobsters and Iceland beauty queens go to co-retire in the lovely sea breeze. The Boston Globe is reporting that Anna Bjornsdottir, Miss Iceland 1974 turned graphic designer and yoga instructor (so Santa Monica), was neighbors with most-wanted crime boss James ... More >>

[Updated] Cars, Pedestrians Crossing Mexico-U.S. Border Stuck in Tijuana After Scaffolding Collapse

ReutersThe hellish line to San Ysidro just got worse.​Update: The wait time at the Otay crossing into the U.S. is over two hours, both in car and on foot. The southbound lanes into Tijuana have been re-opened, but border officials Tweet that they will not be "processing pedestrians or vehicles ... More >>

Frank Gehry Insists He Didn't Design L.A. Disney Hall By Crumpling a Piece of Paper

It's perfect.​We thought it was just general, irrefutable knowledge by now that bigtime L.A. architect Frank Gehry designed downtown's Disney Hall by crumpling up a piece of paper and setting the welders to work. But, as Gehry revealed in a CNN interview on Sunday, it turns out that was proba ... More >>

LAUSD Declares Homework Racist, Classist

HW is for crackers.​Updated after the jump with angry arguments from the "Teach for America" camp, contrasted by the district's stern belief that they've done the right thing. How to deal with the rude K-12 achievement gap in Los Angeles? District officials have a new solution that should be ... More >>

Ass, Cash Used by Mexican Cartels to Move Grass Past U.S. Border Agents

U.S. Border agents' new motto?​The U.S.-Mexico border has been shored up with thousands of new agents in what appears to us to be the Obama administration's attempts (and Bush's before that) to get right wingers to STFU when it comes to immigration enforcement. While it might have been a good ... More >>

Henri Ford: Doctor Sans Frontieres

Arnold Schwarzenegger Love Child: Will it Hurt His Terminator 5 Comeback?

Arnold Schwarzenegger​Reporting that former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger fathered a love child with a member of his household staff, the LA Times finally published a story it's been after for years. In 2003, the Times assigned dozens of reporters to find Schwarzenegger's then-rumored love child ... More >>

Canapes for Monarchists: The Royal Wedding Lunchtime Reception Menu

Flickr/webponcecanapes, of a sort​ If you've been up all night watching the royal wedding coverage on CNN -- which seemed a lot like a cross between the Oscars and an episode of Masterpiece Theatre, circa 1972 -- and are now collapsed on your fainting couch, having called in sick to work, you ... More >>

Lesley Herring, Hollywood Woman Missing for 2 Years, Gets Nancy Grace Treatment on CNN Tonight

Lesley Herring​The media has been roundly criticized for its "missing white woman syndrome" -- giving way more play to missing, young (attractive) Anglo females than those of other ages and ethnicities. So it's refreshing when we buck the trend. Nancy Grace, who has made a franchise of miss ... More >>

L.A. Clean Sweep Nets Big Endorsements, Drops Big Dime in Last Seconds of Election Season

Full disclosure: We have a huge crush on Ron Kaye.​L.A. Clean Sweep may have started small and controversial, but after a rowdy few months of almost mainstream redevelopment scandal and municipal mud-slinging, the out-with-the-old "political action committee" has seen a few of its candidates b ... More >>

Scott Schmidt, West Hollywood Candidate: Gay Republican Tried to Stop Prop. 8, Now Aims to Unseat Incumbent John Heilman

WeHo City Council candidate Scott Schmidt​In West Hollywood, City Council candidate Scott Schmidt is apparently getting the reputation as the guy who worked harder to try to defeat Proposition 8 than incumbents John Heilman, Abbe Land, and Lindsey Horvath -- combined. Schmidt sent out a camp ... More >>

Somali Pirates: America Started It!

​It's easy to characterize hijackin', ransomin' third-world pirates as old-fashioned Disney fiction. But the Los Angeles Times, who apparently has some speed-dials in dangerous waters, proves -- in today's "Deaths of Americans at hands of Somali pirates a troubling escalation in violence, exp ... More >>

Miguel Marquez, Onetime L.A. Journo, Beaten Amid Bahrain Protests

Miguel Marquez.​An ABC News reporter with ties to L.A. was the latest victim of unrest in the Middle East this week, the network reports. Miguel Marquez, who worked as a CNN correspondent in Los Angeles in 2003, got a good beat-down with billy clubs in the Bahrain capital of Manama Thursday m ... More >>

Lindsay Lohan: Allegedly Stolen Necklace Returned, Cops Not Searching Lohan's Venice Home

Lohan almost invited police into her home.​Smart move, Lindsay. A missing $2,500 necklace police were planning to look for at her home was returned to the LAPD's Pacific Division Wednesday. Authorities had asked for a search warrant to search Lindsay Lohan's home after she allegedly walked ou ... More >>

Ozzy Osbourne Defies "Sudden Illness" to Play Gibson Amphitheatre Tomorrow

MTV.com​ Yesterday, Ozzy Osbourne had to cancel a show in Reno. "Based on advice from doctors, it is with great regret that Ozzy Osbourne is postponing his show ... at the Reno Event Center," CNN reported that Live Nation's Chris Martinez said in a statement. "The multi-platinum Rock & Roll H ... More >>

Camp Blogaway 2011 Update: Registration Is Officially Open

Camp Blogaway​ If you're reading our food blog, chances are good that you might have your own food blog. You might write about recipes, restaurants, chef crushes, or even obscure flavors of Kit Kats. And whether you have 10,000 loyal followers, or twenty casual readers of the friend-and-famil ... More >>

Is Camille Grammer Leaving 'The Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills?'

BravoCamille.​There's important news in your world, and we aim to bring it to you. California's only Democratically appointed Supreme Court justice is quitting. SoCal is turning into a ghost town as more than half of foreclosed-upon homes aren't even on the market. And hiring of much-needed po ... More >>

Hollywood Man Shoots 33-Year-Old Roommate Along Walk Of Fame, Barricades Himself From LAPD For Four-Hour Standoff

Hudson ApartmentsScene of the crime​Updated after the jump with LAPD confirmation: The shooter was Paul Matthew Allee, and officers were forced to subdue him with a Taser gun. Victim was 33 years old. Update, 12 p.m.: The boyfriend of another resident blogs about the shooting. He claims the s ... More >>

Compton Parents Petition to Take Over Chronically Failing Public School Through 'Parent Trigger' Law, Send Shock Waves Throughout the Nation

​UPDATE: L.A. Weekly readers sound off on yesterday's Parent Trigger, no charter school has been approved at Compton Unified. After break. UPDATE: Compton Unified School District Acting Superintendent Karen Frison releases statement about today's Parent Trigger. After break. UPDATE: Governo ... More >>

Proposition 8: Thirteen Out-of-State Attorney Generals Don't Want California Gays to Get Married, Join George Wallace in History Books

Prop. 8 supporter and Alabama Attorney General Troy King​With the appeal hearing for the Proposition 8 lawsuit set for Monday, December 6, we thought it would be a good time to look into the out-of-state attorney generals who stuck their noses into California's business and filed a friendly b ... More >>