A book originally published in 1983 called “Quintessence: The Quality of Having It” was filled with objects, foods, places… in short, things that had “quintessence”: The quality of being the best example or most typical […]

Dear Editor, The debate about development is still raging. How high? How much parking? How much density? All of these questions are irrelevant. Traffic is destroying Santa Monica and the City has its head in […]

Ideas come fast every time California endures a drought of several years. Each time, some of them are accepted and put into use, thus making the next drought a bit easier to handle. Back in […]

Reform of the California Environmental QualityAct has become a mantra for many California politicians over the last several years, all the way up to Gov. Jerry Brown, who found himself frustrated by CEQA at times […]

“You have to do the work even when it’s not going well,” were Diana Gordon’s words when talking about making art. “It’s not a sometimes thing. You have to be disciplined.” Gordon was speaking about […]

It was inevitable once the number of signatures needed to put a constitutional amendment initiative on the statewide ballot dropped by 300,000 following last fall’s election: A measure to change the pension system governing many […]

Now that the state Senate has generally ignored the loud, repeated and unscientific outcries of anti-vaccination crusaders, it’s likely the Assembly will fall into line this summer and pass a law eliminating religious belief as […]

When former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel asked Congress last year to authorize a new round of military base closings, alarm bells went off in many parts of California. For this state has been victimized more […]

Democrats in Congress will never say so publicly, but they know they have little or no hope of taking back control of the House of Representatives until 2022 at the earliest. That’s because gerrymandering in […]

The tragically continuing events in various cities involving police and African American citizens has pushed the notion of a “post-racial” America back a few steps, to say the least. One might even observe that the […]