Killing the Pre-Meeting Invocation — Would That Become Fulwood’s Folly?

Ari L. NoonanEditor's Essays

Is stiff-armed political correctness invading City Hall, more specifically City Council meetings?

City Manager Jerry Fulwood sprang a surprise on the 5 City Councilmen at Tuesday night’s fairly private meeting at the Courtyard by Marriott.

Idly, as if he were merely kicking a can down the road, he wondered if it weren’t time to drop the solemn, succinct moment that is set aside for an invocation to open every Council meeting.

Don’t Loan Slippery Sal a Dollar — She May Grab Your Wallet

Ari L. NoonanEditor's Essays

Wouldn’t you know that the disgraced Long Beach Congresswoman Laura Richardson would be holding in her sweaty, dirty little hands this afternoon the most expensive car lease among any of the 435 Members of Congress?

Surely there are children more prudent with money than this wild woman.

Times Brushes Nuances Aside, Arguing Illegal Immigration Is Just a Hiccup

Ari L. NoonanEditor's Essays

I suspect the heart of the Minuteman founder I interviewed the other day dropped like a rock this morning when he checked the Los Angeles Times.

Reporter Anna Gorman, a smart girl who knows better, wrote a gushingly weepy story about a 10-year-old kid, the son of divorced parents, who is about to lose Daddy Time because his illegal immigrant father is on the ledge of being deported.

Meet a Family That Deserves a Second Chance — and the Newspaper Will Help Out

Ari L. NoonanEditor's Essays

I thought it was a profile in courage and candor last night when one Jason Harris, a father, stepped to the microphone at the special School Board meeting and related a touching story of his family’s decidedly mixed experience with the School District.
Residents of Baldwin Hills, Mr. Harris said that he and his wife chose Culver City for the education of their two daughters because of the School District’s reputation for excellence. For the last two years, the girls have been enrolled at Farragut School.
However, near the end of the recent school term, the permits for both children were revoked.

The Sultan Goes Fishing in Muddy Waters and Reels in Another Defeated Idea

Ari L. NoonanEditor's Essays

Fill up the tank and keep your stained hankie handy, Murgatroyd. It is going to be a long, exasperating and rickety ride in the Silbiger jalopy across the piping hot desert of ideas that is Our Town’s City Council.

Naturally, when I say “City Council” in this context — oh, boy, Mommy, another keen idea from our Vice Mayor, may I have one, too? — I am referring to the Sultan of Useless Suggestions.

Global Warming Evangelicals — Whom Do They Remind You of?

Ari L. NoonanEditor's Essays

This may send a shiver down the spines of our handkerchief-waving friends caught up in the emotion-based hurricane of global warming.

Have you noticed how striking are the similarities between the evangelicals in the global warming movement and the Original Evangelicals in fundamental Christianity?

What Collegiality? Councilmen Wear Out Their Welcome on the Dais

Ari L. NoonanEditor's Essays

Only 7 meetings into the first term of three members of the City Council, and already they are grating on each other’s nerves.

By midnight on Monday, their seams were gaping, almost defying re-stitching.

Memorably, Mayor Scott Malsin giggled, noticeably, over a serious remark by Vice Mayor Gary Silbiger, and Mr. Silbiger retorted with fire, which was understandable.

The Night City Council Hit Bottom — and a Few Observers Did, Too

Ari L. NoonanEditor's Essays

A week after we enthusiastically commended the three new members of the City Council for exceeding expectations, at least two of them did not fall off their lofty pedestal last night. They leaped, hoping, I presume, no one would notice.

Candor suffered a knockout in the first round of the Council meeting. A guy shopping for honesty would have starved to death.

Come on, boys.