GELFAND'S WORLD

GELFAND’S WORLD - Let's start on a tangent, the invention of ice cream. I don't know exactly who first figured out how to mix cream and sugar and ground ice, but at some point there was ice cream.

GELFAND’S WORLD - Let's suppose that you live in a normal residential neighborhood, and all of a sudden, a government agency announces that it is going to build an outdoor amphitheater to do Rock N' Roll concerts.

GELFAND’S WORLD - We've all seen the network footage of the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol building.

GELFAND’S WORLD - People come with all kinds of personalities and temperaments. Some manage to maintain self control, even while losing their temper. 

GELFAND’S WORLD - There is a question that should be asked of all those candidates for mayor and for the City Council. It goes like this:

GELFAND’S WORLD - The Republican approach to mass shootings is to turn the United States into an airport -- more armed guards and locked doors and metal detectors.

GELFAND’S WORLD - Think of it. In each big city newsroom, there is now a reporter whose beat is the mass murder of children.

GELAND’S WORLD - Is there a point at which a political candidate can do so much advertising that it becomes overkill?

GELFAND’S WORLD - This is apparently what is meant by Make America Great Again: White supremacism supported by murder of the minority population. 

GELFAND’S WORLD - Joe beat us to the punch.  Just as I was sending CityWatch an article on mayoral candidate Joe Buscaino, we received word that Joe is dropping out of the race.

GELFAND’S WORLD - It is a truism that the way to deal with a bully is to fight back.

GELFAND’S WORLD - Back in the 1960s, Garrett Hardin pointed out that the effect of anti-abortion laws isn't simply the ban of a particular form of surgery. It is compulsory pregnancy. 

GELFAND’S WORLD - The City of Los Angeles now appears intent on abolishing freedom of speech within its neighborhood council system.

GELFAND’S WORLD - We seem to be in a post-Covid moment, as evidenced by the return of the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books.

GELFAND’S WORLD - In the years following World War II, violent crime, including murders, rose swiftly and sharply.

GELFAND’S WORLD - What promises would I really like to hear from the candidates -- or at least from some one of them so I could have a candidate to support? 

GELFAND’S WORLD - The recent news from Ukraine and from its Russian invaders reveals an unsettling truth about our own country's political culture.

GELFAND’S WORLD - The following story was embargoed until at least Friday, but I decided to release it anyway considering its importance:

GELFAND’S WORLD - Early Sunday afternoon, while film fans and industry people were making their way towards the Academy Awards presentation,

GELFAND’S WORLD - If you, like me, saw the first set of Rick Caruso for Mayor ads on television, you would have come away from them not really knowing the man.

GELFAND’S WORLD - The original idea behind the creation of neighborhood councils was actually pretty simple and at its heart, idealistic.