SAY WHAT?

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--With the March primary election rapidly approaching, the stakes are high in the race for a rare open seat on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

Until now, it has been a largely civil affair, with L.A. City Council President Herb Wesson the perceived front-runner to replace term-limited Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas. But the gloves are finally starting to come off.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--The Trump Administration has quietly removed sexual orientation protections from the U.S. Department of the Interior’s (DOI) guidelines on workplace discrimination. The official explanation of why contradicts an anti-LGBTQ argument being made by Trump in several court cases.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--Sorry but bad news: IMPOTUS is a moron, and increasingly unwell. 

While vacationing once again - on what is now the $118 million taxpayers' dime - he spoke to young conservatives at their Turning Point USA conference in West Palm Beach. 

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--With President Donald Trump headed for a partisan impeachment in the House and a largely automatic acquittal in the Senate, liberals like to console themselves that history will be unkind to Trump’s staunchest defenders in Congress ― that the Republican members turning a blind eye or offering bad-faith excuses for the president will rightfully be recorded as enemies of truth.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--It didn’t surprise the locals when Claremont United Methodist Church unveiled its annual outdoor Nativity scene this week. In keeping with its spiritual leanings and activist traditions, this was no tender Christ-child-in-the-manger tableau.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING-A new report from the state Legislative Analyst’s Office spotlights a dangerous incongruity in how California approaches two issues involving global warming: the push to reduce emissions of Earth-warming greenhouse gases and what to do about the already-rising seas. While the state has been an international leader on the former, it is woefully behind on the latter. California has not done what it should to prepare for coastal erosion, sea incursions into low-lying areas (including sensitive wetlands), storm-surge flooding of shore communities or the possible need for a forced retreat from imperiled developments at the ocean’s edge. (Photo above: San Diego coastal flooding.)

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--Jewish groups denounced President Donald Trump Sunday for anti-Semitic tropes after he referred to some Jewish voters in the real estate business as “brutal killers” who will vote for him to dodge a wealth tax. 

Trump also complained that some Jews “don’t love Israel enough” in a speech Saturday at the Israeli American Council National Summit in Florida before a supportive crowd that chanted “four more years.”

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--Unsatisfied with getting away with murder, the bane of the universe, George Zimmerman, has filed a $100 million lawsuit against attorney Ben Crump and the family of Trayvon Martin.

According to a press release provided to The Root, the lawsuit alleges that Rachel Jeantel, the prosecution’s key witness during the 2013 trial, was both “an imposter and fake witness.” The suit also accuses Crump of defamation for remarks made in his recently published book, Open Season: Legalized Genocide of Colored People.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--Melania Trump is no damsel in distress; in fact, she’s a calculated genius (if her visa is to be believed) who plotted on the old orange man with the attractive bank account. But unless Scrooge McDuck sleeps with his money, Melania reportedly has no interest in laying next to his old wrinkly ass. (Photo above: MANDEL NGAN (Getty Images) 

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--Marking this year's International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, held for the last 40 years on Nov. 25, hundreds of thousands of women from Mexico to Sudan to France took to the streets to honor the roughly 90,000 women murdered each year by men, and to demand the end of rape and all forms of domestic abuse. According to the World Health Organization, one in three women worldwide will endure physical or sexual violence in her lifetime, with the UN deeming that violence one of the "most widespread, persistent and devastating human rights violations in our world today."

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING-Calls for Republican Rep. Devin Nunes to resign spread rapidly on social media Friday night following reports that Lev Parnas, an indicted associate of President Donald Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, is willing to testify to House impeachment investigators that Nunes met with a former Ukrainian prosecutor in an effort to dig up dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--The one thing never to forget about global warming is that it’s a timed test.

It’s ignoble and dangerous to delay progress on any important issue, of course – if, in 2020, America continues to ignore the healthcare needs of many of its citizens, those people will sicken, die, go bankrupt. The damage will be very real. But that damage won’t make it harder, come 2021 or 2025 or 2030, to do the right thing about healthcare.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--The Situation Room, October 2039: the president and vice president, senior generals and admirals, key cabinet members, and other top national security officers huddle around computer screens as aides speak to key officials across the country. Some screens are focused on Hurricane Monica, continuing its catastrophic path through the Carolinas and Virginia; others are following Hurricane Nicholas, now pummeling Florida and Georgia, while Hurricane Ophelia lurks behind it in the eastern Caribbean.

On another bank of screens, officials are watching horrifying scenes from Los Angeles and San Diego, where millions of people are under mandatory evacuation orders with essentially nowhere to go because of a maelstrom of raging wildfires. Other large blazes are burning out of control in Northern California and Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, and Washington State. The National Guard has been called out across much of the West, while hundreds of thousands of active-duty troops are being deployed in the disaster zones to assist in relief operations and firefighting.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--Move over Arianna Huffington!

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--The question has been asked of the trump followers: “With so much winning, why are all of you still so filled with anger and hate?” The answer to this doesn’t require a psychology degree. The fact is that since 2015, trump has stirred the pot of hate and anger and his followers revel in it. This is their existence, and to keep them placated, he has to continue to find new enemies for them to chant against.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg delivers the keynote address at Facebook's F8 Developer Conference on April 18, 2017 at McEnery Convention Center in San Jose, California. The conference will explore Facebook's new technology initiatives and products. (Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

The national advocacy group Free Press expressed support Monday for the hundreds of Facebook employees who recently have signed on to an open letter to CEO Mark Zuckerberg criticizing the social media giant's policy of exempting political advertising from its "misinformation" standards.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--The stink of Trump’s racist and misogynist hate, abject dishonesty and flagrant impunity over laws and the U.S. Constitution ought to follow every Trump supporter inside or outside government for the rest of their lives. (Photo: Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Every time it seems as though the firewall of apologists protecting Donald Trump might crumble, Republican politicians let us down over and over. In an interview Sunday, one of Trump’s top Republican allies, Sen. Lindsey Graham, was asked in an interview whether he was open-minded about supporting impeachment if damning evidence of Trump’s wrongdoing was to emerge. Graham said, “If you could show me that, you know, Trump actually was engaging in a quid pro quo outside the phone call, that would be very disturbing.”

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--Sen. Bernie Sanders' closing remarks during his event with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in Queens on Saturday became a viral rallying cry for supporters of the 2020 Democratic presidential hopeful over the weekend as thousands of social media users promised to be "willing to fight for someone I don't know."

"Are you willing to fight for that person who you don't even know as much as you're willing to fight for yourself?" Sanders asked the crowd of over 26,000 who gathered at Queensbridge Park in Long Island City to hear the senator, Ocasio-Cortez, and others speak. An overflow crowd of an additional 5,000 people were reportedly listening to the event from outside of the park. 

WHAT THEY ARE SAYING--Some may consider the comparison of trump’s regime to Hitler’s Nazis as old hat, but there is truth in this comparison. For anyone that had the honor of talking to those that lived through the horrors of World War II Germany, there is one comment that seems to be shared. Even those that had been thrown into the concentration camps said that many people in their neighborhood were just “nice people.”

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--I was on the phone the other day with my sister, who lives in the Bay Area, and she said she had to get ready to deal with a planned power outage at the house we grew up in.

She also had to pick up a few items at the store, she said, but that was going to be a nightmare because the markets were flooded with shoppers stocking up on supplies in anticipation of the blackout.

What the heck has gone wrong here in California?

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING--Everyone in our country that has a semblance of conscience and humanity has gone through the last years in a constant state of horror and disbelief. Every single day we have witnessed a madman who blackmails those around him so that they comply with his demand for loyalty to him (and not the country), rude and obnoxious behavior, bullying, racism, bigotry, sexism, and a litany of actions and nonsensical words that have made our jaws drop.