Extra, Extra: How California Could Change Voting

• Quick, yet deadly: this weekend's Malibu Fire is 90% contained.
  
• We thought NBC had a policy of not giving car chases attention, a respectable position to take. Those days must be over. Anyway, it's always interesting when a car chase gets off freeway at the exit by your house like the one this morning on the 101. That would make number eight on our list for witnessed car chases.
  
• More cost effective and more feasible. The Mayor's plan for rush hour traffic on Olympic and Pico will not turn them into one-way thoroughfares as proposed by others, but his plan will make the two clogged arteries "behave" like one way streets.
  
• A must read/listen: "There is a huge political battle raging in California that is viewed as either a much needed quest for electoral reform or an attempt to steal the presidential election."
  
• Two burned at Universal Studios back lot. Not the tourist trap, the actual working studio lot.
  
• Phew! Not in LA! "Looking at central Kiev's Victory Square [in Ukraine] is like looking down at a gridlocked Los Angeles freeway, except that many of the cars are going in opposite directions, there's more toxic haze and tens of thousands of people have to live within yards of it."
  
• You used to be able to equate the Valley with Republicans; not so much anymore. The Democrats are gaining clout in numbers.
  
• First time events area always tough. Last night's Hollywood Santa Parade, produced by the City of Los Angeles, received mixed reviews. The annual Hollywood Christmas Parade put on by the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce was canceled after running into a $100,000 deficit in last year's parade. That's when the city jumped in.
  
• “It will be better than the Yule log.” Ovation TV will wage a "Battle of the Nutcrackers" over the next month, "pitting four well-known interpretations of the classic Tchaikovsky ballet against one another for viewer votes and pride of place in a Christmas Eve marathon..."
  
• Nissan is recalling 680,000+ Sentras and Altimas because of faulty crankshafts.
  
• Are you a 50something female looking for a winter vacation of... sex? Consider Kenya. British older women are flying to the African country and scoring young, tall, and quite willing black men. Could Californian cougars be next?

Photo by wassupike via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr