Extra, Extra: Welcome to '08, LA

• Best way for LA to bring in the new year: win the Rose Bowl. USC killed Illini at 49-17, winning their 23rd Rose Bowl title.
  
• 750 bills go into effect this year and the minimum wage is now $8 per hour!
  
• The news battle in Santa Barbara continues: Wendy McCaw, owner of the Santa Barbara News-Press, has lost in court over illegal firings. She "must re-hire and give back pay — to at least eight ex-staffers... they lose by winning," Kevin Roderick says at LA Observed about the staffers who now get to go back to work, err, hell.
  
• LA Times columnist Joel Stein offers his 2008 predictions (on NPR too). Here he is on the Writers Strike: "The Directors Guild accepts a crappy deal from the studios, and a week later, the Writers Guild agrees to the same terms, calling it a "major victory for the proletariat." Studios are then flooded with 150 comedy scripts about an out-of-work dad who drives his wife and kids crazy. Michael Keaton once again commands $20 million."
  
• "Seattle's Freeway Park occupies 5.2 acres above the 5 freeway and was opened on July 4th, 1976," Eric Richardson at blogdowntown reflects when thinking about LA's open proposal for a freeway park over the Hollywood Freeway.
  
• Associate Press: Setback for the Defense in a Hollywood Wiretapping Case
  
• Weather nor protesters ruined the smooth Tournament of Roses parade today. Tons of pictures at LA Times (careful, this link will change your browser window size)
  
• Jay Leno, David Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel, Conan O'Brien and Craig Ferguson will host their shows again starting tomorrow. Only Letterman and Ferguson will have the support of writers.
  

Photo by Tom Andrews via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr