The global day of action was initially announced last month after a video attributed to "Anonymous" coincided with an online effort that managed to temporarily knock out Internet servers belonging to the Church of Scientology. more ›

• As was reported today on LAist, the writer's strike, which cost the city about $1 billion, is nearly over. We all know how involved Mayor V has been nudging the two sides back together. Oh, wait. But at least he weighed in today: "This agreement is a blockbuster for the Los Angeles economy. It will put thousands of writers, set designers, caterers, and behind-the-scenes workers back on the job this week." Blockbuster! HA!
• Election central: Barack Obama added a Grammy to his momentous weekend and Hillary Clinton sacked her campaign manager today. Obama won the award for his oratorically smooth stylins, reading Audacity of Hope and Clinton announced today that she replaced her campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle with longtime aide Maggie Williams in what has had to be a long weekend for beset by four resounding primary and caucus wins by Obama in Washington, Maine, Louisiana and Nebraska.
• The rest of the Grammy winners can be found here and you'll be happy to know that Jimmy Sturr And His Orchestra took the prize for best polka album.
• Is Scientology a cult? Blogging.la found a few Anonymous people who might think so at a demonstration outside the L. Ron Hubbard center on Sunset today.
• A week after a plane crashed into the mountains near Banning Pass, rescuers reported Sunday that they have found the plane more than 11 miles from the site where it was originally reported missing. The fate of all four people on the plane is still unknown.
• Six kids and three adults from southern California fell ill today in D.C., where the group of students from West Covina and their chaperone's were visiting the White House. Insert [Bush Makes Me Sick, Too] joke here.
• From the turnabout is fair play department: A former Internal Revenue Service officer working as a tax preparer in Inglewood has been arrested in connection with an alleged scheme to defraud the government by filing false tax returns. How big of an economic stimulus check do you think he's getting?

Every so often when we feel so inspired to do so, we feature a photo (or two) from a photographer in the LAist Flickr Pool. It's another way of giving the many excellent photographers in our pool the attention that they deserve. more ›

Did any of you catch Bobby Flay's Throwdown the other night? It's the show where he goes to different cities across the world and challenges some legendary food purveyor that his version of whatever traditional city food they're making will win a blind taste test. Usually, he loses, cause I mean COME ON: can anybody really make a cheese steak better than a Philly native? What about fish n' chips from some grotty bar... more ›

You've heard that the South Park Scientology episode was pulled. Trey Parker and Matt Stone wrote, in a statement to Variety, "So, Scientology, you may have won this battle, but the million-year war for Earth has just begun! Temporarily anozinizing our episode will not stop us from keeping Thetans forever trapped in your pitiful man-bodies. Curses and drat! You have obstructed us for now, but your feeble bid to save humanity will fail! Hail Xenu!!!" (via MTV news) Well, Xenu's now up one over the forces of L. Ron, thanks to YouTube. more ›

At the risk of enraging "clear" Scientologists across the city, today's LA Times has a long story about Scientology's Number One Celebrity, Tom Criuse, and his wooing by the church's head, David Miscavige. more ›

To begin the strange story of one of Pasadena's most beloved sons we must go back a bit, and begin in England on October 12, 1875. That was the birthday of Aleister Crowley, magician and occult thinker who is at the beginning of this tale. Crowley began his life's work upon his introduction into the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn; following the dissolution of the Golden Dawn, Crowley studied magick, Kabbalah, alchemy, tarot, astrology, and yoga. Ultimately, those studies led to his takeover of the OTO (Ordo Templi Orientis), which he reformed around his Book of the Law with the organizing principle of his Law of Thelema: "Do what thou wilt." more ›