Trump gets endorsed by Sarah Palin, Clinton's classified emails and more; Uber passenger sues driver for violating his privacy; and Oscar-nominated documentarian discusses his newest film with Larry Mantle.
Election 2016 roundup: More Clinton emails, handicapping the polls, and Palin endorsement impact on Trump campaign
It may be a new year, but many of the trends we’re seeing from the 2016 presidential campaign are very much the same.
For starters, Hillary Clinton’s private email server is once again a topic of discussion, thanks to a new report from Intelligence Community Inspector General I. Charles McCullough. First obtained by Fox News, the correspondence to the Senate Intelligence and identifies a number of emails that may have been classified in a category known as “special access programs,” which is even higher than “top secret.”
The Clinton campaign responded by saying this was just another attempt to hurt the former Secretary of State’s campaign.
Another continuing trend is Donald Trump’s vice grip on national polls. The real estate mogul still holds a 19 percentage point lead over Ted Cruz in the latest Monmouth University poll despite the fact that Cruz’s poll numbers have been on the rise recently. On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton is still comfortably in first, leading Bernie Sanders by 13 percentage points.
What’s new here in 2016 is the latest addition to Trump’s backers. Former Alaska Governor and vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin announced she’d be endorsing him. Palin has somewhat faded from the public’s political eye but is still popular with Tea Party supporters and other niche groups among conservatives.
Guests:
Ed Espinoza, democratic political and public relations consultant based in Southern California, Democratic National Committee member from Long Beach
Lisa Camooso Miller, Republican political strategist and partner at Blueprint Communications, a public affairs firm based in D.C.
Amid uptick in deportations, President Obama struggling to define immigration image
How can the Obama administration take a hard line in enforcing its immigration policy while still appearing sympathetic to immigrants from Central America seeking refugee status?
That’s the conundrum the White House finds itself in. It appeared to be taking a tougher stance on immigration by resuming raids and deportations of some women and children back to Central America in recent weeks.
But that backfired after its own party accused the administration of sending a hypocritical message by accepting refugees from Syria but parsing semantics when it came to those fleeing places like Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador.
A week later, the administration appeared to be walking that tougher immigration stance back with Secretary of State John Kerry’s visit to the region and announcement that the US would be creating a new refugee program specifically for Central American refugees. In the midst of it all, President Obama has found himself a curios foe to his own party and not-quite friend of the right.
Read the full story here.
Guests:
Royce Murray, policy director at the National Immigrant Justice Center, an immigrant advocacy group based in Chicago
Jessica Vaughan, Director of Policy Studies, Center for Immigration Studies, a D.C.-based organization that studies the impact of immigration on American society
Sonia Nazario, reporter who won a Pulitzer Prize with the Los Angeles Times for her coverage of unaccompanied migrants entering the U.S. illegally. She followed some of these children on their difficult journey north and wrote the book "Enrique's Journey." Nazario is also on the board of Kids in need of defense
Videotaped suspect says Uber driver violated privacy
A Newport Beach man who was videotaped beating an Uber driver is counter-suing the driver for violating his privacy - claiming the video could not be recorded without his express consent.
Initially, Benjamin Golden was sued for assault (and fired from his job) after the dash-camera video posted on YouTube showed him drunkenly smacking driver Edward Caban.
The legal questions in this case center around Golden's reasonable expectation of privacy, plus whether a crime was committed might nullify Golden's privacy rights.
Guest:
Art Neill, Public Interest Lawyer, New Media Rights, which provides legal services, education, and public policy advocacy for creators, entrepreneurs, and internet users
Plastics will outnumber fish in ocean by 2050, report says
At the World Economic Forum in Davos today, a new report into the plastics economy says if production growth stays on course, the ocean is expected to contain 1 ton of plastic for every 3 tons of fish by 2025, and by 2050, more plastics than fish (by weight).
The Ellen MacArthur Foundation, whose founder is a record-breaking sailor, is using its report to bring together manufacturers and policymakers to develop "moonshot" ideas to stop plastic waste before it meets coastlines. For instance, because biodegradable plastics are generally compostable only under controlled conditions, MacArthur experts are seeking "bio-benign" plastics to lessen impact.
While the report focuses largely on prevention, cleanup ideas and strategies become even more important if plastics continue to boom.
The Ocean Conservancy says over half of material leaked into the ocean comes from five rapidly developing countries: China, Indonesia, Philippines, Vietnam, and Thailand. Waste collection in these countries alone could reduce plastics in the ocean by 45 percent, but would cost billions of dollars (USD).
What are other innovations aimed at cleaning up plastics? How are they being implemented in California? How do strategies focused on coastlines compare to those focused on garbage patches on the open seas?
Guests:
Nicholas Mallos, Director, Trash Free Seas Program, Ocean Conservancy - an advocacy group founded in 1972; Ocean Conservancy's study "Stemming the Tide" (link)
Sarah Sikich, Vice President, Heal the Bay - nonprofit environmental organization based in Santa Monica
Parks Dept floats new shuttle plan to fix Griffith Park congestion
The Department of Recreations & Parks and Councilmember David Ryu are hosting an event tonight to introduce and seek comments on a proposed plan to fix the traffic gridlock problem in Griffith Park.
The proposal seeks to minimize traffic to the Griffith Observatory by implementing a “free or low cost” shuttle system. Visitors will leave their cars at one of the free lots around the park’s edges, including ones near the Greek Theater and Ferndell. In addition, a free or low cost shuttle will also take parkgoers all the way up to the Hollywood sign viewing area. The plan would also put in place a fee to park at the Observatory and on Western Canyon Road.
The city has been trying to come up with a traffic relief plan that would appease homeowners, hikers, cyclists and users of the Griffith Park. What do you think of the plan?
INITIAL STUDY& MITIGATED NEGATIVE DECLARATION
Guests:
Joe Salices, Superintendent of Griffith Park
Zachary Rynew, founder of cyclist blog, CiclaValley, who has been following the plan
Oscar-nominated documentarian on follow-up to controversial ‘Act of Killing’
Few documentaries in recent years have inspired as much debate as Joshua Oppenheimer’s “The Act of Killing.”
The then 38-year-old first-time director trained his gaze on a subject few people knew about: the Indonesian massacres of 1965-66, a political purge that claimed the lives of more than 500,000 communists, suspected communists and their supporters.
In that film, Oppenheimer decided to tell the stories of the killings from the perspective of a gang of perpetrators and, more controversially, re-staged the murders in fantastical yet disturbing details.
Oppenheimer has been at work making a second documentary on the same topic. The result is “The Look of Silence.” It’s been described as a companion piece to the earlier work, and this time around, the incident is told from the victim’s point of view, in particular an optometrist named Adi in Indonesia, whose brother was killed during the period of political upheaval.
Guest:
Joshua Oppenheimer, director behind the new documentary, “The Look of Silence” -- a companion piece to the Oscar-nominated “The Act of Killing,” which came out in 2012. “The Look of Silence” opens this weekend at the Nuart Theatre in West Los Angeles