The eyes of the nation turn to Simi Valley this evening as the Republican presidential candidates share the debate stage once again. Also, Chief Beck joins us for our monthly visit. Then, what do we really know about Clifford Clinton, the man who created it all and was considered one of the most powerful—and controversial—men of 1930s Los Angeles?
GOP Debate Preview: The qualities of a great debater, and analyzing Trump’s pithy punchlines
The eyes of the nation turn to Simi Valley this evening as the Republican presidential candidates share the debate stage once again, this time at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library.
The top 11 polling candidates (Trump, Bush, Walker, Carson, Cruz, Rubio, Huckabee, Paul, Kasich, Christie, and Fiorina) will be featured in the main event at 5 p.m. PT, with the other four (Santorum, Jindal, Pataki, and Graham) in their own debate that starts at 3 p.m.
Much of the focus will, of course, be on Donald Trump. The current frontrunner made his mark on the first debate, thanks in large part to his exchange with moderator Megyn Kelly.
Carly Fiorina will likely garner a lot of attention as well. She wasn’t part of the main stage in the first Republican debate, and she’s gone back and forth with Trump in the media in recent weeks after Trump made a remark about Fiorina’s looks.
What should we expect to see from the candidates tonight? Who has the most to gain and lose?
Guests:
Aaron Kall, director of the Debate Program and Debate Institute at the University of Michigan
, former speechwriter for South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford and author of the book “The Speechwriter: A Brief Education in Politics.” He wrote an article for the Washington Post yesterday entitled “How Donald Trump’s language works for him”
Bay Area mega donors spend millions on Republican presidential campaigns
The Bay Area image of Birkenstock-sporting liberals is clashing with a more modern reality: big donors born of the (mostly) tech industry are donating millions of dollars to republican presidential campaigns.
The LA Times looked into donors who gave over $500,000 to presidential campaings. There were 19. Ten of those gave to the Clinton campaign, and most of her money came from the Los Angeles area. But, nine of those donors gave to Republican presidential campaigns, and most of that money came from the Bay Area. The largest donor was Larry Ellison, co-founder of Oracle Corporation, giving $3 million to a committee supporting Marco Rubio of Florida.
Orange County, a region known to support Republican candidacies, seems to be holding back for now.
How do mega-donors influence the dialogue of political campaigns? Do candidates make their donors’ issues their issues?
Guests:
Anthony Pesce, LA Times reporter
Jessica Levinson, Professor of Law at Loyola Law School
LAPD Chief Beck: Body camera videos an 'investigative tool,' not for public consumption
The LAPD is awaiting word on whether federal money will help fund body-worn cameras for officers, after the American Civil Liberties Union asked the Department of Justice to halt funding this month because videos will largely be kept from the public.
Current allocation plans seek federal funds for about 10 percent of the camera purchases. Has Chief Charlie Beck contacted the DOJ the challenge to ACLU's position?
Plus, after a violent summer in South L.A., the homicide rate is up about seven percent in Los Angeles. How is the LAPD responding to residents' fears? And a scam alert from LAPD warns of phone calls claiming a family member is being held hostage for ransom. The calls are originating from Mexico.
We'll have more details on that and other crime and safety developments.
Interview Highlights
Let’s talk about body cameras because LAPD rolling them out, you got them in the Valley, with other areas to come. But the ACLU has asked the Feds not to give any more money toward the department’s body cameras because you’re not making the footage available immediately in officer-involved shootings. Your response to that?
Well, the ACLU is welcome to offer whatever recommendations they want to whoever they want, but I don’t agree with them, I don’t think the federal government will agree with them either. Body cameras, and I’m wearing one right now as we talk and you can see it, are an evidence-collection tool, just like detectives are, just like the coroner’s investigation is, just like many many pieces of an investigation. We don’t release investigations piecemeal. Body camera footage is available for review by the district attorney, by the city attorney, by a civil court, by a criminal court, and in cases of uses of force that rise to the appropriate level, by the civilian police commission. So there are multiple levels of review, and to merely put video into the public without further investigatory information I think is inappropriate.
Of course, the concern is that the department is going to release the video when it suits its interests, not so quick to do so when it makes the department the gatekeeper. How do you respond to that concern?
I respond to it by looking at my track record. I’ve been Chief for five years now. We’ve had in-car video for that whole time, and I haven’t released that video when it supports my position or when it is detrimental to my position or to the department. I use it as part of the investigation; it is not something I use to form public opinion. It’s an investigative tool. That is not to say that I would never release video. If the state of the city depends on it, then that would weigh heavily on my decision. But in the day-to-day incidents of policing. One of the things I like to remind folks is that when you call the Los Angeles Police Department, it’s not on your best day. It never is. We go to your house. There may have been a domestic incident. You may have been the victim of a crime. It could be any number of circumstances. None of which you want put in the public domain. At least, all of the victims I’ve ever talked to. And so we want to be very circumspect, we want to be the guardians of the public trust. When people interact with the police, I think they have a right to some privacy in that condition.
I wanted to ask you about the rollout of the body cameras and whether you’ve had glitches with them so far. I know there was the pilot run of them, but now with more officers having them, how’s it going?
So far it’s gone very well. Obviously it’s a learned, physical skill. It’s just like taking your seatbelt off, or any other thing you learn by repetition. The activation of the body camera, the deactivation of the body camera. Learning the appropriate times. Remembering to do it under stressful circumstances. All of that has to become muscle memory to the officer. So they’re working on that, and we’re working on some certain other minor things. But nothing of any import.
I was talking with an officer who was engaged in a pursuit, caught a suspect, and he forgot to turn on his camera before he took off. So he got sent for retraining. Very frustrating for him, just saying, “It’s yet another thing we got to remember when we’re looking out for our safety, trying to catch someone, make sure the camera’s on.” Are you seeing as they’re getting used to doing this very many instances where they simply forget to turn on the camera?
Well it happens. We forget a number of things; sometimes people forget to put the car in park, under stressful circumstances. They try to get out without taking their seatbelt off. They leave some of their equipment in the car. Human beings, and you know, we’re all human beings, have a lot of emotion and a lot of adrenaline running through their systems in stressful circumstances. And sometimes it can be hard to cognitively remember to do things. That’s why it has to be muscle memory, that’s why it’s so important to do it daily, to remember it, to do it in a way that’s consistent so that it becomes part of your day-to-day actions. So as we see that happen, we will see it being less and less of an issue. But it’s always going to happen because in those circumstances in where we’re the most interested in what the body camera collects, those are the most stressful circumstances.
Well and you know there are going to be times, as we said before, it’s going to glitch because technology is not foolproof. There’s going to be times officers truly forget to turn it on, not just that they’re trying to avoid being seen doing something. It’s always going to raise the suspicion that the officer or the department did something to keep it from being recorded.
Well I think that’s why it’s important to have the discussion we’re having now. To recognize that, 1) it is not the totality of the evidence. To be perfectly frank, the autopsy results, the ballistic results, the forensic results, the trace evidence results, often paint a much more concretely prosecutable or understandable picture than a body camera does because they are science where the body camera is going to capture what it captures. Like I say, it’s like the young kids watching a baseball game through a knothole; you only see what you see. And the body camera doesn’t collect everything. But it’s a great evidence collection tool, it will add to our ability to analyze incidents. I’m excited about it, I think it’s going to be something that is a game changer in policing.
Guest:
Charlie Beck, Chief, Los Angeles Police Department
Olympics 2024: It’s LA vs. 4 European cities
The battle to become the US nominee for the 2024 Olympics host city wasn’t without drama.
After Boston unexpected dropped out, Los Angeles has clinched the spot, with Mayor Eric Garcetti promising to foot $400 million to cover potential cost overruns.
Now the next phase of the competition begins, as Tuesday marks the final deadline for submissions to become 2024’s host city. The City of Angels is facing some formidable opponents: Paris, Rome, Budapest, and Hamburg. And Los Angeles is not the favorite.
How does L.A. against these other cities?
Guests:
Ed Hula, Editor in Chief, Around the Rings, a publication based in Atlanta, Georgia devoted to covering the Olympics
, Paris Bureau Chief for the New York Times
Joerg Luyken, reporter with The Local Germany based in Berlin
LA leaders challenge changes at 'LA Times'
Adding a long list of Angelenos disappointed with the firing of LA Times publisher Austin Beutner last week, the LA County Board of Supervisors passed a symbolic resolution yesterday opposing his dismissal.
Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas said, "We're not trying to run the business of the newspaper. We're essentially standing up for our town." Beutner was replaced by Baltimore Sun publisher Tim Ryan. The board joins a group of influential business and civic leaders who last week signed an open letter to Tribune CEO Jack Griffin, owner of the Times, expressing disappointment over Beutner's dismissal.
Does the provenance of a paper's publisher matter? Does the Tribune have an obligation to consider purchasing bids to buy the Times from heavyweight Angelenos?
An open letter to Mr. Jack Griffin and the Tribune Company Board of Directors
Guests:
Ken Doctor, media analyst for newsonomics.com and the author of “Newsonomics: Twelve New Trends That Will Shape the News You Get”
Rick Edmonds, Researcher and writer for Poynter Institute on business and journalism issues. Co author, State of the News Media 2006
Clifford Clinton’s grandson remembers Clifton’s crusader
There’s great buzz right now around the reopening of Clifton's Cafeteria in downtown LA, but what do we really know about Clifford Clinton, the man who created it all and was considered one of the most powerful—and controversial—men of 1930s Los Angeles?
He looked like a chemistry professor and talked like a man of God. He made certain his establishments followed the Golden Rule. He offered a "Pay What You Wish" policy and believed the profits he earned from the restaurants could help feed the needy. For them, he created the Penny Cafeteria, a downstairs meal room where the hungry could buy meals for pennies.
He opened the first Clifton's Cafeteria in 1931 at 618 S. Olive St. with $2000 in his pocket and 2,500 recipe cards. Soon, he had created a franchise catering to weary souls during the Depression, a haven for the rest of the city and a place to speak one's mind.
He also made enemies—most notably the chief of police, the district attorney and the mayor. When he saw corruption, he went after it. Plus, his vision for what he hoped Los Angeles would become could very well read like a treatise about Los Angeles in 2015.
Guest:
Edmond Clinton III, eldest grandson of Clifton’s founder, Clifford Clinton, and author of "Clifton's and Clifford Clinton: A Cafeteria and a Crusader" (Angel City Press, 2015); he grew up working at Clifton’s Cafeteria as a teenager and has been an internist on staff at Huntington Memorial Hospital since 1978