Will President Obama be able to make changes to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms? Then, what's the marketing connection between real and virtual firearms?; LAPD holds a gun buyback program today; Sheriff Lee Baca is under pressure to curb inmate abuse; Patt Morrison and Brian Lehrer debate which is better during the holidays, NY or LA? Plus much more.
Can Obama fix the beleaguered Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms?
Part of President Obama's plan to get tough on gun control involves the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, or ATF. The agency hasn't had a permanent director in six years, and now the president is urging Congress to change that.
For more on the beleaguered federal agency, we're joined by John Hudak, governance studies fellow at the Brookings Institution.
The marketing link between real and virtual firearms
Last week, the NRA, in part, blamed video games for an upsurge in gun violence. But in terms of business, a report in the New York Times points out how video game and gun manufacturers are closer bed fellows than you might think.
Joining us is Andrew Martin, who writes about this for the New York Times.
LAPD's holds gun buyback program today
It's been nearly two weeks since the shooting in Newtown, Conn., and while December gun sales are at record highs across the U.S., the LAPD is urging people to turn their firearms in.
They've moved up their annual gun buyback event from its usual spring date to today, in response to the Newtown tragedy.
KPCC's Erica Aguilar is at the buyback site, where they started taking guns about 20 minutes ago.
Sheriff Lee Baca under pressure to curb inmate abuse
Sheriff Lee Baca is under intense pressure to stop what an independent citizen's panel called "A persistent pattern of unreasonable force," against jail inmates. The FBI is reportedly examining dozens of allegations of abuse by sheriff's deputies, and the federal government could seek a consent decree mandating reforms if Baca fails to reduce violence inside his lockups.
KPCC's Frank Stoltze reports.
The scene repeated itself throughout the year: whenever the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisorsdiscussed the jails, someone showed up to tell a story of alleged abuse.
The week before Christmas, it was Eva Flores, whose 26-year-old son is awaiting trial at the county’s most problematic lockup: Men’s Central Jail in downtown L.A.
“Without any cause, he was pepper sprayed on his face,” the Maywood resident told the board through a translator. “He got several broken bones in his back and a broken nose. These happened while he was handcuffed.”
It was impossible to immediately confirm the account.
Over the years, however, the county’s five elected supervisors — who control the sheriff’s budget but not his operations — have expressed frustration as they’ve sought to persuade Sheriff Lee Baca to implement reforms.
“It’s hard for us on this side of the table to really know what goes on within our jails,” Supervisor Gloria Molina said. “Use of force by far is one of the most difficult issues.”
The issue came to a head a year ago after the American Civil Liberties Unionpresented dozens of declarations not just from inmates, but also chaplains and jail teachers who said they'd witnessed abuse. The Los Angeles Times published a series of articles that included former sheriff’s officials describing excessive use of force.
In response, the board created a citizen’s panel that included four former federal judges. In September, they made more than 60 recommendations for reform. The panel’s general counsel, Richard Drooyan, is now leading the push to implement them. One change demands that deputies avoid using force against inmates, even if the inmate is challenging the deputy.
“Was there an opportunity to de-escalate?" Drooyan said. "If so, did that deputy take the opportunity to de-escalate? If not, why not?”
The sheriff has implemented two reform recommendations and begun to work on 44 others, Drooyan said. But he also accused Baca of dragging his feet on some. He noted the sheriff has given himself until November 1, 2013, to hold his managers more accountable.
“I think that’s too long,” Drooyan said.
The independently-elected sheriff is not obligated to follow the recommendations, but has said he will. He told the board his self-imposed deadlines are reasonable.
“I think we can beat some of those projections. That’s our desire,” Baca said. “But you don’t want to rush to implementation.”
The sheriff said changes in jail management and policies already have produced a 45 percent drop in the use of force at the jails — an improvement that Drooyan worries is only temporary.
The sheriff has said he’ll need more than$30 million to implement all of the reforms, including hiring a new assistant sheriff from outside the department to run the jails. The county also plans to create an inspector general position to monitor a sprawling system that holds nearly 20,000 inmates.
Amid the intense scrutiny, Baca has remained adamant that allegations of abuse are exaggerated.
“I invite everyone from the public to come into the jails and see for themselves,” the sheriff said. “I have 7,000 inmates who are in classrooms now.”
Baca, who’s been sheriff for 14 years, said he’s always wanted to change the jail culture to what he calls education-based incarceration. That may be true, but the way he’s operated his jails to date prompted the federal government to launch an investigation a year ago. It’s a difficult time for Baca.
“Unquestionably, this is a key moment for Sheriff Baca and his team,” Loyola Law School Professor Laurie Levenson said. “They have the opportunity to put in practice reforms and stave off the federal government filing a lawsuit.”
The federal government refuses to comment on its inquiry, but Levenson said it likely has two tracks: A grand jury is probably looking at whether individual deputies should be charged with excessive use of force and, separately, the Justice Department’s civil rights division is likely considering whether to file a pattern-and-practice lawsuit.
“They have to look and see if this is just a few bad eggs…or if it's more widespread,” Levenson said.
It was only after the federal government filed a pattern-and-practice lawsuit against the LAPD more than a decade ago that the department changed its ways.
One key question for Baca in 2013: what’s the role of Paul Tanaka?
The citizen’s commission described the powerful undersheriff as having "specifically derailed efforts to address excessive force” at Men’s Central Jail when he vetoed a job rotation plan in 2006. The county’s longtime jail watchdog, Special Counsel Merrick Bobb, said Baca relies heavily on Tanaka.
“Paul Tanaka’s always been very important in terms of the budgetary process. He will continue to do that,” Bobb said. “But the other assignments and responsibilities that he has had, only time will tell what happens next year.”
Baca has said his top commanders report directly to him now, not Tanaka, but he’s been vague about the undersheriff’s current authorities.
At the board of supervisors, Daisy Cruz joined Eva Flores – her mother – in expressing concern about her brother, who remains locked up.
“I’m very worried about my brother and about his safety in there,” Cruz said. "I think no one has a right to be treated this way. Everyone needs respect and dignity.”
Cruz is part of a new group called The Coalition to End Sheriff Violence in L.A. Jails. Members are calling on the county to create a civilian review board that has subpoena power over a sheriff they don’t trust. The Board of Supervisors so far has rejected that idea, and intends to rely instead on a new inspector general to watch over the nation’s largest jail system.
Baca is up for re-election in 2014, but he must decide whether he'll seek a fourth term before the end of next year.
The architect and the opera singer: a tale of two drug mules
One offense that could easily land you in prison: drug smuggling. Prosecutions for the offense can vary between state and federal court.
Fronteras Desk reporter Erin Siegal looks at what happens when accused smugglers say they were forced to work as drug mules.
Meet Arizona's new democratic congresswoman Kyrsten Sinema
President Obama and members of the lame duck congress will return to Washington tomorrow to negotiate a deal to avert the fiscal cliff. Only half of Americans think a deal will be struck before the end of the year, according to a Gallup poll out today.
In January, a very different type of Congresswoman will arrive in Washington.
Arizona Democrat Kyrsten Sinema is a social worker who rose quickly through the state legislature, and she also grew up homeless for a time.
From the Fronteras Desk in Phoenix, Peter O'Dowd has this profile.
LA Clippers win 14-straight games to earn best record in NBA
The Clippers won their 14th straight game last night, and forget about just L.A., they have the best record in the NBA.
While the Lakers have been scrambling to stay afloat, the Clippers have been making it look easy and could for the first time not be an automatic joke for LA sports fans.
Kevin Arnovitz, NBA writer and host of the Clippers Podcast at ESPNLA.com, joins the show with more.
Tuba players get their annual chance to shine
If you don't play tuba or know a tuba player, you may not know that in the month of December, California hosts nine "Tuba Christmas" events. The Tuba Christmas at Disney is the biggest, but the one in LA is the oldest. That's the one Susan Valot took in for the California Report.
You can’t miss Linda McLaurin. She’s wearing an elf hat, complete with pointy ears. The former tuba player just picked up the instrument again about six months ago. And on a recent Sunday in Los Angeles, she took part in her first concert: Tuba Christmas Los Angeles.
“Even if I mess up, you’re not going to hear it. If I’m out of tune, you’re not going to hear it,” McLaurin said as she sat on an auditorium stage amid tubas warming up. “It’s a really good way to get back in on ensemble playing somehow, but realizing, ‘You know, if I make a mistake, it’s not bad because I’m not going to be the only one.’ But people are here to have fun, and that’s what I’m out to do is have fun.”
McLaurin said she likes the fact that Tuba Christmas puts tubas in the spotlight.
“A lot of people think it’s not very popular and this and that, but when you come in here and see the camaraderie of a lot of people and everybody hunking away on their super-low instruments, it’s just no real way to describe it,” McLaurin said. “A lot of people don’t even realize what you can get out of a tuba because I think they’re so programmed to thinking you just play Souza marches and play the ups and downs like a string bass or something, not realizing the potential of it.”
Famous tuba player Harvey Phillips started Tuba Christmas with the first concert at Rockefeller Center in New York City in 1974. There are now more than 200 Tuba Christmas concerts nationwide, including nine in California.
Tuba Christmas L.A. is the oldest in California. It started two years after the original Tuba Christmas.
“Part of the core reason that Harvey Phillips started Tuba Christmas is because he realized that the tuba is not that popular, that the tuba player in the orchestra typically sits there for measures of rest and measures of rest and finally gets a note,” said Tuba Christmas L.A. leader Scott Wilkinson with a laugh. “And that’s what Tuba Christmas is about – to liberate the soul of the tuba at this time of year.”
Wilkinson said tubas create a mellow, “glorious” sound that teams well with Christmas songs.
“It’s unlike any other instrument,” Wilkinson said. “For example, I can’t imagine ‘Oboe Christmas’ or ‘Flute Christmas.’ It just wouldn’t be the same. There’s a mellowness and a majesty to the tuba.”
More than 100 tubas of all shapes and sizes filled the stage -- some draped with glittery garland and even one wrapped up like a present.
They launch into one familiar Christmas tune after another, playing each one twice. The first time is only tubas. The second time, a singer leads the crowd in a sing-along with the tubas.
Bob Beecher sits in the front row, wearing a Christmas tree hat, green scarf and red shirt.
“It’s just fun to get together and play,” Beecher said. “And the fact that it’s a free concert for everybody to come in. The audience gets to sing along. It’s just a great, joyous kind of concert to play.”
Beecher has played more than a half dozen Tuba Christmases over the years.
“When we’re all together, it’s kind of a thunderous, wonderful sound,” he said. “If we get off, it’s something else. It sounds like stampeding elephants almost.”
Jeff Hutchins and his 80-year-old dad have been coming to Tuba Christmas L.A. every year since it started, after Jeff came home with a flyer from school about the concert.
“When I first started, I was … eight, nine years old, and I was just overwhelmed by the sound when we were practicing of all these huge tubas around me, and I said, ‘This is amazing. I’ve never heard anything like this,’” Hutchins said. “So here we are.”
Last year, Jeff Hutchins started bringing his son, who’s now 10-years-old. The three generations play together.
“It’s always fun every year,” the younger Dylan Hutchins said. “I love playing my tuba.”
Stephen Klein leads the Tuba Hanukkah portion of the show each year. It’s something that’s been included since Tuba Christmas L.A. began.
“There are people who’ve been coming to this for many, many years – generations of families who come to this to listen,” Klein said. “You know, it’s become part of L.A. tradition.”
Eureka, Fresno, Riverside, Sacramento, San Pedro (L.A.), Santa Barbara and Ventura all hosted Tuba Christmases earlier this month.
Anaheim will host the largest in the state December 22 and expected to attract about 500 tuba players to Downtown Disney for an outdoor concert.
Tuba Christmas L.A. is the only one of the Tuba Christmases nationwide to have top professional players join in. Many have links to Hollywood.
“It was really surprising,” said Mary Batenhorst, whose husband persuaded her to come watch the show with some friends. “I just thought, ‘Oh my gosh! They really sound like an orchestra.’ I couldn’t get over that!”
Wilkinson says this year’s show was bittersweet, given this month’s deadly school shooting in Connecticut.
“I’ve gotten a number of emails from people who’ve said, ‘I’m so glad you’re doing this. I’m going to come because I need to feel something positive, some hope, some happiness in the face of this horrible thing that happened,’” Wilkinson said. “What I hope people come away with from Tuba Christmas this year is a sense of hope.”
Wilkinson mentioned the shooting during the concert, talking about the healing power of music.
Tuba Christmas volunteer Cheryl McMillan -- who’s playing in her 34th Tuba Christmas L.A. -- says with that hope comes friendships and traditions that are renewed every year.
“Even though we don’t have anything else, we have this in common. And it’s just an amazing thing to feel like you’re part of something big,” McMillan said.
“And we get to see Santa Claus every year, too. Santa does play the tuba! Nobody knew!” McMillan laughs.
'Do The Movies Have A Future' in an increasingly digital world?
It was a record breaking weekend at the box office over the Thanksgiving holiday thanks to blockbuster films like "Twilight: Breaking Dawn - Part 2" and the latest James Bond movie "Skyfall." In total, box offices throughout the U.S. brought in more than $290 million.
The big Hollywood studios may be faring well financially now, but what about five or 10 years from now?
New Yorker film critic David Denby is worried about the blockbuster films being made today and the effect they're having on American cinema. His new book is called "Do The Movies Have A Future?"
Interview Highlights:
What do you think is the biggest problem with the movie industry today?
“The companies are totally interested in revenue flow, they have lost any sense of the cultural value of movies, of the kind of unspoken contract they might have with America, to produce some sense of its life, of its streets, of its soul, of its social existence. And so first of all, we are getting all these enormous movies based on comic book material and games and young adult novels that are all digital spectacle, they are not set anywhere in particular, there are a lot of pixels contending in a dead digital space. Those movies cost anywhere from $150 to 250 million and if they fail they threaten to bring the company down… the system is not accommodating its best talents.”
You said the companies have broken their contract with the nation, what do you mean by that?
“Movies were always our national theatre, they always were a central part of our national culture. They no longer are. They have become so bent out of shape that they have become a very minor part of our culture. There are other things going on like the Internet and cable television but there is no reason that there can’t be more movies like the “Social Network” and “Lincoln” that deal with life that matters to us, that has some significance. It has become a very minor form of entertainment; it’s mainly for kids. They have given up on the older audience for about nine months of the year. There is a marvelous season that starts on October 1st where our IQ goes up by 40 points and ends on December 26 and the rest of the time the adults are treated like down trodden workers.”
If this is what makes them the most money, can you blame them?
“Yes, they are tying their survival to the birth rate, not to the entire population. They don’t have to make 250 million dollar movies that threaten to throw the administration down every time, there are two ways out of this box. They can make smaller winners, you know 15 million dollars and grow to 60 and make a whole slate of them every year. Or they can bring down initial costs, instead of letting agents rule the roost in this insane system and get 12 or 14 million dollars for their star clients, they can do what Soderbergh has done with George Clooney a couple time, pay up front a million dollars up front and at the back end as all the revenue comes in, you divide everything by fixed percentages. It would take longer to pay off and the agents wouldn’t like but they would get their cut too at the back end, but it would bring down initial costs by 30 to 40 percent. Soderbergh has done this but unfortunately he hasn’t had a hit so others haven’t seen the logic of this system.”
How does the fact that two-thirds of the audience comes from over seas exacerbate the problem?
“These movies are not for us anymore, they are as much for Mumbai as for Maine, two-thirds comes from over seas so that has led to the movies being defoliated of nuance and local color, of certain kinds of sophisticated dialogue, there is a lot of facetiousness and self mockery but that is about it. In the seventies in the golden age, movies were set in a particular time and place…these were commercial movies that made to make a profit, that was the way they can conceive that audience. There is as much talent as ever, if not more, it’s the business structure that is not rational.”
One section of your book deals with the genre mumblecore, what role do you see this genre playing in this economic climate?
“It means micro budget film making… it may be shot in Seattle or Portland or Chicago…it creates a kind of awkwardness, but it has its truth, but how much though do you want to watch that? Generally we want firmer action and characters than that. Out of this semi improvised quickly made movies we will eventually get something that’s startling. What startled me the most out of more traditional independent films was “Beast of the Southern Wild,” which is a shoo-in for an Oscar nomination. That was very carefully prepared, it only cost a million dollars but it was very carefully prepared, shot in the bayou of south west of New Orleans and it had a script that went through elaborate development. The problem with mumblecore is they don’t trust writing enough, they think that directing and acting can do everything. The John Cassavetes films from forty years ago is the model, you just have to have a general idea of where a scene is going to go and let the actors find their way. It is very low intensity that is at the moment is not going to draw a theatrical audience. It’s a home media… but the revolution will come sooner or later.”
Which of the most recent movies give you the most hope for the future of movies?
“Steven Spielberg after years of trying got to make his dream project, “Lincoln” with Daniel Day Lewis. It turned out marvelously well. There are great actors and it is a great triumph and I think it is a shoo-in for the Oscar at this point.”
NY vs. LA: Where do you want to be for the holidays?
New York has the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree, and L.A. has the Rose Parade. New York has snowstorms, and L.A. has bad traffic on just about every freeway in the city.
The holidays can be a drag for everyone, no matter what coast you're on.
KPCC's Patt Morrison spoke with WNYC's Brian Lehrer about where they'd prefer to spend their holiday season.
How you can avoid customer service hell after the holidays
Now the glow of Christmas has begun to wear off, the crumpled wrapping paper has collected in the corner, the egg nog's not sitting so well, and it's time to deal with those inevitable holiday returns.
You know what that means: customer service hell.
For advice on how to endure this we turned to comedian Ed Salazar. Like a lot of comedians, he's had his share of unenviable day jobs. Some that have required him to be the voice on the other end of those frustrating phone calls.
He's figured out how to game the system to get what you want without losing your mind. He stopped by our studio recently to give us his rules of customer service.
'The House I Live In' doc turns critical lens on decades-long war on drugs
Documentary filmmaker Eugene Jarecki has become something of a war reporter.
His acclaimed film, "Why We Fight," examined the origins and consequences of the so-called military industrial complex. His new film, "The House I Live In," turns a lens on a different sort of war, America's war on drugs.
In a sprawling narrative that weaves together history and personal stories, Jarecki brings us a penetrating look at the decades-long battle against drugs.