A look at the GOP caucuses, there may be another issue at play in the Apple encryption case, is the #OscarSoWhite campaign really making an impact?
Nevada Republicans hope for a caucus less raucous than 2012
In Nevada Saturday, Democrat presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton scored a narrow victory over Senator Bernie Sanders. Today, Republicans have their say.
Marco Rubio campaigned in the north of the Silver State ahead of caucuses. Ted Cruz has made several stops around Las Vegas. Both candidates trail Donald Trump, however, who is favored to win the state.
Take Two spoke to reporter and producer, Joe Schoenmann, at Nevada public radio station KNPR about the political landscape in the state.
Press the blue play button above to hear the interview.
California sees rise in Independent voters. What's the GOP to do?
The Republican party in California is shrinking. Quickly.
New data released by Secretary of State Alex Padilla on Monday reveals the GOP has declined by about 400,000 registered voters over the last four years, as the number of voters registered as Independent is on the rise.
L.A. Times Sacramento Bureau Chief
and GOP strategist
joined host Alex Cohen to talk about what's behind the decline, and what it could mean for California's political future.
To listen to the full interview, click on the blue audio player above.
Custody battle over triplets raises questions about CA surrogacy law
That's the question at the heart of a legal situation brewing in California that raises enormous and complex questions about parenthood, surrogacy and the fertility industry.
It's a custody battle involving a 47-year-old California resident named Melissa Cook and a 50-year-old man living in Georgia.
The man, known as "C.M." in court papers, is single and wanted to become a dad. So, through an agency, he enlisted the help of Cook to be a surrogate mother.
She became pregnant with implanted embryos created using C.M.'s sperm and eggs from another female donor.
Cook wound up with triplets, but C.M. didn't feel ready to raise three newborn babies on his own and had concerns about the likelihood of birth defects.
When he asked Cook to terminate one of the fetuses, she refused and initially asked to raise one of the babies herself. C.M. said no.
Now Cook is challenging California's surrogacy law and fighting for custody of the children, who are due in March.
Slate columnist Michelle Goldberg explains the details of the case and the thorny legal and ethical questions it raises.
To hear the full interview, click the link above.
Tuesday Reviewsday: The Record Company, BJ the Chicago Kid and Lucinda Williams
Every week we get the latest music that you should be listening to. This week Alex Cohen talks to music journalists
and
.
Nic started us off with a selection from the L.A. area band, The Record Company.
He says the Record Company contacted him via email years ago, then he played them on a syndicated show he hosted at the time and "we kept in touch."
The blues has been reworked and doing quite nicely these last ten years with bands like the white Stripes, The Black Keys and Alabama Shakes, this is another spin on the genre as the Record Company blends raw bass and lap steel driven music
Chris brought in
, who's done songs with Mary J. Blige, Kanye West, and Stevie Wonder. His parents were choir directors and his first gig was with Grammy-winning Christian duo Mary Mary.
In My Mind is his new album, and Chris' favorite song is this one, Turning Me Up
Nic also brought us selections from Fantastic Negrito, whose new album is called, The Last Days of Oakland.
And Lucinda Williams.
And Chris also talked about the group, Amthst.
Could the Apple encryption case also be about free speech?
In the Apple encryption case, much of the debate so far has centered on the tension between the right to privacy and the government's attempt to access vital information when it comes to crime or terrorism.
FBI Director James Comey has said unlocking the phone from San Bernardino shooter Syad Farook could provide important information to the investigation. Apple Chief Tim Cook counters that it's an unprecedented move that threatens the security of its users.
But there may be another issue at play: the first amendment and speech.
"The question really is going to be: when Apple speaks to its robots, one of its machines, is that a form of expression that constitutes a substantive value or statement of belief?" said Andrew Woods, law professor at the University of Kentucky.
The idea that code is a form of protected speech has already been established in a landmark 1996 case, called Bernstein vs. Department of Justice, said Woods. But the current Apple case is breaking new ground and pushing the question of what a person or company should be compelled to do or say in an increasingly digital world.
"That's novel terrain for the court," said Woods.
Some pot advocates not on board with legalized pot initiative
Recreational pot might be legalized when Californians head to the polls this November.
A proposed ballot initiative called the Control, Regulate and Tax Adult Use of Marijuana Act would legalize and highly regulate recreational marijuana in the state.
It has the backing of many people and organizations like Lieutenant Governor Gavin Newsom, Napster co-founder Sean Parker, the California Medical Association and the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML)
But it has yet to win over everyone, including the head of the state chapter of NORML.
Phil Willon, political reporter for the L.A. Times, tells Take Two that negotiations were long to get people behind this particular initiative and not similar ones.
#HollywoodSoWhite: From the perspective of actors
Hollywood does a really lousy job reflecting the population of the United States, this has been the complaint for a long time.
However, this week there is new data to support that claim. A new study from USC's Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism looked at more than 400 films, T.V. and digital episodes released during a recent year-long span.
Of all that content, fewer than 29% of speaking roles came from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups. This is in spite of the fact that such groups now make up nearly 38% of our off-screen population.
Also, let's face it, many of the roles non-white actors get cast in aren't that big or that great.
So, what is it like to be an actor in this climate? We asked Roxana Ortega, who has appeared on shows like NCIS, The League, HBO's Togetherness and
, who can currently be seen on Amazon's most-watched new series, The Man in the High Castle and on Netflix's Hemlock Grove.
Joel told me about advice he got early on in his career:
"I met a producer...and the producer said, 'Hey listen, you can be a really big star, you're a leading man. But you need to go to the Philippines and you need to change your name from Joel De La Fuente to Joel Fontaine...I thought it was really funny because you know, here my name is so unique...Here's a guy who's of Filipino heritage but we're going to bring him back to the Philippines, where I will only be seen as American and then give him a name that is neither American nor Filipino."
Roxana on one-dimensional roles:
"The irony is not lost on me. In Hollywood, as I'm driving on La Brea, La Cienega in Los Angeles, I better be auditioning for Mayor. Why am I going to audition for maid number 4? ...Unfortunately Hollywood is about what's tried and true wha't snot going to fail..the way it shows up for roles, you can be the cop, you can be the over-sexualized Latina...you have to talk a certain way to get that across because these become certain colors in a very limited box of crayons that Hollywood is coloring with."
Joel on a need for more complex color characters:
"The problem is, is that it's systemic...how many people who make the really big decisions or who are telling the actual stories have the kind of perspective and the kind of power where they can slowly start to bring in all different kinds of people...this is part of the reason why it's so complicated...you think, well look how many maids have I been in on and that can be an issue, BUT when Jennifer Aniston plays a maid it's a really well---it's not the fact that it's a maid it's the fact that our color is being assigned to that role and that's it...there's no other thought...that's the whole character."
To hear the full interview, press the blue play button above.
'SKIN' exhibition tackles race through art
It can be tough to have a conversation about race. Oftentimes, it's controversial and in your face.
But one way to explore how we feel about race in a more thoughtful way might be through art.
The Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery has debuted a new exhibition SKIN now on display through April 17th.
One piece by artist April Bey is different shades of brown smeared in vertical stripes against the canvas, inviting you to put your own hand against it to see where it fits on the spectrum. But the captions above and below change from words like "articulate" to "abrasive" as the shades get darker.
"You do look for where you fit in," says SKIN curator Isabelle Lutterodt of the work, one of the many that are intentionally interactable. "Oftentimes where we fit in is based on who we are, what we look like."
The idea for the exhibition came about in conversations with her staff, and how to be a part of the national conversation on race and politics.
"When talking about race and identity, it's too easy to do a drive-by," she says. "We wanted moments of deep reflection."
Artist Ken Gonzales-Day contributed his own piece, "41 Objects Arranged by Color," as a way to explore how skin tone has been portrayed in sculpture through history.
The work, stretched across a massive canvass nearly the size of a billboard, organizes various busts and figures on a spectrum based on skin tone.
"Part of it was thinking about the changing way that skin signifies racial difference in Western European sculptural traditions," he says. "Even in the spectrum of figures that are black, they're painted black in a way that's not like human skin."
Meanwhile artist Audrey Chan tackles the idea of history in her own piece, "Center of the Universe, Ahma (detail)."
The face of a woman, Chan's grandmother, reappears throughout the painting against images of family, hope and violence.
"Something I really thought about were the depictions of the American dream, and how they're often idealistic and many smiling faces all aiming for a single, prosperous American life," she says. "I wanted to deal with the fact that my grandmother fled a very complicated, politically violent social context."
Curator Lutterodt says she hopes that this collection of art can spark thoughtful and challenging conversations.
"How do we talk about race, it being a very delicate subject for a lot of people?" she says. "What is wonderful about visual arts and the arts in general is that you have this moment of, 'We can talk about this [art] and I'm not talking about you."
SKIN is on exhibit at the LA Municipal Art Gallery through April 17, 2016. The gallery is located at Barnsdall Art Park at 4800 Hollywood Blvd, Los Angeles.