Today, we'll begin with a look at the war on poverty, 50 years later. Then, who might succeed Lee Baca as LA County Sheriff? We'll also look at his legacy when it comes to immigration. Plus, Slate's Emily Yoffe joins us to offer some advice on dealing with workplace pet peeves, an Airbnb house in Glendale is shut down due to raucous parties, the author of "Trickster's Hat" unleashes our creative mind's potential, and much more.
50 years later, the war on poverty is far from over
50 years ago today, then-President Lyndon B. Johnson announced the war on poverty. This "war" was meant to help the nearly 1 in 5 Americans who were poor.
Half a century later, after the country's great recession, the number of people living below the line hasn't gone down by much. That reality is also reflected here, where Californians tend to struggle more than the rest of the country.
For more we're joined by Ann Huff Stevens, director of the Center for Poverty Research at UC-Davis.
Who might succeed Lee Baca as the next LA County Sheriff?
On of the heels of LA County Sheriff Lee Baca's announcement that he'll be stepping down before his term is up, we look today at the candidates hoping to fill his shoes.
KPCC's political reporter Frank Stoltze and Raphe Sonenschein, the executive director of the Patt Brown Institute at Cal State LA, join the show to discuss the possible candidates.
Why are there so few women in law enforcement?
When LA County Sheriff Lee Baca announced his retirement yesterday, he suggested two Assistant Sheriffs he thought would make good replacements for him.
One is a woman, Assistant Sheriff Terri McDonald, unusual because there are very few female leaders in law enforcement. In fact, out of 3,081 sheriffs in the U.S., only 40 are women. That's about .01 percent.
For more on why there aren't more women in law enforcement leadership, we're joined now by Chief Penny Harrington, who was the first female chief of the Portland Police Bureau, and the first female to head a major police department in the United States.
California school districts vary on definition of 'willful defiance'
Students throughout California are heading back to school this week, and depending on where they live, they run the risk of suspension for things like doodling, or falling asleep in class.
Some schools deem such behavior as "willful defiance," whereas other schools only consider things like hitting other students as willful defiance. A new report from EdSource finds a wide disparity in how often "willful defiance" is used to suspend students.
For more on this, we spoke with EdSource reporter Susan Frey who began by explaining how schools define the term.
Sports Roundup: Dennis Rodman, Sochi Games, and more
Worming a way into North Korea, voting for admission into the Hall of suspicion and the story of the greatest deal ever made. That means it's time for sports with Andy and Brian Kamenetzky, they've covered the sports world for ESPN and the L.A Times.
Dennis Rodman is making his 4th trip to North Korea, this time he brought some former NBA players to play a basketball game as birthday gift of sorts to president Kim Jun Un. The trip got real when Rodman was interviewed by CNN's Chris Cuomo who asked him about American Kenneth Bae who is being held captive there. Rodman can make himself an easy target, but should he be?
For whatever reason, determining who gets into the Baseball Hall of Fame is often the focus of heated debate.
The Winter Olympics is Sochi is right around the corner and if you haven't noticed theses aren't your grandparents Winter Games as events have gone past figure skating and hockey and into more X-Games style events, such as slopestyle, much to the chagrin of Bob Costas.
Whenever I've asked football players what sport they would like their kids to play most of them say golf, and Tiger Woods bank account is making a good case for that.
The Lakers continue to lose games as they are now way closer to last place than they are to a playoff spot. Many fans are advocating "tanking."
The American Basketball Association was folded into the NBA way back in 1976. The league brought names like Julius Irving Dr. J with it and was immortalized in the Will Ferrell film "Semi-Pro", but the NBA continues to pay through the nose for the memory of the ABA.
Etiquette Lesson: How to deal with workplace pet peeves
The holidays are now over, and it's finally back to the grind for most of us. Time to reunite with your coworkers, a few of whom may have some pretty obnoxious habits.
There's the guy who constantly microwaves fish and broccoli and stinks up the whole office, or the woman who takes personal calls very loudly in her cubicle.
RELATED: What's your biggest workplace pet peeve?
No matter what your office pet peeve is, there is a right and wrong way to go about dealing with it in the workplace. To get some advice on how to handle these minor annoyances gracefully, we brought in Emily Yoffe, best known for her Dear Prudence advice column Slate.com.
Interview Highlights:
How do you deal with smells in the workplace without offending somebody:
"Smells are a big office issue from food to body odor to bathrooms. I think with foods, look, it's an office not a restaurant. Eat a salad. Eat a sandwich. I got a letter once from a woman who said her coworker comes in in the morning and heats up a can of tuna fish for breakfast and the rest of the day the office smells like a cat food factory. You don't have to have hot food, if it's hot try not to make it very odiferous. Go out. Go out for lunch if you want that hot dog with hot sauerkraut on it. But especially when you're heating it up in an office microwave and the whole office is going to smell your lunch, just think twice."
How to deal with coworkers' clothing choices:
"This is why HR is helpful. If people are coming to work as if they're going off surfboarding later in the day, then HR needs to put out a, 'Hey, everyone should know we expect this kind of footwear, we expect this amount of coverage.' I often turn to George Washington for this kind of rules. He has a rule that deals exactly with this. 'Put not off your clothes in the presence of others nor go out your chamber half dressed.' So George was right. If you're going to work, get fully dressed. That means probably covering your feet, wearing a bra, the basics."
How to deal with a coworkers annoying personal hygiene habits:
"I actually got a letter from a woman saying in the next cubicle, the guy next to her would clip his toenails and she could hear them pinging, well flying. She made him sound like he was actually a werewolf and this went on every day. Some of these things, you just have to accept, everyone is annoying. That includes you. Obviously, people can't be doing manicures every day. For the nail clipping, there are ten of them, it's got to be over pretty quickly. Just take a walk when your cubicle mate is doing this."
How to deal with people who have loud personal phone calls in the office:
"The loud cubicle mates, the loud chewers, the loud hummers, the people who listen to music without earphones? I don't even know how you get your work done. Again, that's one of those that you actually have to address because studies have shown if your concentration is continuously disruptive, it's not just that moment that's disruptive, it's very hard to get back to where you were. This is making you unproductive. Again, nicely, assume the person is not doing it to annoy you. Say, 'You probably aren't aware, but when you start talking, particularly, to your daughter or your husband, your volume goes up. Could you keep it quiet or maybe if you're taking those personal calls, take them outside because I can hear everything. I'm sure you don't want me to.'"
On what office habits annoys her the most:
"Well, I actually am a recluse who works at home and I talk to my dog all day. I mean, I'm bizarre in my sweat clothes. When I come in to Slate, I mean you talk about sounds, when I come into work at Slate I sit at one of these open desk. Everyone is hunched over. If I sneeze it's like an explosion has gone off in this room. Maybe I have a weird reaction. I'm coming to the office for a little bit of socializing so I think I'm the pest and they're feeling like, "For God's sake, this woman only talks to her dog all day. Shut up." So what I find annoying is my colleagues won't talk to me when I show up."
Election year may complicate move for Immigration reform
2013 came and went without any significant reform. Many advocates are hoping things will be different this year, and now they're adopting a new strategy: Wait until spring.
It's a tactic Seung Min Kim wrote about for Politico.
A look at LA Sheriff Lee Baca's legacy on immigration
Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca has had a complicated relationship with immigrants in his jurisdiction. Although he is the son of an immigrant born in the Mexican state of Michoacan, he's been a controversial figure among immigrant advocates.
RELATED: LA County Sheriff Baca's legacy on immigration
KPCC immigration reporter Leslie Berestein-Rojas joins the show with more.
The tech gadgets of yesteryear that didn't quite catch on
Since 1967, the latest and greatest in technological innovations have debuted at the Consumer Electronics Show. The CD player, Xbox and Blu-Ray discs were all shown at shows in the past. So were lesser known items, like the velcro-mounted television, which didn't quite catch on.
Megan Garber of The Atlantic is covering the Consumer Electronics Show this year, but she wrote about the CES products of yesteryear.
Do Hive's plasma lights herald brighter days for a greener Hollywood?
Petroleum refining pollutes Southern California more than any other industry, that's probably no surprise. Number two on the list out of UCLA is film and TV production. KPCC's Molly Peterson says there's a glimmer of hope in the early success of an LA-based film lighting company.
California's long road to greenhouse gas emissions goals
California is also trying to reduce pollution through its cap and trade program. The law that established it passed seven years ago, but as The California Report's Craig Miller says, the state's journey toward meeting its climate goals has just begun.
Airbnb 'party house' in Glendale shut down after complaints
In recent years, the web has revolutionized the way people travel by giving them the opportunity to rent other people's homes. But sites like Airbnb are not without their critics, especially in Glendale, where a 4,000-sq. ft. estate has been listed as “party central.”
The ad invited potential renters to host weddings, receptions, reunions and a variety of other parties at the house, with a guest list of up to 200 people.
At first, neighbors just thought the home's new tenant was having a housewarming party, but when the parties continued, they became suspicious.
"All of sudden for several months, they would have a party every weekend, up to two or three in the morning," said Glendale News-Press reporter Brittany Levine. "They would see fights out in the street, they would see beer bottles in the street, which are not things that people in the Glenwood community are typically used to. People move there because they want a quiet suburban life."
Neighbors soon discovered the Airbnb listing and began filing complaints with the police whenever a party would happen at the house. In October, the police were dispatched to break up parties six times.
"At one point there was a police helicopter that had to shine a spotlight on the house, several police officers were around," said Levine. "One neighbor sent me a video that he had taken from that night and he said he called it a 'war zone.'"
The party house listing has since been taken down, though the property is still advertised for short term stays.
'Trickster's Hat': Unleashing the creative mind's potential
About 20 years ago, I became obsessed with a book called Griffin and Sabine. It was a mysterious love story of sorts, told through letters and post cards. I wasn't the only one who pored over it, Griffin and Sabine stayed on the New York Times Bestseller list for two years.
The book's author, Nick Bantock, joins me now from Victoria Canada to talk about his latest book, "Trickster's Hat: A Mischievous Apprenticeship in Creativity."
Try this at home! Do the exercise and send us the results:
Exercise: Loosening the Brain
Materials: Fat black pencil and 2 sheets of paper.
Time: 2 or 3 minutes
Size: Not less than 12" x 12"
Instructions:
Using your left hand if you are right-handed, or vice versa, quickly draw a circle, a triangle, a square, and a pentagon, all on the same sheet of paper. Keep drawing geometric shapes, not worrying about their accurateness. Continue for about a minute, filling the page. Then get a new sheet of paper and switch to your other hand. This time keep your arm stretched away from your body and start scribbling and making short slash marks. What it looks like doesn't matter; what counts is the devil-may-care attitude.
Hint:
Concentrate on the feel of the pencil in your hand rather than the shapes you are drawing. Make sure you breathe right into the pit of your belly as you doodle away. Three minutes in total should be ample time to loosen your brain and get you ready to focus on whatever work is calling.