On Tuesday Take Two discusses how much candidates rack up on credit cards during campaigns, a doctor who worked in Liberia quarantining himself in California and why Taylor Swift decided to pull her new album from the free music streaming service Spotify and what this means for the music industry.
Put it on plastic: How California lawmakers spent more than $4 million on campaign credit cards
Cross-country travel, fundraising dinners, late night meetings at an LA nightclub?
If you're running for office in California, you may have an option for how to pay for these campaign-related expenses: just put it on plastic.
Apparently, that's what many state lawmakers did in the run up to Tuesday's election.
Lawmakers in California used credit cards to make more than $4 million in purchases in the first 18 months of the election period, according to an investigation by the Sacramento Bee that looked at lawmakers' credit cards and how much they did – and did not – disclose.
For more, Take Two is joined by Jim Miller, who reports for the Sacramento Bee and the Capitol Hill Alert blog. Read his report, "California lawmakers’ campaign credit-card spending often lacks disclosure."
Ebola doctor quarantines himself in California prior to mandate
The Ebola epidemic has accelerated this week in Sierra Leone, despite cases slowing in hard-hit Liberia.
Here in the U.S., the state of Maine has come to an agreement with nurse Kaci Hickox who had defied a mandatory quarantine order after being cleared of symptoms.
She's now free to travel and visit public places but must monitor her health.
Meanwhile, a returning health worker in California has sworn off all human contact.
Doctor Colin Bucks practices emergency medicine at Stanford and until about a week ago he was on the front lines of the Ebola fight in Liberia.
He decided to go into quarantine before the state of California mandated such measures for returning health workers and he joins Take Two for more.
'Winter In The Blood' film: A man's wild journey leads to finding himself
The new film "Winter in the Blood" tells the story of a Native American man named Virgil living in Montana.
Virgil's wife has left him. He's struggling with an alcohol addiction.
And then he meets a guy at a bar who makes him a proposition.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hBPIUWQTBI
The film's site offer a brief film synopsis:
Virgil First Raise embarks on a wild and darkly comic odyssey to retrieve his renegade wife— and the beloved rifle she stole. He ultimately finds: himself.
Take Two speaks with Sherman Alexie, one of the producers of the film, who is also the author of books such as "Reservation Blues" and "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian."
The Wheel Thing Special: The SEMA show's spectacle of custom cars in Vegas
Imagine one of those hotel shuttle vans - the kind you see at the airport - barreling over hills and dunes, far from any road. Or a car that doubles as a monster guitar amp.
These vehicles, and many others are debuting Tuesday in Las Vegas at the SEMA show. SEMA is a trade organization of auto customizers and manufacturers of specialty auto parts. Every year, auto "upfitters" try to top each other with cooler, or more outrageous modifications.
There are vans specifically for go-kart racers, dirt bike aficionados and even skateboarders.
Orange County Register automotive critic Susan Carpenter shares more about some of the interesting, and maybe even insane custom vehicles being shown. She notes there are some more down-to-earth things at the show, too, such as a new line of auto tires that are designed from the get-go to be recycled into shoe soles.
Oh, and all this crazy customizing. It's really big business. According to SEMA, sales of custom and specialized auto parts and services should add up to about $34 billion.
Taylor Swift dumps Spotify: What does it mean for music industry?
Singer Taylor Swift's new album 1989 is expected to sell 1.3 million copies, or more.
It could be the biggest album of the year.
But one place you won't find it - Spotify.
On Monday, Swift delivered the message to the music streaming service that they are never ever ever getting back together.
The singer effectively dumped Spotify by removing all of her albums from its catalogue.
For more on what this means for the music industry, Steve Knopper joins Take Two.
Tuesday Reviewsday: Jamie Cullum, Bambu and more
Oliver Wang from Soul-Sides and music supervisor Morgan Rhodes join A Martinez in the studio for Take Two's weekly new music installment - Tuesday Reviewsday.
Below are their picks for what you should be listening to.
Oliver Wang
Artist: Bambu
Album: "Party Worker"
Song: "Welcome to the Party"
Summary: Bambu is an L.A.-raised rapper (currently living up in the Bay) known for his uncompromising political messaging. He's also Filipino American and sometimes raps bilingually in Tagalog and on this song, you can hear what I think is a Filipino kulingtang. He's been grinding away for years now and I feel with every new release, more and more people are discovering him - as well they should!
Warning: Explicit lyrics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8KXGapAfBI
Artist: Captain Planet feat. Chico Mann
Album: "Esperanto Slang"
Song: "Un Poquito Mas"
Summary: Captain Planet is Charlie Bethel, a transplant from the East Coast to L.A. who's found a cozy home here with his particular style of dance music that you might describe as being all about the Global South. On the album, there's Brazilian, Colombian, West Indian and Afro-Cuban influences and you can hear the latter on the song we just heard which also features Brooklyn's Chico Mann, no stranger to world fusion dance beats.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQ8HTfTIVsY
Morgan Rhodes
Artist: Jamie Cullum
Album: "Interlude"
Song: "Good Morning Heartache ft. Laura Mvula"
Summary: Compelling arrangements and interpretations seem to be a mainstay in Jamie Callum's albums. Interlude is his 7th, and we find him covering Cannonball Adderly, Randy Newman, Nina Simone and Billie Holliday. "Good Morning Heartache" featuring Laura Mvula, brings a soulful intimacy to a song which has never been recorded as a duet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMjn6nQWfQo
Artist:
Album: "Havana Cultura Mix: The Soundclash"
Song: "Para Ti (feat Sexto Sentido)"
Summary: "Havana Cultura Mix: The Soundclash" is the latest offering in the Havana Cultura series, which features collaborations between Cuban artists and electronic producers. Gilles Peterson, one of the most celebrated tastemakers of our time, launched this series in 2009 and each release is highly anticipated and enjoys heavy rotation from deejays and music programmers the world over.
Rukaiya Russell is a British producer, well known in the world of UK Funky (an uptempo 4-to-the-floor genre of music that blends afrobeat, deep house, soca, electronica). She brings a soulful dance element to the project.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cr_T8rvwd-s
Why do politicians steer clear of talking about race?
There are plenty of issues politicians like to talk about to no end: The economy. Immigration. Health care.
But there is one issue most candidates try to steer clear of these days - race.
For more on why race has become such a difficult issue to talk about in politics, Mark Sawyer, director of UCLA's Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity and Politics, joins Take Two.
CHP officer charged in connection with allegedly sharing female suspects' racy photos
A former CHP officer has been charged in connection with allegedly taking illicit photos off female suspects' cell phones and sending them to his colleagues.
Alex Cohen talks with reporter Matthias Gafni of the Contra Costa Times for the latest in this story.
Chile allows medical marijuana use: One woman's story
Voters in several states are deciding marijuana initiatives Tuesday.
In Alaska and Oregon there are measures that would legalize recreational use.
And if Florida voters approve Amendment 21, it will become the 24th state to allow medical marijuana.
This movement to end restrictions on pot isn't limited to the U.S. In Uruguay, marijuana sale and possession is legal.
And Chile is now allowing cultivation for medical use. It's also allowed a Chilean woman, who is terminally ill, to import a cannabis-based medicine from Europe.
The BBC's Gideon Long has this report.
UCLA flood: Sticker shop owners create project to offset water loss
When that massive water main break flooded portions of UCLA this summer it sent 20 million gallons of water gushing into the streets, down the storm drains and out into the ocean.
That figure seems particularly painful in light of the devastating drought the state has been experiencing.
Southern California Public Radio's Molly Peterson met two Angelenos who are working on ways to offset the loss of water.
LA water mains: Which to fix first before another bursts?
Since that geyser erupted at UCLA in July, there have been a number of significant water main breaks in Los Angeles.
Most recently, a water main ruptured at the intersection of Highland and Santa Monica Boulevard, flooding the street.
It was fixed but then busted in another spot.
It is no question that parts of the city's water distribution system are badly in need of a repair.
But how to prioritize?
For more, Take Two is joined by Martin Adams, Senior Assistant General Manager of the LADWP Water System.
INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS
I heard a statistic from you that LA averages three water leaks a day. These aren't all big leaks, but isn't that a lot?
The three a day turns out to be not that much. We're probably about only 60 percent of the national average for water main breaks. But in a city the size of LA where we have enough pipe that stretches from here to NY and back—about 7,000 miles of pipe in the street—having that amount of leaks per day is really a pretty good record.
Do you get time to fix the three leaks per day?
We have crews that repair leaks and we don't let them run any longer than we have to and we have a priority order. The ones that are big are the ones that make the news but there's a lot of small ones that we repair just as well.
The pipe that broke about a week ago (Highland and Santa Monica) was installed in the 1920s, correct?
Yes, it was getting close to 100 years old; 1920s-era pipe. The pipes in that era, there are different ways they were manufactured back then and insulation was different. So a lot of the pipes in that era were subject to a lot more corrosion. Certain parts of town we have the pipes in a hot soil environment and we're starting to see the age and corrosion take effect on that length of the pipe's life.
How does LA's system rank with other big cities?
Overall, in spite of what we see with water main breaks and the attention to it, our track record is pretty good. We did a detailed study by a nationally accepted method for how tight our system is—how many leaks we have and how much water we lose—and we're sitting at about half of where the norm would be for the water industry. So have a pretty water tight system overall. But that doesn't mean that we can stop here; we know there's work to be done.
That work is to replace the questionable water mains. How much is in question?
Generally we think of questionable mains as old mains but there's a lot more to it. We look at the pipe material, how it was installed and what the soil around it is like, but age is a good indicator. We have a huge mountain of pipe that's going to hit the 100-year-plus range in the next decade, so we want to get ahead of the pipe. There's some older pipe that we don’t see failures in that’s different construction and methods.
What percentage of LA pipe is questionable?
There's probably maybe 20 to 25 percent of pipe that’s getting to a range where we really want to get it replaced. Less than 10 percent we are really concerned about but there's a lot of pipe in the moderate range that’s getting older fast so we need to address it systematically. We've been ramping up our replacement rates and plan to continue to do that. That'll get us ahead of the curve. We don't want to wait until it goes bad and has a problem and we have to face it all at once.
What are you doing now?
We have increased our replacements. About five to six years ago we were doing about 11 miles of pipe a year and now we are doing about 25 to 30 miles of pipe a year replacements so it's dramatically increased. We're going to continue to push that up and be ahead of the pipe. Our leaks are down about a third of what they were six to eight years ago.
How does the drought affect the LADWP's sense of urgency in pipe repairs?
This is a real big issue. Because the leaks are one thing but the importance of losing that water has really added a different level of understanding to getting on the leaks, so we are increasing our crews that are available to, not just fix the pipe, but respond to the leaks.
It's a heartbreak to see the water on the street going to waste. It's difficult because a lot of times a number of changes have to be made in the system so we can shut down the main correctly. We don’t want to cause additional damage, a sanitation issue where we have to worry about what's coming into a pipe when we shut it down. So there's a lot of factors that go into shutting down a pipe. Plus the fact that our crews are still battling the same traffic that people have when the pipe breaks.
South El Monte park renovation divides environmentalists
The San Gabriel Valley will get some money to help restore habitat and expand an educational program in South El Monte.
Southern California Public Radio's Jed Kim says county supervisors will spend $3 million to revamp the open space, but the plan has divided environmentalists.
Mountain lion population stable in Texas, study suggests
The mountain lion of Texas is known by many names in the Southwest--cougar, panther, puma.
In California it’s protected. In Arizona and New Mexico, you can hunt this predator but with strict limitations. In Texas, mountain lions can be hunted at will. Still, preliminary results from a four-year-old study suggest the number of Texas mountain lions is stable, and may be growing.
Coyote hunting contest enrages conservationists
Eleven coyotes were killed in a hunting contest this weekend in a remote area outside Bakersfield, California.
The killings are legal, but they've outraged conservationists who are working to ban predator killing competitions state-wide in California.
Camilla Fox is the executive director of Project Coyote, one of several environmental groups who've petitioned the California Fish and Game Commission to ban the contests.
Mark Bittman shares 'How to Cook Everything Fast'
What are some of the reasons why most people say they can’t cook?
No time, it's too hard and they don’t know where to start.
All of these reasons might be solved by New York Times food columnist Mark Bittman’s new book – How to Cook Everything Fast.
Host Alex Cohen opened her kitchen to Mark and they made one of his recipes, this delicious curried beef with eggplant:
HTCE Fast Curry Braised Beef With Eggplant