On Wednesday, Take Two will discuss the fashion angle of the new Apple Watch, the cause and effect of parents opting out of vaccines, early autism treatment, the safety of lucrative compound creams, oceans turning acidic and the results of America's best burrito bracket.
What should Obama do about ISIS?
President Obama is expected to take to the airwaves in primetime Wednesday night to address a war-weary public and outline his strategy for action against Islamic militants who call themselves the Islamic State or ISIS.
Related: Obama to speak Wednesday on US strategy against ISIS
Analysts suggest that part of that strategy will include expanding U.S. airstrikes into Syria. But, according to President Obama, the deployment of ground troops is not currently part of the plan.
What will the President's plan be? And what are the odds of quashing ISIS without drawing the U.S. into another lengthy and uncertain fight in the region?
Josh Gerstein is the senior White House Reporter for Politico. He expects that President Obama will be clear in his address Wednesday night that, while the U.S. is willing to put more effort into defeating ISIS, they cannot do it alone. And, Gerstein says, the Obama administration will have to pursue political and public relations strategies as well if they will have a shot at success in defeating the militant group.
Compound cream raises questions about safety
A dozen doctors and pharmacists in Orange County will be arraigned this week in a huge workers comp fraud case.
Prosecutors claim they scammed people over a little known - but lucrative - business of compound creams.
In the second part in her series, Southern California Public Radio’s investigative producer Karen Foshay reports on the cream industry's marketing tactics and production methods, and on concerns about the products' safety.
Related: The price of pain: Questionable marketing, loose oversight of compound creams
This is the second in our series of reports on the compound cream industry. You can read Part One here.
Sen. Barbara Boxer on the US response to Islamic militants
President Obama is set to deliver a speech Wednesday night, outlining his plan to respond to the threat of Islamic militants in Iraq and Syria, a group calling itself the Islamic State.
Related: Obama to speak Wednesday on US strategy against ISIS
The plan is unlikely to include U.S. combat boots on the ground, said U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA). Instead, that should come from local players.
"If you look in Iraq, you see the Kurds, you see the Iraqis now getting their act together now that they have got a new government," said Senator Boxer. "These are the people who have the most at stake in the region."
Vaccines: Causes and effects of parents opting out
Though still a small minority, a growing number of California parents are choosing not to vaccinate their children, fearing what they believe are dangerous side effects.
The phenomenon is frustrating public health experts, who believe the anti-vaccination movement is in part responsible for the reemergence of diseases like measles and whooping cough.
It's an issue Southern California Public Radio's Rebecca Plevin has been looking into and she shares more.
Related: More California parents opting out of vaccinating their kids
Earlier autism treatment could prevent developmental delays, study shows
In most cases, autism spectrum disorder isn't diagnosed in a child until they are three or four years old.
But new research from UC Davis shows that treating preliminary signs of autism at an earlier age might help infants avoid developmental delays.
The pilot study of seven children involved treatment known as Infant Start, according to UC Davis.
Treatment was administered over a six-month period to 6- to 15-month-old infants who exhibited marked autism symptoms, such as decreased eye contact, social interest or engagement, repetitive movement patterns and a lack of intentional communication. It was delivered by the people who were most in tune with and spent the most time with the babies: their parents.
Dr. Sally Rogers of the Mind Institute at UC Davis is a professor of psychology and headed up the study. She shares more on these findings.
Sports roundup: Ray Rice, Hawks owner and manager controversy, Clayton Kershaw, Derek Jeter's retirement
For the NFL a video is worth a thousand words and Donald Sterling may not be alone.
It is time for sports with Andy and Brian Kamenetsky.
This week, the sports roundup addresses:
- Suspension of Ray Rice after video surfaced of him knocking his then-fiancee unconscious in an elevator.
- Atlanta Hawks owner Bruce Levensen will sell his share of the NBA team because of an email he sent two years ago to the team's co-owners regarding attendance for games. In it he writes: "My theory is that the black crowd scared away the whites and there are simply not enough affluent black fans to build a significant season ticket base. Please don't get me wrong. There was nothing threatening going on in the arena back then. I never felt uncomfortable, but I think southern whites simply were not comfortable being in an arena or at a bar where they were in the minority."
- Hawks General Manager Danny Ferry under fire for discussing the team's free-agent options with Hawks owners and saying that Luol Deng "has a little African in him. Not in a bad way, but he's like a guy who would have a nice store out front but sell you counterfeit stuff out of the back."
- Dodgers lefty Clayton Kershaw recently won his MLB leading 18th game Tuesday night, lowering his earned run average to 1.67 (no one else is under 2)
- It's the last month of Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter's career as he's set to retire.
- Yankees outfielder Ichiro Suzuki is a sure fire HOFer. He's also known as an all-world jokester, so much so that he has learned Spanish just so he can trash talk with Latin ballplayers for a laugh.
Are yoga pants the new jeans?
Could America's long-standing love affair with jeans be on the rocks?
The popularity of denim is due in large part to its versatility and comfort, at least when compared to dress pants. But there's a competitor on the horizon that's beating out jeans on the comfort scale: yoga pants.
Denim sales are down 6 percent this year, due in part to what some in the fashion industry are calling the "athleisure" trend.
Michelle Dalton Tyree, founder of Fashion Trends Daily, says that while jeans aren't going away anytime soon, the "athleisure" trend has really made its mark.
Ocean acidification on the rise, UN climate change study finds
The ocean absorbs one-fourth of the world's carbon emissions, yet that capacity is diminishing fast. That's according to an annual UN study, known as the Greenhouse Gas Bulletin, out this week from the World Meteorological Organization.
That capacity is just 70 percent of what it was at the beginning of the industrial era, and it could go all the way down to 20 percent by the end of the century, the study finds.
All that matters because the dynamic affects seawater acidity.
Related: Increasingly acidic ocean dissolving key marine snails along West Coast
It's a phenomenon known as acidification and it's taking place in the world's oceans at a rate that the report calls "unprecedented." Scientists are still trying to understand exactly how it affects marine life, said Dr. Andrew Dickson, professor of marine chemistry at the SCRIPPS Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego.
From the WMO Greenhouse Gas Bulletin report:
The current rate of ocean acidification appears unprecedented at least over the last 300 million years, based on proxy-data from paleo archives. In the future, acidification will continue to accelerate at least until mid-century, based on projections from Earth system models.
The potential consequences of ocean acidification on marine organisms are complex. A major concern is the response of calcifying organisms, such as corals, algae, mollusks and some plankton, because their ability to build shell or skeletal material (via calcification) depends on the abundance of carbonate ion. For many organisms, calcification declines with increased acidification. Other impacts of acidification include reduced survival, development, and growth rates as well as changes in physiological functions and reduced biodiversity.
Solving the mystery of the ratfish
The prehistoric ratfish was a shark-like creature with jaws that looked like a buzzsaw.
But until recently scientists didn't know how the ratfish used its teeth to catch and eat prey. New research is shedding light on this strange-looking creature.
A model created by paleontologists at Idaho State University demonstrates how the buzzsaw-mouthed fish would have sliced prey.
Brian Switek wrote about the fish for National Geographic and shot the video below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R61reJlzItQ
The ratfish--scientifically named Helicoprion--was a biter, Switek reported in National Geographic. The ratfish’s jaws were too narrow to suction feed, University of Rhode Island biologist Jason Ramsay and colleagues point out in a Journal of Morphology paper, and so old buzzsaw jaw had to actively chomp prey.
The process, Switek explained, went something like this: Teeth at the front snagged the prey and, as the jaws closed, moved the flesh backward. Here, the middle teeth speared the food, securing it in the mouth, before the back teeth bit in and sent the morsel down the hatch.
This illustration from Ramsay and his colleagues breaks it down.
Not a happy cephalopod. This is now one of my favorite science illustrations. http://t.co/E7ZWNKCipy pic.twitter.com/KrqfvKWkfZ
— Riley Black 🦕🏳️⚧️ (@Laelaps) September 6, 2014
Switek talks more about the fish's unique teeth and how it functioned and survived.
Earthquake insurance: Is it worth it?
The recent earthquake in Napa did more than break a lot of bottles; it reignited interest in earthquake insurance.
Related: Napa earthquake: Big damage for California wineries
The state runs the California Earthquake Authority, and it issues the majority of quake policies.
Traffic on its website spiked after the earthquake. But the reality is - only about one homeowner in 10 has coverage.
The California Report's Tara Siler is one of those trying to decide whether she ought to take the plunge.
App Chat: 'Shower with Friends' wants to help curb your water use
Hoping for a strong El Niño this winter to moisten California up a bit? Don't get your hopes up - as weather experts are saying that even if it does come along, El Niño will probably be pretty weak.
Which could mean yet another dry winter... which means more drought... which means more water conservation... which some people are hoping that they can help with technology.
One of those groups are some guys who just won Tech Crunch Disrupt with the hack they're calling Shower with Friends. It's an app out of Intel's Mashery up in San Francisco, and the idea is that it helps you save water by monitoring your usage in the shower and telling you how much you're using and if it's too much, via text.
They want to gamify the experience as well, and that's why it's called Shower with Friends. They want you to be able to compete with your friends to see who can save the most water. They think that by doing that, it'll make people more likely to commit to the process.
The idea came about after
- a developer at Mashery - and his colleagues were paid a visit by Intel's CEO Brian Krzanich.
"He noticed that we had a tablet computer sitting on top of our kegerator, which is basically a keg. And he asked what it was and so we showed him. It was a hack that we built where every time you dispensed beer from our keg, it keeps track of how many ounces were dispensed. So he said, "Show me how it works.""
Nevermind the fact that they have a keg at their office - Kraznich asked if they could build something similar for his house, that wasn't keg-centric. So, they figured out how to do it for his shower.
They later submitted the idea to Tech Crunch Disrupt and subsequently won $5,000 for the idea.
But just how big of a deal is showering in a family's water usage in terms of statewide water usage?
Households account for about 14 percent of water use in the state of California, according to KCET. And according to the EPA, showering accounts for about 17 percent of indoor water use, which on average equals about 40 gallons a day for a family, or about 1.2 trillion gallons of water are used in the U.S. per year, just showering. Of course, these numbers depend on the flow of the shower head, how many people are in the household and how often they shower.
In terms of state wide usage, things like agriculture use a lot more water, but Mansilla's hope is that their contraption can save you money and water by slowly helping you cut back on water use.
He said that he doesn't know if or when the product will come to market, but that he expects that they'll release an open source version soon.
But if you're interested in apps available now that'll help you monitor your water usage, check out Drip Detective and the Los Angeles DWP's app (which has terrible reviews).
You could also always just try
your neighbors. That might work too.
Apple Watch: Could it be the next must-have accessory?
Yesterday, Apple announced its much anticipated Apple Watch, its first full-fledged wearable.
Related: Apple's next big thing: Apple Watch, iPhone 6, ApplePay — worth the hype?
To everyone's surprise, it was not called the iWatch. The gadget sounds promising, with features similar to the ones you would find on the actual iPhone, but from a fashion standpoint, does it hit the mark?
Eliza Brooke, staff writer and wearables expert at Fashionista, gives her take on the smart watch. Brooke says the gadget's sleek design and resemblance to a traditional watch makes it more appealing.
The results are in: America's best burrito is in San Francisco
Earlier this summer, we told you about ESPN's FiveThirtyEight website and their quest to determine — once and for all — the best burrito in America.
In an NCAA-style elimination tournament, the original field of 64 burritos (determined by an expert "burrito selection committee") was whittled down to a final four:
- Delicious Mexican Eatery (El Paso, Texas)
- Al & Bea's Mexican Food (Los Angeles)
- La Taqueria (San Francisco)
- Taqueria Tlaxcalli (The Bronx, N.Y.)
Round three is over Wednesday, and we have a winner: La Taqueria in San Francisco.
FiveThirtyEight's burrito correspondent Anna Maria Barry-Jester traveled more than 20,000 miles across the United States and sampled 84 burritos in two rounds.
She judged the burritos based on five criteria: The tortilla, main protein, other ingredients, presentation (look and textures) and overall flavor profile.
The winning burrito is a rice-less, mission-style burrito, and Barry-Jester said she tried all of their burritos but liked the carnitas one best.
What makes La Taqueria's burrito so great?
Barry-Jester says, "They have sort of a magical first bite. The first time you ever eat one of their burritos, it's really incredibly juicy. And it really came down to this liquid ratio that, I think, makes for just an incredible, monumental culinary experience the first time you try it."
Do you agree? Let us know your favorite burrito in the comments below, on our Facebook page or on Twitter (tag @KPCC).
To pay for new Tesla plant, Nevada slashes film tax credits
Nevada lured away a new Tesla battery plant from California by offering $1.25 billion in tax breaks.
Paying for it requires a lot of cutbacks, one of which slices into the state's relatively new film tax credit program.
Started just this year, it offered $80 million in breaks over four years.
That could be slashed to just $10 million.
Anjeanette Damon with the Reno Gazette-Journal explains what that means to the film industry in Nevada that fought hard for these credits in the first place.
Net Neutrality: The goal of Internet Slowdown Day
Visitors to sites like Netflix, Etsy, Reddit and Digg will find something a bit different online today.
These sites and more are participating in something known as Internet Slowdown Day.
Related: Net neutrality: Why your favorite sites will 'slow down' today
It's a digital protest in support of net neutrality--"to funnel the public's attention to the Federal Communication Commission's on-going rulemaking on open Internet principles and practices, the Washington Post reports.
Washington Post's Nancy Scola writes for the The Switch blog and shares more.
Video game 'Destiny' breaks sales records by raking in more than $500 million
The hottest movie of the summer "Guardians of the Galaxy" had a production budget of about $170 million dollars, which is a lot of money for an untested franchise, but it wound up faring quite well.
But that $170 million is nothing next to the $500 million it cost to make the new video game called "Destiny."
Bungie — that's the company who makes the game — is probably feeling good about their big investment Tuesday, because even though it was just released, they've already made their money back, and in the process set the record for the best selling new video game IP of all time.
The game's by the same company who created the "Halo" franchise, and it's been highly anticipated for quite a while now, with more than 4.6 million people participating in the online beta of the game - setting yet another record for the biggest beta for this new generation of consoles.
This Wired article goes in depth as to why so many resources were invested into this game. And the accompanying audio interview with
- the Editor-in-Chief of Games Beat - includes why this game's been so highly anticipated, what the money was spent on and whether you should play it.