On Monday, Take Two discusses how terrorist groups like the so-called Islamic State use rape and sexual violence as a weapon of war, the importance of local waterways, new regulations for extra virgin olive oil and much more.
Where does Turkey stand in call for action against Islamist fighters?
This week in New York, President Barack Obama is expected to make the case for military action against Islamist militants in Iraq and Syria. He dispatched Samantha Power, Ambassador to the UN, to get the conversation started on the weekend talk shows.
"The Iraqis have appealed to the international community to come to their defense, not only in Iraq but to also go after safe havens in foreign countries and what they mean by that, of course, is Syria," said Power on ABC News Sunday. "So they've made the appeal to the international community for collective defense and we think we have the legal basis we need."
The big question: Should the U.S. go forward with air strikes in Syria and, if it does, who will partner in military action?
Turkey is one country the U.S. would like on its side. But the country, which borders both Iraq and Syria, has so far stopped short of publicly endorsing the US plan or offering clear support.
Turkey's special history with Kurdish minorities, both in Iraq and in Turkey, and its close relationship with Iran, are keys to understanding its stance on the issue, said Zachary Lockman. He's chair of the Department of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at New York University.
Islamist militants use sexual violence to control communities
When President Barack Obama outlined his plan last week for fighting the so-called Islamic State group last week, he described that the terrorist group was responsible for many crimes including sexual violence.
"They enslave, rape, and force women into marriage," Obama said.
Last month, the United Nations estimated that the group forced some 1,500 women, teenage girls and boys into sexual slavery.
Former CIA intelligence analyst Nada Bakos explains that it's a disruptive force that helps these fighters gain control of a local community.
Rockefeller's divestment from big oil "remarkable", says climate change activist Bill McKibben
Tomorrow, a U.N. climate summit kicks off in New York. More than 120 countries are expected to attend and discuss ways to reduce greenhouse emissions.
On the eve of the conference, the Rockefeller family announced it will start divesting of fossil fuel stocks through its Rockefeller Brothers Fund. This is no small move considering the Rockefellers are considered the first family of oil in the United States.
Climate change activist Bill McKibben spoke to Take Two about the announcement:
The theme of the UN summit is "catalyze action." What does that mean to you?
Truthfully, I think the summit itself will be seen as inaction. I don't think we'll see much more than we've seen out of the UN in the past.
But there's a lot of action going on on the sidelines. Yesterday, in New York City, was by far — by a factor of four probably — the largest rally about climate change in the planet's history. And it's already helping to catalyze other action.
The Rockefeller's announcement last night is a pretty signal moment. If anyone can say that the oil era is drawing to a close, it's the heirs of John D. himself, the guy who started the oil era.
But the Rockefellers are quite wealthy and it seems they'll be able to fare just fine without investing in fossil fuels. Not everyone feels financially comfortable enough to make that decision...
The evidence is pretty clear that if you're looking at it in purely financial terms, that you'd be wise to get out of fossil fuel. The AP commissioned a study last year asking stock analysts to look at what would have happened if a university with an endowment of $1 billion had gotten out of fossil fuels ten years ago, and the answer was they would have had an extra $120 million that they would have made in the last decade.
This is not just morally a bad idea to support the industries that are flooding the atmosphere with carbon, it's also a financial bet that the fossil fuel era is going to keep going on for years and years, and it's pretty clear that it isn't.
Not everyone feels that way, though. Just last week in California, the University of California regents made the decision not to divest from coal and oil...
Yes. People who run money are, you know, conservative and sometimes it takes them a while. It took seven or eight years for the UC regents to decide that they wanted to divest from apartheid, but then they did divest from apartheid. And when Nelson Mandela got out of prison, the first trip he took was to California to go thank students at the UC system... and he said, 'We fought to liberate ourselves, but we couldn't have done it without your pressure.'
UC's not divesting, but Stanford is. And I predict that the UC system will do it before long. And I predict that they'll do it in part because they can't afford to keep being invested in yesterday's technologies.
Even if you do get major institutions to divest, it seems that the oil industries aren't too hurt by it. We spoke with one oil analyst who said that this move by the Rockefellers is purely symbolic, and any reduction in investment is really just a drop in Exxon or Chevron's overall market cap...
Well, that's definitely one way of looking at it, and I'm under no illusions that we can bankrupt Exxon financially in the short term. But we can start to politically bankrupt them.
The problem is mostly that they're incredibly powerful... These guys are the biggest players that there is. Your local California oil company Chevron gave the largest single corporate campaign contribution in history two weeks before the last federal election. And it was designed to make sure that the House of Representatives would stay in the hands of climate [change] deniers.
If you're an investor in Chevron, then you're a part of that process. And if you're comfortable with that, then so be it. But more and more people aren't comfortable with it— and that those people now include the Rockefellers is a pretty remarkable moment.
Nation's estuaries form vital, and vulnerable, coastal wetlands
This week, scientists and coastal residents across the United States are drawing attention to the importance of local waterways, called estuaries.
Those are the bays, lagoons, harbors and wetlands that provide vital nurseries for marine life and play a big part in the local economy.
"They're a very intricate system; they're a very dynamic system," said Karina Johnston, director of Watershed Programs for the Bay Foundation on a recent visit to the Pacific coast near L.A. "They have life that is supported both by the salty ocean water that comes in with the tides and the freshwater that comes down, in this case, from the Ballona Creek watershed."
That forms an important habitat for some marine species, such as the large halibut that is an important fish both for consumers and fishermen. Nationwide, estuaries and coastal waters provide habitat for 75 percent of the U.S. commercial fish catch and 80 to 90 percent of the recreational fish catch, according to Restore America's Estuaries, a nonprofit.
But estuaries across the nation are facing threats to their health, including urbanization, pollution from runoff and sea level rise due to climate change.
In Southern California, the ongoing drought poses another concern.
"Even in the dry season, like today, when we haven't seen rain in months and months, we are still getting dry weather water running off of our streets, from our sprinklers, washing our cars, into the Ballona Creek Channel," said Johnston. "This changes up what the proportion of fresh water and salt water is in this area."
Find a National Estuaries Week event near you.
Correction: A previous version of this post misspelled the name of Karina Johnston, director of Watershed Programs for the Bay Foundation. KPCC regrets the error.
Cops can record interactions with the public without prior consent
When a Los Angeles police officer stopped "Django Unchained" actress Daniele Watts, he recorded his exchange with her on a personal recording device.
How legal is that? Very, KPCC's Erika Aguilar reports — how that recording got into the TMZ's hands is another story.
Read the full story: Can cops record you without your consent? And other questions from the Watts case
Picture This: Recreating iconic movie scenes
Phil Grishayev's dream came true when he first visited Los Angeles as a teenager from Poland.
"I was so excited that I made a little map of 'Back to the Future' locations, 'Ghostbusters,' everything," he says, aiming to visit places where his favorite movies were shot instead of the beach or the Walk of Fame.
When he finally moved to Los Angeles as an adult, Grishayev continued to hunt down elusive scenes from films. This time, though, he recreates them down the same angle and positioning as seen in the original movie.
He compiles these images for his Tumblr, Dat Scene.
Many of these locations can be found online. However, in some cases it take meticulous sleuthing.
"You literally have to move each frame," he says, "see something that you might recognize from the city."
For example, to find the famous place where John Cusack's Lloyd Dobler holds up the boombox in, "Say Anything," he had to comb through North Hollywood Park where it was shot.
But, there had been some landscaping done in the decades since, so Grishayev had to figure out the spot by lining up the trees in the background.
There are still some elusive spots that he's hunting down, though.
"Right now, there's a scene from 'The Mask,'" he says.
In it, Jim Carrey's character goes on a date with Cameron Diaz at a park. He ducks behind a bush and returns as his alter ego, the Mask. He learned that it was shot in Hancock Park, but so far hasn't had luck finding the exact spot.
"I was walking around the park for an hour looking for that tree. They all look the same and all had the same height, but it just wasn't that one, so I'm still searching for it."
Angelina Jolie directs, Deadpool rises from the dead: The latest from Hollywood: On the Lot
She's an A-list actor, married to an A-list actor, but like everyone else in Hollywood, what she really wants to do is direct. Angelina Jolie's "Unbroken" will open in theaters on Christmas Day.
But, so far, says Rebecca Keegan of the Los Angeles Times, no one has seen it yet — apparently that doesn't worry executives. Jolie has also signed a deal to direct a film about the conservationist Richard Leakey, and has, yet another, directing job in the works.
Keegan also fills us in on the latest "X-Men" spinoff to get a release date. This one is "Deadpool," the profane, wise-cracking super-anti-hero. 20th Century Fox says the movie will be released in early 2016, after years of being in development limbo. This YouTube video of test footage, which got a big response from the fans, helped turn the light from yellow to green. (Note: Clip contains profanity.)
Also in On the Lot, a preview of the New York Film Festival, which opens later this week, and features the premiere of Paul Thomas Anderson's movie, "Inherent Vice," along with a documentary on Edward Snowden.
Mexican government opens investigation into June killings of 22 civilians
Nearly three months ago, the Mexican army killed 22 people in what it described as a massive gun battle with an armed gang. Since then, reporters have raised doubts about the military's version of the story.
Los Angeles Times reporter Tracy Wilkinson joins Take Two to talk about how the Mexican government is now launching an official investigation.
Lancaster officials move to shut down Metrolink station
Citing a growing homeless population, Lancaster officials announced they want to shut down the only commuter train linking the city to Los Angeles.
The city, about an hour and a half north of Los Angeles, is in the Antelope Valley where roughly 12 percent of the county’s homeless population reside, writes The California Reports' Steven Cuevas. "Officials claim that number grows by the day because of an alleged migration of train-hopping homeless people."
Read the full story: Citing Homeless Infusion, Lancaster Officials Move to Shutter Metrolink Station
California to require new tests for state-produced olive oil
The state Department of Food and Agriculture approved new quality standards for olive oil last week. This will require California-produced olive oil to be tested for purity, and producers must also prove that their product is truly extra-virgin.
This is a major victory for state olive oil makers who regularly compete with European importers, which make up 95 percent of olive oil consumed in the United States, says Jeff Colombini, chair of the Olive Oil Commission of California, the organization that recommended the new standards.
Colombini says USDA standards weren't enforced and European importers knew that, "so typically, they will import non-extra virgin olive oil and label it as extra virgin oil, essentially deceiving consumers... The olive oil industry is a relatively young industry in California and we do produce, almost exclusively, high quality extra virgin olive oil."
And, the only way to ensure that is to have mandatory testing of all olive oil made in the state, Colombini says.
So, how do you tell the difference between what's real and what's not?
"The first difference [can be determined through] an object chemical analysis that is done in terms of free fatty acid levels and peroxide values, etc., and then there's a taste panel that taste the olive oil to make sure it's free from flavor defects," Colombini says.
Medical school aims to train doctors for Inland Empire
University of California Riverside School of Medicine opened last summer, in large part, to address the growing doctor shortage in the Inland Empire.
“We need physicians," says Dr. Ravi Berry, a pediatrician at the Riverside Medical Clinic who mentors Deedas. "If we grow our own they stay in the area."
KPCC's Elizabeth Aguilera reports UCR officials have been working to attract local students into the School of Medicine, in the hopes that they'll stay.
Read the full story: UC Riverside Med School eager to keep new doctors close to home
Maven orbiter reaches Mars' atmosphere
It took 10 months and 442 million miles, but last night, NASA's latest orbiter nuzzled up to Mars. Maven is now orbiting the Red Planet. It joins a growing fleet of scientific instruments sent to study our celestial neighbor.
KPCC science reporter Sanden Totten joins Take Two to tell us more.
Watch a replay: MAVEN orbiter meets the Mars atmosphere
Director Jen McGowan on the unlikely friendship at the center of 'Kelly & Cal'
The new film 'Kelly & Cal' focuses on a woman named Kelly (played by Juliette Lewis), who's just had a baby and moved to a new town. Finding herself lonely and isolated, she strikes up an unlikely friendship with her 17-year-old neighbor Cal (Jonny Weston).
First-time director Jen McGowan won this year's "Gamechanger Award" at SXSW for the film, and joins Take Two to talk about what drew her to the story.