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Virtual pioneer Jaron Lanier warns: Machines make bad masters
February 7, 2010
"People have to be able to make money off their brains and their hearts," Jaron Lanier was telling me. "Or else we're all going to starve, and it's the machines that'll get good."
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Denial is a familiar road for Toyota
February 4, 2010
Here's my Toyota sob story.
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Better oversight could cure doubts of stem cell project
February 1, 2010
It's never pretty to see people get blown up by their own bombs. But it sure can be educational.
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IPad less than revolutionary for now, but holds great promise
January 28, 2010
Only Steve Jobs could make anticlimax seem so fascinating.
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Stop looking to feds to cure California's budget crisis
January 25, 2010
Our political leaders trot out new and more creative excuses for their failure to get the state's fiscal house in order every day, but one hardy perennial was recently aired again by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
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Bailout tax short on penalties, deterrents
January 21, 2010
In almost every criminal case -- at least the ones that get ripped from the headlines and end up on "Law & Order" -- there's a point when the D.A. offers a plea bargain.
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Bailout tax short on penalties, deterrents
January 21, 2010
In almost every criminal case -- at least the ones that get ripped from the headlines and end up on "Law & Order" -- there's a point when the D.A. offers a plea bargain.
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Casual purchase of counterfeit DVD shines light on piracy
January 4, 2010
About a week before Christmas, I took a stroll around the Los Angeles Toy District and bought a pirated DVD.
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Peter Drucker's revolutionary teachings decades old but still fresh
December 31, 2009
The mark of a truly revolutionary thinker is that his revolution has to be fought anew in every generation.
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PG&E ballot measure is a stealthy power play
December 28, 2009
On the face of it, nobody should find anything objectionable to the Taxpayers Right to Vote Act, a proposed initiative now awaiting certification to go on the state ballot.
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A plan for getting California's fiscal house in order
December 27, 2009
Charles Dickens would have been flummoxed by the Golden State in 2009. It was the worst of times, pure and simple, with no "best" to balance out the ledger.
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Internet sales tax scofflaws cheat state
December 24, 2009
On this glorious day before Christmas, I have a message for all you sales tax scofflaws out there:
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Landlords' pullback puts L.A. Toy District at risk
December 21, 2009
This being the yuletide season, I made my way to the downtown Los Angeles Toy District the other day, because nothing says "Christmas" to me so much as stepping over piles of garbage to cross the street and shouldering my way past overflowing dumpsters in busy alleys.
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Biotech bonanza lurks in healthcare reform bills
December 17, 2009
The debate over healthcare reform is focused on such a small number of hot issues -- should there be a public option, Medicare buy-in, government-paid mental health counseling for Sen. Lieberman? -- that dozens of other questions are cruising under the radar.
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Are we being shortchanged by TARP repayments?
December 14, 2009
The headlong rush by big banks to pay back their TARP bailout loans -- Citigroup is the latest candidate looking for the exit -- has prompted a lot of stock-taking about this widely detested $700-billion program.
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Tiger Woods' path to redemption has been blazed by many who preceded him
December 12, 2009
Since Tiger Woods first hit a fire hydrant outside his home, the most curious thing about l'affaire Woods has been the golf star's clumsy handling of the fallout.
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State's school funding process is failing
November 19, 2009
Anyone who has spent time in or around government, from the deeply embedded bureaucrat to the young policy wonk, knows that there are two important issues in funding a public program.
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U.S. Census Bureau data on the medically uninsured simply can't be denied
September 17, 2009
Pity the medically uninsured in America. As if they don't already have enough to worry about, now they've become a political football.
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Will U.S. learn its healthcare reform lesson from California?
September 14, 2009
The difference between a government program that works and one that fails spectacularly can be razor thin. A few words here, a loophole there, and you can turn a boon for the consumer into a windfall for big business.
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Coffeepot maker vents about doing business in California
July 30, 2009
Wilbur D.Curtis invented the globular glass coffeepot, that staple of coffee counters everywhere, in 1940. Since then his son and grandsons have turned Wilbur Curtis Co. into a manufacturing concern that earns revenue approaching $100 million by turning out commercial coffee brewing equipment from a sprawling factory in Montebello.
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CalPERS appears to be a willing victim
July 27, 2009
Students of the fine art of pointing fingers know that the key thing is to not make yourself look like an idiot in the process.
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File California tax system revision effort under flawed
July 20, 2009
In these budget-crisis days, when California citizens showing true public spirit are thin on the ground, I propose a tip of the hat to Gerald L. Parsky.
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It's time to close a big tax loophole for businesses
July 13, 2009
Of all the ways in which California residents have slit their fiscal throats over the last 30 years, surely the most inexplicable is the bestowal of a gaping tax loophole on commercial and industrial property owners.
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Mercury General using guise of benevolence to assault Prop. 103
July 2, 2009
The art of setting automobile insurance rates is incomprehensible to most of us civilians. Liability coverage, comprehensive insurance, assigned risk pools, discounts, surcharges . . . the list goes on. Just try to figure out how your carrier arrived at the figure at the bottom of your itemized bill -- I know nuclear physicists who can't do that math.
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A California tax on oil drilling? Why not?
June 15, 2009
The most persistent misconception about Californians is that we hate to raise taxes. The truth is that we adore raising taxes -- as long as someone else is paying, that is.
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In-N-Out: Can perfection survive?
May 7, 2009
My life as a fast-food consumer pretty much ended the moment my kids became old enough to drive themselves to the nearest hamburger stand.
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Credit card companies as evil villains? It's not that simple
May 4, 2009
Is there any business in the United States more vilified than credit card lending?
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Apple's condition linked to Steve Jobs' health
January 5, 2009
Some important questions can't be asked without sounding crass and insensitive. But there's no way around asking this one that's on everybody's mind, so here goes:
