Newsletter: Today: Let It Snow. Or Rain. How About a Sprinkle?
On Christmas Day in California, the weather is frightfully dry as a whole — with no end in sight.
TOP STORIES
Let It Snow. Or Rain. How About a Sprinkle?
Last rainy season, California’s northern Sierra Nevada had the wettest winter on record. This year, not so much. And in Southern California, the situation is even drier. A mass of high pressure in the atmosphere is directing storms away from the state, and no one knows for sure how long it will last. Scientists say it’s all part of a larger pattern of higher fall temperatures and less rain over the last seven years.
Can a Pardon Keep Them From Being Deported?
Call it Christmastime clemency. Gov. Jerry Brown granted 132 pardons and commuted 19 sentences over the weekend in what’s become a tradition around this time of year and Easter, focusing mostly on those who had run-ins with the law years ago. Two Cambodian refugees were among those pardoned; Brown said they had paid their debts to society and now lived upright lives. Their lawyers hope the pardons will shield their two clients from deportation. Though the results have been hit and miss, more immigration attorneys are looking for gubernatorial pardons as a last-ditch effort to help people stay in or move back to the U.S.
More Politics
-- President Trump launched a Christmas Eve attack on FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, whom he accuses of favoritism toward his former opponent, Hillary Clinton, and bashed the news media. Trump also claimed, “People are proud to be saying Merry Christmas again” after he “led the charge against the assault of our cherished and beautiful phrase.”
-- What did Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin receive for Christmas? Someone sent a package of manure to his Bel-Air home.
Hollywood Gets Less Than Full Marks for Attendance
Some days it seems Hollywood never met a sequel or remake it didn’t like. The same can’t always be said for audiences, who look online for what’s good and often prefer to stream their entertainment. So despite huge numbers for “Star Wars: The Last Jedi,” as well as strong turnout for films like “Beauty and the Beast,” “Wonder Woman” and “Girls Trip,” movie ticket sales in the U.S. and Canada in 2017 are expected to drop just below last year’s record of $11.38 billion. Even more alarming for the film business: The number of tickets sold is projected to drop to the lowest level since 1995.
The Naughty, Nice and Perplexing History of ‘Santa Baby’
How do you make a Christmas song sexy? Phil Springer remembers when he and collaborator Joan Javits got the assignment to create such a tune for Eartha Kitt, he was going to turn it down. Instead, Javits came up with a title, “Santa Baby,” which Springer says inspired him to write the music in 10 minutes; it’d take Javits about three weeks getting the lyrics just right. But to this day, Springer still isn’t quite sure why the song has remained popular.
Inside the Rough and Tumble World of Archaeology
In 1992, paleontologist Richard Cerutti made a startling discovery near San Diego. In an excavation of mastodon bones, he unearthed evidence of humans living in North America more than 100,000 years earlier than anyone had thought possible. But would anyone accept the findings? Twenty-five years later, he and his team would find out.
MUST-WATCH VIDEO
-- The SpaceX Falcon 9 launch offered a dramatic show over L.A. Some people thought it was an alien invasion.
-- This Chino Hills businesswoman goes all out with her Christmas decorations, and her 65 trees are just the start.
CALIFORNIA
-- Columnist Steve Lopez looks at “a kind of middle-class homelessness”: living in a vehicle in Santa Barbara.
-- About 1,800 people paid tribute to Cory Iverson at his funeral. The firefighter died battling the Thomas fire.
-- A Santa Monica school district’s conflict of interest investigation has grown to include three of the board’s seven members, a school district official has confirmed.
HOLLYWOOD AND THE ARTS
-- Film critic Kenneth Turan says director Ridley Scott’s achievement with “All the Money in the World” goes beyond replacing Kevin Spacey at the eleventh hour.
-- The Miss America Organization suspended its CEO after leaked emails surfaced showing him and others disparaging the appearance, intellect and sex lives of former Miss Americas. A day later he resigned.
-- Njideka Akunyili Crosby will become the second artist to wrap the entire facade of the Museum of Contemporary Art in downtown L.A. with one of her works.
CLASSIC HOLLYWOOD
It’s been 20 years since “Seinfeld” introduced Festivus, the “festival for the rest of us.” The Times took a look at “9½ fun Festivus facts” back in 2013 that are still relevant today.
NATION-WORLD
-- A federal judge has ordered that a U.S. citizen accused of fighting for Islamic State and being held without charges in Iraq must be allowed to meet with a lawyer.
-- Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital has received sharply different reactions from Christians in the Holy Land versus American evangelicals.
-- Peru’s president has granted disgraced former President Alberto Fujimori a pardon on humanitarian grounds, but suspicions abound.
-- These ruins on a remote Irish island are a well-known heritage and tourist attraction, but they’ve also become a pilgrimage site for “Star Wars” fans.
BUSINESS
-- How long can the stock market‘s record-breaking rally keep going? Most analysts are optimistic about next year, at least.
SPORTS
-- The Rams clinched their first division title since 2003, and the Chargers’ playoff hopes are still alive.
-- Santa Anita’s horse racing season, starting Tuesday, may be the most critical in the track’s more than eight-decade history.
OPINION
-- Who’s been bad and who’s been good this year? Boy, have we got a list.
-- Warren Olney asks: What are people really afraid of if they say the homeless make them feel unsafe?
WHAT OUR EDITORS ARE READING
-- In Sitka, “The Nutcracker” gets a rural Alaskan twist. (NPR)
-- J.R.R. Tolkien created an illustrated letter for his children every Christmas. (The Guardian)
-- Down the rabbit hole: A cartographer explores Google Maps’ incredibly detailed depiction of structures. (Justin O’Beirne)
ONLY IN CALIFORNIA
A loggerhead sea turtle with a broken shell and twisted spine has made quite a journey over the last four years: rescued from the canal of a New Jersey power plant, transferred to a facility in South Carolina and then on to the Birch Aquarium in La Jolla for rehabilitation. Recently she was fitted with a 3-D printed brace to fill in part of her shell — the perfect gift for the holidays.
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