Category: 1-HeadlineNews

Mj Rodriguez has busted through a tough barrier as the first transgender performer nominated for an Emmy in a lead acting category. Now that she’s wrapped up her successful run in the hit FX show “Pose,” will there be more great mainstream opportunities for trans performers in the future?

“Pose” took us into New York’s LGBTQ ballroom scene amid the AIDS crisis of the 1980s and early ‘90s, and Rodriguez brought it all together as Blanca, the mother of the House of Evangelista. Regardless of whether she wins the Emmy next month for outstanding lead actress in a drama series, she’s already made history.

Today’s episode continues our collaboration with our sister podcast “The Envelope.” Rodriguez talks about her background as a musical theater performer and Berklee-educated songwriter, the night she learned that the part of Blanca was hers and how she feels the doors are opening up for trans performers. Plus we’ve got a clip of her new single.

More reading:

How Mj Rodriguez and Billy Porter are saying goodbye to ‘Pose’

‘Pose’ cast celebrates Mj Rodriguez’s historic Emmy nomination: ‘About mf’n time’

Queer actors are finally playing queer roles. Next up? More chances to play it straight

 

Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Trevor Bauer hasn't played a Major League Baseball game since late June, when a woman received a temporary restraining order against him after alleging that consensual sexual encounters turned into sexual and physical assaults on two occasions. Bauer has not been charged with any crimes and denies the allegations, and a judge denied last week a request to make the restraining order permanent. 

But the controversy has cast a harsh light on sexism in baseball, which has been present in the sport since its start and continues to plague the national pastime. And this time, the reaction seems different. 

More reading:

What we know about the Trevor Bauer case, and what we’ll never know

2021 hindsight: Inside the Trevor Bauer disaster and how the Dodgers got here

Commentary: Trevor Bauer, faced with report of previous protective order, plays old card: Bullying

Today we talk about California’s huge role in influencing gun control laws in the U.S. and about the backlashes. We discuss the state’s historic 1989 ban on assault weapons and why a federal judge recently issued an order to overturn that ban. And we talk to the mayor of San Jose, who wants his city to be the first in the United States to require gun owners to buy liability insurance. Gun rights advocates are already threatening a lawsuit.

More reading:

California’s long history on assault weapons on the line in court battle

The judge upending California’s gun laws: ‘Blessed’ jurist or ‘stone-cold ideologue’?

Biden huddles with local officials over gun violence as ownership rises

Democrats and progressives helped Alex Villanueva rise to power back in 2018, excited about his left-leaning campaign promises. But that support did not last long. The sheriff has been criticized over his response to issues including homelessness, COVID-19 and police brutality, as well as transparency and reinstating fired deputies.

The Sheriff Civilian Oversight Commission, a sitting county supervisor and the Democratic Party have called for him to step down. He’s up for reelection next year, and he doesn’t agree with the criticism.

Today, we run a condensed version of a conversation Villanueva had on “Los Angeles Times Today” with host Lisa McRee.

More reading:

Column: Sheriff Villanueva is angry — at elected officials, at the L.A. Times, at lawlessness

‘Running against the woke left’: Can Sheriff Villanueva’s shift to the right work in L.A.?

Op-Ed: Villanueva’s bogus Venice ‘outreach’ is just a cover for criminalizing homelessness

The Dixie fire is now the largest single wildfire in California history. At more than 600,000 acres, it’s been burning in Northern California for over a month and has destroyed more than 500 homes in areas that never imagined wildfires to be a year-round risk.

That inferno continues at the same time that the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has released its bleakest report yet, saying: “It is unequivocal that human influence has warmed the atmosphere, ocean and land.”

Today, we welcome our good-natured Masters of Disasters — L.A. Times earthquake reporter Ron Lin, coastal reporter Rosanna Xia and wildfire reporter Alex Wigglesworth — to make sense of these dark and hot times.

More reading:

Dixie fire generates fire whirl, pyrocumulonimbus cloud at 40,000 feet

PG&E power line suspected in Dixie fire was set to be buried underground in safety move

California builds a ‘Noah’s Ark’ to protect wildlife from extinction by fire and heat

Today, we continue our collaboration with our sister podcast “The Envelope” and its host Yvonne Villarreal. In this episode, she talks with Hannah Waddingham about Waddingham’s Emmy-nominated performance in “Ted Lasso,” the feel-good Apple TV + comedy series that centers on the upbeat, fish-out-of-water American coach of an English soccer team. Waddingham plays the coach’s initially vindictive and cynical boss, Rebecca.

Waddingham also discusses her turn as the “Game of Thrones” nun who infamously yelled “Shame! Shame!” at Cersei Lannister, recounts how doors have opened for her during her career and reflects on her childhood as the daughter and granddaughter of opera singers.

More reading:

Those biscuits in ‘Ted Lasso’ look delish. Not so much, says Hannah Waddingham

‘Ted Lasso’s’ Christmas episode wasn’t part of the plan. Here’s how they pulled it off

‘Ted Lasso’ isn’t just a TV show. It’s a vibe

Today we talk to L.A. Times education and science reporters about the full reopening of schools, which will affect millions of families in California and beyond. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention mostly OKed this reopening, with the provision that everyone should mask up in schools and, if 12 or older, be vaccinated against COVID-19.

But what if your kids are younger than that? How about if they develop symptoms or come into contact with someone who tested positive for the coronavirus? What safety measures should schools be prioritizing?

More reading:

California students are going back to school. We answer parents’ most pressing questions

‘Que locura,’ this is madness. First-day-of-school delays frustrate students and parents

$350 million. 1,000 healthcare workers. 500,000 tests weekly. Inside L.A. Unified School District’s virus testing effort

President Biden wants 40 percent of new cars to be electric by 2030. As automakers race to meet demand, they're setting off a mining rush worldwide from rare earth and critical metals. Cobalt, lithium, manganese and nickel here in the United States are hard to come by, but exist in sensitive habitats like the ocean floor and indigenous land. Now, environmentalists and activists are questioning whether electric cars are the wisest way to tackle climate change. In this episode we take you to the lithium mines of the Western U.S. in Nevada, to the geothermal vents of California’s Salton Sea, and to the seafloor of the Pacific Ocean.

More reading:

California’s electric car revolution, designed to save the planet, also unleashes a toll on it

Column: I was going to buy an all-electric car but chickened out. Here’s why

Good luck getting a state rebate on your new electric car

Black police officers are facing new challenges in the current atmosphere around policing, especially in the wake of George Floyd’s murder and the many demonstrations against police brutality that have taken place over the last 18 months.

In addition to heckling from activists on the streets, some of whom call them traitors, Black officers experience internal racism within the police department — which has always existed but has surfaced in new ways since last year’s protests began.

Today, Officer Michael Silva talks to L.A. Times reporter Kevin Rector about why he joined the Los Angeles Police Department, what he’s experienced and where he thinks we can go from here.

More reading:

For a Black LAPD officer, police reckoning brings pressure from protesters and fellow cops

In court, BLM says LAPD ‘failed completely’ to punish officers in protest abuses

Police Commission reinstates one of LAPD’s first Black officers, undoing 120-year-old injustice

2019 analysis: LAPD searches Blacks and Latinos more. But they’re less likely to have contraband than whites

Corn is a part of modern life in all sorts of ways: It fattens up livestock and gets turned into biofuels. We eat it on the cob, as grits, polenta and tortillas, and as syrup that sweetens so many other foods.

Most of the corn used in the U.S. is sprayed with weed killers such as glyphosate and is genetically modified to survive those weed killers and to create bigger yields — controversial practices.

Mexico, corn’s birthplace, imports millions of tons of U.S. corn each year. But there’s about to be a dramatic change. The nation is preparing to shut its doors to GMO corn and ban glyphosate. Today we talk with reporter Renée Alexander, as well as the head of a company that’s devoted to buying from Mexican farmers who grow non-GMO corn, about what that means for both Mexico and the United States.

Host: Gustavo Arellano

Guests: Journalist Renée Alexander and Masienda founder and CEO Jorge Gaviria

More reading:

Mexico is phasing out imports of glyphosate and GMO corn

Champion of poor or demagogue? Mexico’s president remains popular

Court upholds $25-million verdict against maker of glyphosate weed killer Roundup