Good morning -- here's what's happening

A bad day here at the L.A. Times as the largest layoffs in the newspaper's history, demanded by Tribune Co.'s new owner, hit the newsroom. We're losing 150 journalists. Another 100 layoffs are taking place in the rest of the newspaper. With banks imploding and bombs exploding, this is hardly the most important news of the day. I just wanted you to know what's happening here; didn't want you to think we would hide it or minimize it or try to explain it away. Our story, with a rundown of the $8.2-billion debt load that has triggered these cuts, is here.

So, on to the rest of our world here in SoCal:

Lines around the block as nervous investors rush to get their cash out of failed IndyMac.

Will "the King of Beers" lose a bit in translation, now that Budweiser brewer Anheuser-Busch has been snapped up by InBev of Belgium?

So far, convicted murderer Susan Atkins and her family are pretty much the only ones who think her plea for "compassionate release" is worth granting.

A new car insurance pricing plan is being floated in California: pay by the miles driven. Pros: lower premium costs and less car usage. Cons: even more of your personal information in the hands of corporations.

Why no one wanted to "Meet Dave."

The steroid era of baseball fades away as a new crop of kids take to the diamond in the All-Star Break.

--Veronique de Turenne

Comments

[joshooi]

This is bound to happen at LA Times. I have found that all the news in the Times today are skewed and basically has lost the trust of most readers. LA Times are afraid of issues like immigration, state of the state government, or the city's government. During these hard times, it is important that we force upon our leaders to sacrifice and act.. yeh.. what do they do.. just freeze their fat salaries with all the benefits while the rest of us are loosing. Name me one year where their salaries are cut, I mean cut not freeze. They are the CEO's of the state and the cities and they have run it to the ground yet.. we the people just ignore all these issues. The US is really out of touch with the developing world and this impede our competitiveness.