Good morning -- here's what's happening 7.24.08
So, the Governator's playing hardball. After our lolligagging state legislators once again breezed by their deadline to pass a state budget, Arnold Schwarzenegger has prepared an executive order to balance the books on the backs of 200,000 state workers by rolling back salaries to $6.65 an hour, the federal minimum wage. The governor may not get the pay cut, but he certainly has everyone's full attention. Looks like he got what he wanted.
Three SoCal mortgage lenders -- Countrywide, New Century Financial, and IndyMac -- will face a grand jury in a federal investigation into possible fraud and other crimes.
Meanwhile, Downey Financial, which carried a big share of subprime loans, is starting to look a bit shaky.
Need some good news? Wildlife is making a comeback at Mono Lake 14 years after L.A. was ordered to stop slaking the city's thirst with the lake's water.
Why did the AP tests of 400 kids at Trabuco Hills High School in the O.C. get tossed out? Maybe because the kids talked, used study aids, texted each other and left the classrooms in groups.
Helene Elliott thinks that bench-clearing brawl at a WNBA game -- well, the passion behind it -- may actually be a good thing.
Do you believe? Does anyone? That's the question facing the "X-Files" movie opening Friday, six long years after the series folded.
The MTA wants to put a sales tax on the November ballot, which is never as easy as it sounds.
O.C.'s new top cop, Sandra Hutchens, plans to take back the 400 sheriff's badges handed out to wealthy and well-connected civilians by her predecessor, Michael S. Carona.
Payments to thousands of Medi-Cal facilities are frozen by the state, just another byproduct of our state legislature's casual way with a budget deadline.
Eric Robinson paid for a crime he never committed. Now Angelenos are paying Robinson $1.75 million for the 14 years he spent in jail as an innocent man.
-- Veronique de Turenne
Photo: Associated Press
