| November 3, 2009 | - A graduate student in California unveiled a hat that pokes you in the head if you don't smile.
| Source:
NY Daily News
|
| November 3, 2009 | - A man in Wales was jailed for using cameras hidden in smoke detectors to spy on the people who rented his cottage, and a shop assistant at a Christian bookstore in California was arrested for placing a hidden camera in the bookstore bathroom.
| Source 1:
BBC
Source 2:
Metro UK
|
| October 30, 2009 | - Abdullah Abdullah, presidential challenger to Hamid Karzai, announced that he was quitting the runoff election. In a choked-up voice he cited concerns about increased violence in Afghanistan and outrage at the fraudulent election process. The election was cancelled and Karzai was declared president. More U.S. troops died in Afghanistan in October than in any month since that war began eight years ago. A suicide bombing by Taliban militants killed six U.N. staff, and Major General Mike Flynn, director of intelligence for General Stanley McChrystal's headquarters in Kabul, warned that the number of insurgents in Afghanistan (many of whom were from other countries) was now between 19,000 and 27,000, a ten-fold increase since 2004. “I wouldn't say it's out of control right now,” Flynn explained, “but this is a California wildfire and we're having to bring in firemen from New York.”
| Source 1:
New York Times
Source 2:
Washington Post
Source 3:
Associated Press
Source 4:
Airforce Times
|
| October 29, 2009 | - Interstate 680 in California was closed after a pedestrian was repeatedly struck by passing cars, scattering pieces of the victim's body on all the lanes.
| Source:
CBS5
|
| October 28, 2009 | -
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger issued a letter vetoing a bill sponsored by San Francisco assemblyman Tom Ammiano (who recently told the governor to “kiss my gay ass”) in which “Fuck You” appeared as an acrostic.
| Source:
San Francisco Chronicle
|
| September 22, 2009 | -
California firefighters sawed through a dumbbell fastener after a man got his penis stuck in the fastener, where, over several days, it turned black and swelled to five times its original size.
| Source:
Daily Pilot
|
| September 21, 2009 | -
California scientists made paralyzed rats walk again.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| September 10, 2009 | -
California state legislator Mike Duvall, a Republican, resigned after he unwittingly bragged about having sex with much younger women--including one who wore “little eye-patch underwear”--into a hot microphone before a hearing.
| Source:
LA Times
|
| August 13, 2009 | - Thousands of Californians lined up for as long as two days to receive free physical exams and dental care.
| Source:
NYT
|
| August 1, 2009 | - The Army's base in Fort Irwin, California, was invaded by wild burros.
| Source:
San Jose Mercury News
|
| June 19, 2009 | - Young girls in Zimbabwe were trading sex for food, three boys in Dorset, England, stomped a baby deer to death, a 16-year-old boy in California was running for city council, and a 14-year-old boy in Germany was hit by a meteorite.
| Source 1:
BBC
Source 2:
BBC
Source 3:
NBC
Source 4:
Telegraph
|
| June 15, 2009 | -
California
scientists studying guppies found that evolution can take place in as little as eight years.
| Source:
Science Daily
|
| May 29, 2009 | -
President Barack Obama nominated Sonia Sotomayor, a Bronx-born, divorced, childless, diabetic, Hispanic federal judge on the U.S Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, to replace Justice David Souter on the Supreme Court. Analysts studying Sotomayor's decisions were unable to determine whether she would uphold Roe v. Wade, or whether she was distinctly pro- or anti-business, but much was made of a 2001 speech at the University of California at Berkeley in which she expressed hopes that a “wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life.” During the speech she also expressed fondness for “platos de arroz, gandoles y pernil,” a dish made with rice, beans, and pork. “Her word choice in 2001 was poor,” offered White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, but many Republicans were unconvinced. “The comments she made about the quality of her decisions being better than those of a white male—I mean, we need to go further into her record to see whether this is a trend,” said Senator John Cornyn (R., Tex.), one of 98 non-Hispanic senators, who was considered for the Supreme Court in 2005 but not appointed. Newt Gingrich, who in 2007 spoke out against bilingual education by suggesting that students should “learn the language of prosperity, not the language of living in a ghetto,” criticized Sotomayor via Twitter. “White man racist nominee would be forced to withdraw,” tweeted Gingrich. “Latina woman racist should also withdraw.”
| Source 1:
The New York Times
Source 2:
The New York Times
Source 3:
The New York Times
Source 4:
The Guardian
Source 5:
The Washington Post
Source 6:
The Los Angeles Times
Source 7:
Fox News
Source 8:
The White House
Source 9:
The New York Times
Source 10:
FJC.gov
Source 11:
Wikipedia.org
Source 12:
Leading the news
|
| May 26, 2009 | - The California Supreme Court upheld Proposition 8, thereby maintaining the state's ban on same-sex marriage.
| Source:
California Supreme Court upholds gay marriage ban
|
| April 26, 2009 | - The U.S. Centers for Disease Control declared a public-health emergency over an outbreak of swine flu that has infected at least 20 people in California, Kansas, New York, Ohio, and Texas. The virus is believed to have originated in Mexico City, where more than 149 people, all aged between 20 and 40, have died, and at least 1,300 people have gotten sick. Mexico's government closed all schools, universities, and zoos, canceled church services, soccer games, and bullfights, and banned visits to beauty salons and juvenile detention centers. Swine flu has been found in Canada, China, France, Israel, New Zealand, and Spain, prompting the World Health Organization to consider raising the pandemic alert level from 3 to 4 out of 6.
| Source 1:
New York Times
Source 2:
Yahoo News
|
| March 24, 2009 | - A sperm bank in California was running a sale on “select” sperm of which they have a “huge inventory.”
| Source:
Breitbart.com via Drudge
|
| March 5, 2009 | - A man accused of killing his girlfriend was shot inside a California
courtroom after he repeatedly stabbed the judge presiding over his case.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| February 28, 2009 | -
California declared a state of drought emergency.
| Source:
BBC News
|
| February 18, 2009 | - A man dressed as a clown in Redwood City, California, was arrested for impersonating a federal agent.
| Source:
SF Chron
|
| February 6, 2009 | - Furlough Fridays began at California state-government departments, forcing more than 200,000 employees to remain at home without pay. Ski resorts were offering Friday discounts to California state workers with valid identification.
| Source:
Breitbart
|
| February 5, 2009 | - Saying that “there is no reason only poor people should be infected” with malaria, Bill Gates opened a jar full of mosquitoes in front of a crowd of wealthy, influential attendees at the invitation-only Technology Entertainment Design (TED) conference in California. Gates later admitted that the mosquitoes were free of the disease.
| Source:
Fox News
|
| December 26, 2008 | - A man dressed as Santa Claus opened fire at his in-laws' Christmas Eve party in Covina, California, killing at least eight people before setting fire to the house and killing himself.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| December 1, 2008 | - A statistician in California said that humans would soon reach their maximum running speed. “Men are still on the upward trend,” said Mark Denny of Stanford University, but “they are getting near that plateau.” Horses and dogs are already running as fast as they can.
| Source:
Mercury News
|
| November 5, 2008 | -
California,
Florida, and Arizona passed propositions banning same-sex marriage.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| October 15, 2008 | - The Republican Party in Sacramento, California, removed the words “Waterboard Barack Obama” from their official website. “Some people find it offensive,” said county chairman Craig MacGlashan. “Others do not. I cannot comment on how people interpret things.”
| Source:
Sacramento Bee
|
| October 3, 2008 | -
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger emailed Paulson to say that he may need a $7 billion loan for the state.
| Source:
Los Angeles Times
|
| September 14, 2008 | - At least 25 people were killed and another 140 injured when a Metrolink commuter train crashed head-on into a freight train in the San Fernando Valley.
| Source:
Los Angeles Times
|
| September 9, 2008 | - Police in Fresno apprehended a man for breaking into a house, rubbing cooking spices on the body of one sleeping resident, and assaulting another resident with a sausage.
| Source:
The Fresno Bee
|
| August 31, 2008 | - A man concerned that he had injected air into his veins while shooting cocaine tried to amputate his own arm with a butter knife, and then a butcher knife, at a Denny's Restaurant in California,.
| Source:
CBS
|
| August 11, 2008 | -
Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, developed a material for use in invisibility cloaks.
| Source:
BBC
|
| July 26, 2008 | -
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill requiring that students in the state's public schools be taught about global warming.
| Source:
San Jose Mercury News
|
| July 18, 2008 | - The U.S. Census Bureau announced that the 2010 census will not count the estimated 780,000 same-sex marriages that will have by then taken place in California and Massachusetts.
| Source:
LA Times
|
| July 13, 2008 | - The U.S. Office of Thrift Supervision seized the IndyMac Bank of California, worth an estimated 32 billion dollars, after the bank's closure in the wake of mortgage industry collapse.
| Source:
AFP
|
| June 15, 2008 | - Responding to a Father's Day 911 call in Stanislaus County, California, about a man who was kicking and beating his toddler by the side of the road, police descended in a helicopter, shot and killed the man, and found that his son, beaten beyond recognition, was dead.
| Source:
Mercury News
|
| May 23, 2008 | -
Clinton insisted that her candidacy was still viable. “My husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right?” she offered. “We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California.”
| Source:
The New York Post
|
| May 16, 2008 | - The California Supreme Court struck down a state ban on same-sex marriage, surprising legal experts because six of the seven judges are Republican,.
| Source:
CNN.com
|
| May 2, 2008 | - Three northern elephant seals were found shot in the head, lying in pools of blood, in San Simeon, California, near the Hearst castle.
| Source:
The Los Angeles Times
|
| February 29, 2008 | - Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer, speaking before Congress following the recall of 143 million pounds of beef packed at the Westland/Hallmark plant in Chino, California, refused to support an outright ban on processing “downer” cows for food, even though such cows are by definition too weak or sick to stand.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| February 23, 2008 | -
Texas surpassed California to become the top producer of wind power, and oil men were cashing in on the boom. “We're number one in wind in the United States,” said Texas land commissioner Jerry Patterson, “and that will never change.”
| Source:
NY Times
|
| February 18, 2008 | - The whistle-blower website Wikileaks.org was removed from the Internet after a Swiss bank obtained an injunction against California Web hosting company Dynadot.
| Source:
BBCnews.com
|
| February 7, 2008 | - In the G.O.P. primaries on Super Tuesday, John McCain emerged as the likely Republican presidential nominee after winning California,
New York, New Jersey, and other “blue states”; Mike Huckabee won states in the South, and Mitt Romney won states in which he has owned a home. Romney later announced the end of his presidential campaign to an audience that moaned and cried “No, no!” “Size,” explained Romney, referring to the number of delegates pledged to McCain, “does matter.”
| Source 1:
Talking Points Memo
Source 2:
National Post
Source 3:
Breitbart
|
| February 3, 2008 | -
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger endorsed Republican candidate John McCain, while Schwarzenegger's wife, Maria Shriver, the niece of John F. Kennedy, endorsed Barack Obama.
| Source 1:
McCain Wins Schwarzenegger Nod
Source 2:
Maria Shriver endorses Obama
|
| January 26, 2008 | - Weusi McGowan, who was standing trial for robbery in a San Diego court, smeared his feces on the face of his lawyer and threw the rest at the jury box, where it hit the briefcase of juror No. 9. “That juror didn't even see it coming,” said the prosecutor.
| Source:
San Diego News 10
|
| December 2, 2007 | - President George W. Bush put forth a plan developed by mortgage lenders to freeze interest rates for some homeowners, and watched Hootie and the Blowfish perform “California Girls” for ex‒Beach Boy Brian Wilson.
| Source 1:
NYT
Source 2:
The Washington Post
|
| December 2, 2007 | - Khaled Hosseini, the author of the novel on which the film is based and a resident of California, implored the United States not to abandon Afghanistan. Without U.S. support, he wrote, “Afghanistan is doomed.”
| Source:
'Kite Runner' author urges US to hang on in Afghanistan
|
| November 25, 2007 | - Fourteen thousand refugees fled wildfires in Malibu, California,.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| November 9, 2007 | -
California was suing the federal government for preventing it from reducing car pollution.
| Source:
BBCnews.com
|
| October 26, 2007 | - Wildfires spread from north of Los Angeles to south of San Diego, killing at least seven people, consuming more than 1,800 homes, burning a half-million acres, setting Camp Pendleton afire, forcing about 300,000 San Diego residents to evacuate, and prompting California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to declare seven counties disaster areas and to mobilize the National Guard. At the Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego, typically home to the Chargers but a place of refuge for 20,000 evacuees during the fires, an air-conditioned medical tent was erected, a cell-phone provider offered free calls to anywhere in the United States, volunteers distributed coloring books and crayons to children, coolers brimmed with cold sodas, residents piled sandwich meat onto bread, and a massage therapist and acupuncturist set up shop. FEMA apologized for holding a fake press conference on the wildfires, with FEMA staffers posing as reporters. “Are you happy with FEMA's response so far?” asked one fake reporter. “I'm very happy,” said Deputy Administrator Harvey Johnson, “with FEMA's response so far.”
| Source 1:
Washington Post
Source 2:
Washington Post
Source 3:
MSNBC
|
| October 24, 2007 | - A couple in southern California was facing criminal charges for attempting to sell 375 pounds of bathtub cheese.
| Source:
Central Valley Business Times
|
| October 23, 2007 | - Former FEMA director Michael D. Brown, who now works for a disaster recovery company, was made available for comment regarding the wildfires raging in California,.
| Source:
PR Newswire
|
| September 25, 2007 | - A Rudy Giuliani supporter in Palo Alto, California, charged guests $9.11 per person to attend a fundraiser.
| Source:
CNN
|
| September 22, 2007 | - A University of Florida student was Tasered after his question for Senator John Kerry went on too long. An Ocala, Florida, man accused police of Tasering him after he refused to drop his Koran; police in Tustin, California, Tasered a 15-year-old autistic boy; and a Taser dart fired at a Vancouver, Washington, man ignited the cigarette lighter in his pocket, setting his pants on fire. Sales at Taser International were expected to reach $90 million this year.
| Source 1:
The Boston Globe
Source 2:
WRAL.com
Source 3:
OC Register
Source 4:
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Source 5:
Times Online
|
| September 14, 2007 | - Evening traffic slowed in Santa Barbara, California, as commuters watched the carcass of a 70-foot blue whale drift south along the highway.
| Source 1:
FOX
Source 2:
LAT
|
| September 7, 2007 | - A San Diego woman was reportedly considering a lawsuit against Southwest Airlines after she was asked to leave one of their flights because attendants deemed her skirt and sweater too revealing.
| Source:
ABCnews.com
|
| September 4, 2007 | - A convicted California voyeur sued police to get back his porn collection.
| Source:
Breitbart.com
|
| September 1, 2007 | - A vegetable grower in Fresno, California, recalled 8,000 cartons of salmonella-tainted spinach.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| August 30, 2007 | - Polling revealed that Democrats despise President Bush more than any other executive in history. “No one,” said Gary C. Jacobson, a political scientist at the University of California, San Diego, “comes close.”
| Source:
NY Times
|
| August 16, 2007 | - Baptist pastor Wiley S. Drake instructed his Buena Park, California, congregation to pray for the deaths of two members of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. “Let his days be few,” read the prayer, “and let another take his office. Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.”
| Source:
The Los Angeles Times
|
| July 18, 2007 | - Recently filed court documents described how Henry T. Nicholas III, the billionaire founder of Broadcom, built a $30 million underground sex bunker in Laguna Hills, California, and stocked it with prostitutes flown in by private jet.
| Source:
The Los Angeles Times
|
| July 17, 2007 | - A newborn was found in a trashcan at a Denny's in Anaheim, California; a 17-year-old girl with blood dripping down her legs was discovered nearby, having just shared a meal with her family.
| Source:
O.C. Register
|
| July 15, 2007 | -
Garbage was overflowing in parts of Oakland, California, after two weeks of dispute between Waste Management, Inc., and Teamsters Local 70. “It stinks,” said Oakland resident Jarod Smith.
| Source:
SF Chron
|
| May 18, 2007 | - Off the coast of Monterey, California, a new kind of sea anemone--small, white, and cube-shaped--was found inside a whale's corpse.
| Source:
LiveScience
|
| May 12, 2007 | - The editor of a California news website, explaining that editors and interns “are extremely demanding and produce inferior work,” hired two new reporters who will cover Pasadena from India.
| Source:
The Guardian
|
| May 3, 2007 | - The Republican candidates for the presidency debated at the Ronald Reagan Library in California. Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas said that the day Roe v. Wade was repealed would be “a glorious day of human liberty and freedom” and that the current tax system “ought to be taken behind a barn and killed with a dull ax”; Senator John McCain of Arizona claimed that he would “follow [Osama bin Laden] to the gates of hell”; Texas
Congressman Ron Paul said that not going to war in Iraq would have been “conservative,“ because ”it’s a Republican, it’s a pro-American, it follows the Founding Fathers. And besides, it follows the Constitution.” California
Congressman Duncan Hunter took responsibility for the border fence in San Diego. “It’s a double fence,” he said. “It’s not that little straggly fence you see on CNN with everybody getting over it.” “No one on this stage,” said former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, ”probably knows Hillary Clinton better than I do,” to which former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani replied: ”Oh my!” Collectively, the candidates invoked Reagan's name nearly 20 times.
| Source:
NY Times
|
| March 29, 2007 | - A California man was released from prison after serving five months for shooting an ostrich named Gaylord who had embarrassed him in front of women.
| Source:
San Francisco Chronicle
|
| March 23, 2007 | - And in the Mojave Desert, a wandering photographer in search of a striptease museum stumbled across an estimated acre of rotting food discarded by a food bank, including cases of eggnog and tooth whitener. “Creepy, spooky, gross, disgusting,” he said. “Filled with animals and bugs.”
| Source:
MSNBC
|
| February 8, 2007 | - An Irvine, California, police officer was found not guilty of charges that he ejaculated on a female motorist during an early-morning traffic stop. “She got what she wanted,“ explained the officer's lawyer. ”She’s an overtly sexual person.”
| Source:
OC Weekly
|
| January 17, 2007 | - A freeze destroyed as much as 75 percent of California's
citrus crop. “We may have to do without guacamole for a while,” said a Pasadena resident. “And we may be drinking our Coronas without limes.”
| Source:
AP via Cnn.com
|
| January 14, 2007 | - A California woman died from water intoxication after a water-drinking contest.
| Source:
L.A. Times
|
| January 4, 2007 | - The 110th Congress convened on Capitol Hill, and Representative Nancy Pelosi of California kicked off her tenure as America's first female speaker of the House with four days of parties dubbed “Pelosi-Palooza.” The festivities included a performance by singer Tony Bennett and an honorary street-naming in Pelosi's hometown of Baltimore. Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia disrupted the Congress's opening prayer with shouts of “Yes, Lord!” and “Mmmhmmm!” and Senator Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts mimed tipping a bottle to his mouth. Congress's first Muslim member took his oath on a Koran once owned by Thomas Jefferson, and a Buddhist representative swore in on no book at all.
| Source 1:
Washington Post
Source 2:
Washington Post
Source 3:
CBS News
Source 4:
AZ Central
|
| December 5, 2006 | -
Los Angeles gave the Owens River back to Inyo County, California, after diverting it for more than 93 years.
| Source:
Christian Science Monitor
|
| November 30, 2006 | - In California, former presidential candidate Michael Dukakis successfully led a fight against parking scofflaws.
| Source:
Los Angeles Times
|
| November 30, 2006 | - Conservative rabbis in Beverly Hills called for an end to the religious edict forbidding oral sex between men; anal congress, however, would still be forbidden.
| Source:
Los Angeles Times
|
| November 28, 2006 | - A “yearlong rash of nut robberies” ended when police recovered 136,000 pounds of stolen nuts with a street value of $400,000 from a warehouse in Sacramento.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| November 9, 2006 | - Midterm elections were held in the United States; the Republican Party lost its majority in the House of Representatives and the Senate. Six incumbent Republican senators, including Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, were defeated, and Santorum's daughter cried. Nancy Pelosi of California, who is expected to become the first female Speaker of the House, had lunch with President George W. Bush.
| Source 1:
Reuters via Yahoo!
Source 2:
MSNBC
Source 3:
Boston.com
|
| October 27, 2006 | -
Los Angeles admitted that it has 1.3 million outstanding parking tickets.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| October 24, 2006 | - Actress Mary Carey, star of such films as Pussyman's Decadent Divas 29 and Tit Happens, dropped out of the California gubernatorial race to care for her mother, a schizophrenic, who was injured while jumping from a four-story building.
| Source:
Yahoo News and IMDB.com
|
| October 24, 2006 | - Charlie Brown was running for Congress as a Democrat in Roseville, California.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| October 10, 2006 | -
California researchers found that women dress more fashionably when they are ovulating.
| Source:
Reuters
|
| October 3, 2006 | - President George W. Bush visited George W. Bush elementary school in Stockton, California, and promised to improve school safety.
| Source 1:
CNN
Source 2:
CNN
Source 3:
NBC12
Source 4:
MSNBC
Source 5:
Whitehouse.gov
|
| September 20, 2006 | - In California, accused pedophile John Karr was described by his lawyer as a “southern gentleman with a sense of humor.”
| Source:
New York times
|
| September 8, 2006 | -
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger apologized for saying that Cubans and Puerto Ricans were “very hot,” due to their mixed “black blood” and “Latino blood.”
| Source:
New York Times
|
| September 5, 2006 | - Researchers at the University of Southern California determined that celebrities exhibit higher rates of narcissism than the general population.
| Source:
Breitbart.com via the Drudge Report
|
| August 1, 2006 | - In California, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said Tony Blair should be named United Nations secretary-general when he steps down as prime minister. “It's a big job that he has right now,” Schwarzenegger said, “and I think whatever job he wants he will get, because he has such a great success rate at home and he has done such a remarkable job, I think.”
| Source:
CNN
|
| July 31, 2006 | - Hot weather killed 141 people (as well as 25,000 cattle and 700,000 fowl) in California, at least 170 people in France, Italy, and Spain, and dozens of racing dogs in Oregon, and shut down MySpace.
| Source:
CBS
|
| July 20, 2006 | - The United States agreed to buy a 29-foot-tall cross located on a hilltop in San Diego.
| Source:
NY Times
|
| July 19, 2006 | - Prosecuting attorneys in California and New York were trying to limit “gay panic” defenses in criminal trials.
| Source:
CNN.com
|
| June 22, 2006 | -
Daryl Hannah was forcibly removed from a walnut tree in South Los Angeles.
| Source:
Philadelphia Inquirer
|
| June 21, 2006 | - The Scripps Institution of Oceanography predicted that a massive earthquake will strike southern California some time in the next ten years.
| Source:
Discovery Reports via Google News
|
| June 2, 2006 | -
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger ordered 1,000 National Guard soldiers to the Mexican border.
| Source:
The Los Angeles Times
|
| May 25, 2006 | - In San Diego a man named Lawrence Christopher Smith was sentenced to 84 years to life in prison for shooting and killing a man named Dom Perignon Champagne.
| Source:
Sign on San Diego
|
| May 17, 2006 | - In Santa Ana, California, a homeless man was arrested after he told five boys he would cast them in a television commercial, then licked their feet.
| Source:
CBS News
|
| May 11, 2006 | - In California a 1,500-pound sea lion was biting people.
| Source:
SFGate.com
|
| May 11, 2006 | - Authorities in gas masks entered a residence in California to remove 98 guinea pigs, 84 cats, 27 dogs, 14 rabbits, three potbellied pigs, and one bird.
| Source:
AP via Breitbart.com
|
| April 26, 2006 | - After 15,000 tries a California scientist was able to teach starlings some grammar.
| Source:
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
|
| April 23, 2006 | - An Oakland, California, carpenter named Percy Honnibal was in trouble for carpentering naked.
| Source:
CNN.com
|
| April 4, 2006 | -
California legislators were considering a law that would make it a significant crime for a murderer to rape a victim's corpse; corpse rapists currently receive only 16 months of prison time for that portion of their crimes.
| Source:
RecordNet.com
|
| March 24, 2006 | -
German
scientists announced that cells from mice testes can act like embryonic stem cells; a private company in California said that it had achieved similar results with cells from human testes, and that it had grown new brain, heart, and bone cells from the human testes cells.
| Source 1:
CBS News
Source 2:
Reuters
|
| March 16, 2006 | - In California authorities were fitting gang members with GPS anklets.
| Source:
Reuters
|
| March 13, 2006 | - A 38-year-old California
clown kidnapped the 14-year-old girl who is carrying his child.
| Source:
NBC San Diego
|
| March 8, 2006 | - The House passed legislation that, if approved in the Senate, will make it far more difficult for states to put warning labels on food; under the new rules all warnings will be approved by the Food and Drug Administration. "What's wrong," asked Representative Henry Waxman (D., Calif.), "with our system of federalism?"
| Source:
Canada.com
|
| February 23, 2006 | - People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals criticized a teacher in Rosamond, California, for castrating a live pig in front of a high school group; a school superintendent countered that animal castration is an important skill for students to learn.
| Source:
LA Daily News
|
| February 1, 2006 | - A former postal worker shot and killed six people at a mail-processing center in Goleta, California.
| Source:
CNN.com
|
| January 18, 2006 | - In San Jose, California, Anna Ayala, who planted a severed finger in a bowl of Wendy's chili, was sentenced to nine years in prison. Her husband, Jaime Plascencia, who obtained the finger from a co-worker, was given more than twelve years.
| Source:
Wendy's chili-finger couple sentenced to prison
|
| January 17, 2006 | -
California
executed 76-year-old, blind, wheelchair-bound, mostly deaf, diabetic Clarence Ray Allen. "It's a good day to die," said Allen via a statement.
| Source:
AP
|
| January 13, 2006 | - Scientists announced that the Donner family had not actually been cannibals; it was in fact other pioneers, six miles away, who cooked and ate each other.
| Source:
SFGate.com
|
| January 4, 2006 | - An artist in California went to an abandoned mine shaft in a desert and bound his feet together with a long chain and a lock in order to sketch a self-portrait. He lost the key, however, and was forced to hop for 12 hours to get help.
| Source:
Boston.com
|
| January 2, 2006 | - It was flooding in California, and parts of Oklahoma and Texas were on fire.
| Source 1:
CBS News
Source 2:
Forbes.com
|
| December 31, 2005 | - A police officer in Fremont, California, was attacked by a pack of chihuahuas and was later treated for ankle bites.
| Source:
AP
|
| December 19, 2005 | - Tookie Williams was executed in California.
| Source:
CourtTV.com
|
| December 4, 2005 | - Two women told a reporter that Randy “Duke” Cunningham, the California
Congressman who resigned after he was found to have accepted bribes from defense contractors, once changed into pajama bottoms and a turtleneck sweater and offered the women champagne by the light of a lava lamp.
| Source 1:
Newsweek
Source 2:
KTLA
|
| December 4, 2005 | - In Fremont, California, Iron Crotch Grandmaster Tu Jin-Sheng pulled a rental truck several yards with his penis. “He's very special,” said student Shawnee Wang.
| Source:
Tri-Valley Herald
|
| November 28, 2005 | -
Representative Randy “Duke” Cunningham (R., Calif.) confessed to taking $2.4 million in bribes and resigned from office.
| Source:
CNN.com
|
| November 25, 2005 | - It was revealed that the investigation into illegal payoffs made by lobbyist Jack Abramoff involves not only Representative
Tom DeLay (R., Texas), but Representative Bob Ney (R., Ohio), Representative John Doolittle (R., Calif.), Senator Conrad Burns (R., Mont.), 17 current and former Congressional aides, and two former Bush Administration officials.
| Source:
Reuters
|
| November 19, 2005 | - Representative John Murtha (D., Pa.), called for the halt of U.S. troop deployments to Iraq. Duncan Hunter (R., Calif.), seeking to cut off debate over Murtha's statements, countered by proposing a measure that required that U.S. troops be brought home immediately. Jean Schmidt (R., Ohio) addressed Murtha, a decorated veteran and former Marine colonel who previously supported the invasion of Iraq, by quoting a Marine Corps reserve officer who told her that “cowards cut and run.” She was booed by Democrats. “You guys,” yelled Marty Meehan (D., Mass.), “are pathetic!” Harold Ford (D., Tenn.) ran across the House chamber's center aisle to the Republican side. “Say Murtha's name!” he shouted. Schmidt asked that her comments be struck from the record, and Hunter's resolution was rejected 403 to 3, with Murtha among those voting against it.
| Source:
The Washington Post
|
| November 10, 2005 | -
California
voters rejected four initiatives proposed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. “If I was to make another Terminator movie,” said Schwarzenegger, “I would tell Terminator to travel back in time to tell Arnold not to have another special election.” Schwarzenegger then visited China, where he was greeted by hundreds of flag-waving children.
| Source 1:
ABC News
Source 2:
BBC News
|
| October 30, 2005 | - Four fraternity members at California State University, Chico, were sentenced to jail time after one of their pledges died from "water intoxication"; during hazing the pledge was forced to drink several gallons of water.
| Source:
CNN.com
|
| October 27, 2005 | - Strange, vibrating lights were seen in the skies above California and Nevada.
| Source:
SF Gate
|
| October 25, 2005 | - In Los Angeles a man dressed as Sesame Street's Elmo was arrested for panhandling.
| Source:
ABC News
|
| October 10, 2005 | - Americans celebrated Columbus Day, except in Berkeley, California, where they celebrated Indigenous People's Day.
| Source:
LA Times
|
| October 1, 2005 | - A Fresno, California, man who stabbed a cross-dressing man to death with a pair of scissors was sentenced to only four years in prison after his attorneys argued that the murder was the result of "gay panic."
| Source:
Fox News
|
| September 14, 2005 | - A federal judge in California ruled that requiring students to recite the Pledge of Allegiance in public schools is unconstitutional. "Undoubtedly," read the court's decision, "the pledge contains a religious phrase."
| Source:
CNN.com
|
| August 22, 2005 | - A California
Army veteran and resident of the United States for 51 years was upset with J.P. Morgan Chase for repeatedly getting his name wrong in their credit-card database, misspelling "Sami Habbas" as "Palestinian Bomber."
| Source:
ABC News
|
| August 9, 2005 | - The Space Shuttle Discovery landed safely in California.
| Source:
BBC News
|
| August 4, 2005 | - A company in California was planning to sell human breast milk.
| Source:
BBC News
|
| July 16, 2005 | -
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger decided to quit his job editing muscle magazines, which paid at least $1 million a year. “I pledged to put the people of California front and center,” he said after receiving a great deal of press criticism.
| Source:
SF Gate
|
| July 14, 2005 | - The bones of a mammoth were found in Silicon Valley.
| Source:
SF Gate
|
| July 11, 2005 | - It cost $75 to bleach
your
anus in Los Angeles.
| Source:
The Village Voice
|
| July 6, 2005 | - It was announced that up to 4,700 birds, including burrowing owls, red-tailed hawks, and golden raptors, were being killed each year by a wind farm in Altamont, California.
| Source:
The Guardian
|
| June 3, 2005 | -
Scientists in California sequenced the genes of an extinct cave bear using material extracted from its teeth, and now plan to sequence the genes of Neanderthals. "I think it will work," said a scientist. "It is just a matter of time."
| Source:
BBC News
|
| May 31, 2005 | - In California, the owners of a chicken were fined for letting it cross the road; the fine was later dismissed.
| Source:
Herald Sun
|
| May 27, 2005 | - A road crew in San Jose, California, dug a fresh 10-by-15-foot pothole so that Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger could be photographed filling it.
| Source:
San Francisco Chronicle
|
| May 24, 2005 | - A San Diego doctor was training a dog named Ginger to detect cancer by sniffing human urine.
| Source:
Sign On San Diego
|
| May 24, 2005 | - Two teenagers in Marysville, California, hacked into their school's computer system to change their grades. They accidentally altered the grades of all 18,697 students in the school district, and were arrested.
| Source:
Monterey Herald
|
| May 22, 2005 | - Warren Beatty was wondering whether he should run for governor of California.
| Source:
ABC News
|
| May 19, 2005 | - A California man was arrested because he lived in a tent for two weeks in order to buy tickets to the new Star Wars movie; his doing so violated a requirement that, as a sex offender, he let police know if he changed lodgings.
| Source:
NCTimes
|
| May 13, 2005 | - Charlotte Spadaro, the former mayor of Beverly Hills, California, was in trouble for keeping 135 dogs and 30 cats in her home, and for filling a rental van with a ton of dead animals and leaving it out on the street.
| Source:
SFGate.com
|
| April 22, 2005 | - A Fresno, California, man was standing trial for killing nine of his children, seven of whom he fathered with his own daughters and nieces. “Jesus was a womanizer,” he explained.
| Source:
CourtTV.com
|
| April 18, 2005 | - Marla Ruzicka, an activist from California who made it her mission to count the number of civilian casualties in Iraq, was killed in Baghdad by a suicide bomber.
| Source:
Guardian
|
| April 15, 2005 | - Fewer than half of all Californians approved of the job Arnold Schwarzenegger was doing as governor.
| Source:
Guardian
|
| April 9, 2005 | - Millions—possibly billions—of butterflies were fluttering towards California.
| Source:
Biology News Net
|
| March 30, 2005 | -
Scientists in California developed a scale that can measure the mass of a cluster of xenon atoms. It turns out that they weigh a few zeptograms.
| Source:
BBC News
|
| March 23, 2005 | - A California woman, eating chili at a Wendy's restaurant, bit into a human finger. The finger had a manicured nail.
| Source:
Stuff.co.nz
|
| March 10, 2005 | - A San Diego woman died when her building was fumigated to kill termites.
| Source:
CNN
|
| March 6, 2005 | - Two community colleges in California halted their student-exchange program with Spain after Spain pulled out of the Iraq war.
| Source:
USA Today
|
| March 6, 2005 | - In California, a couple visiting an animal sanctuary to celebrate their pet chimp's thirty-ninth birthday were just about to cut into a birthday cake when two other chimps, presumably jealous, attacked. The chimps, Buddy and Ollie, bit off the sixty-two-year-old man's fingers, gouged out one of his eyes, ripped off his nose, hacked off a foot and parts of his lips, mutilated his buttocks, and tore off his testicles. The chimps also bit off his wife's thumb before they were shot and killed. The birthday chimp was unharmed.
| Source 1:
Newsday
Source 2:
The New Zealand Herald
Source 3:
SFGate
|
| February 11, 2005 | - The Supreme Court of California decided to allow mentally retarded
death-row
prisoners to appeal their cases.
| Source:
LA Times
|
| January 20, 2005 | - Hundreds of jumbo squid were washing up on beaches in California.
| Source:
CNN
|
| January 10, 2005 | - Storms ravaged California, where the resulting mud slides killed at least nine while dislodging boulders up to twenty-five feet in diameter.
| Source:
AP
|
| December 23, 2004 | - A California company shipped its first cloned cat.
| Source:
Mercury News
|
| October 16, 2004 | - Disabled, elderly, and sick people were lining up for hours hoping to get a flu shot; one woman in California died after she collapsed from exhaustion and hit her head.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| September 25, 2004 | -
California regulators announced that car makers must cut carbon dioxide emissions by 30 percent by 2016.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| September 14, 2004 | -
California banned necrophilia.
| Source:
Scotsman
|
| August 24, 2004 | - A lawmaker in California threatened to require performers in pornographic films to wear condoms.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| August 13, 2004 | - The California Supreme Court nullified gay marriages in that state, and
| Source:
San Francisco Chronicle
|
| July 23, 2004 | -
West Nile encephalitis killed a man in California, and
| Source:
Reuters
|
| July 23, 2004 | - officials there were considering closing national forests to prevent fires.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| July 12, 2004 | - Public-health experts said that 40 percent of the residents of Los Angeles County get no more than 10 minutes of exercise per week.
| Source:
Center for the Advancement of Health
|
| June 1, 2004 | - A judge in California ruled that the Partial-Birth Abortion Act is unconstitutional.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| May 26, 2004 | -
Malibu banned smoking on the beach.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| May 18, 2004 | - Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of California filed suit against a toy company that makes a bobblehead doll in his image; the company also makes dolls of other political figures, as well as celebrities such as Jesus Christ and Anna Nicole Smith.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| May 1, 2004 | -
California banned Diebold's electronic voting machines.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| April 23, 2004 | -
Diebold Election Systems was in trouble again for using insecure software in its voting machines in California.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| April 8, 2004 | - Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of California said that he would prefer state legislators to work part-time. "I like them when they're scrambling and they really have to work hard."
| Source:
New York Times
|
| March 2, 2004 | -
California's supreme court ruled that a Catholic charity must cover birth control in its employee health coverage.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| February 21, 2004 | - Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger ordered the California attorney general to put a stop to it, and declared that the city was becoming a "risk to civil order."
| Source:
San Francisco Chronicle
|
| January 30, 2004 | - The California Assembly was considering a proposal to incorporate feng shui into the building code.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| January 19, 2004 | - Several communities in California were competing to host the murder trial of Scott Peterson.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| January 3, 2004 | - State officials in California said they were unable to reveal the ultimate destinations of a large quantity of tainted soup bones, tenderloins, and other cuts of meat included in the voluntary mad-cow recall, because doing so would violate the beef industry's proprietary interests. Consumers were told simply to ask their grocers if their meat was infected. "I do think that the USDA has erred in its judgment," said a health officer in Alameda County. "It has sacrificed the public's health in favor of the beef industry."
| Source:
San Francisco Chronicle
|
| December 23, 2003 | -
California suffered an earthquake that measured 6.5 on the Richter scale; 3 people died when they were crushed by a clock tower.
| Source:
New Scientist
|
| December 19, 2003 | - Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a fiscal crisis in California and invoked emergency powers to deal with it.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| December 11, 2003 | - Moody's Investors Service downgraded California's credit rating after Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger cut the registration fee for automobiles without having a plan to pay for the change.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| December 4, 2003 | -
California banned the sale of the genetically altered "GloFish," a zebra fish that glows in the dark.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| November 26, 2003 | - Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of California proposed cutbacks in therapy for the mentally disabled and in AIDS and poverty programs.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| November 17, 2003 | -
Arnold Schwarzenegger was sworn in as governor of California.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| November 5, 2003 | -
President Bush, who has refused to comment directly on the daily casualties in Iraq and has not attended a single funeral for a soldier killed there, traveled to California to inspect the damage from the recent wildfires and was photographed hugging a woman who lost her home.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| October 27, 2003 | - Firestorms in southern California killed at least 13 people and drove tens of thousands from their homes.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| October 20, 2003 | - Attorney General Bill Lockyer of California admitted that he voted for Arnold Schwarzenegger. "I am just doing what is right," he said. "It's a new me."
| Source:
New York Times
|
| October 9, 2003 | -
Arnold Schwarzenegger was elected governor of California and told his son that being governor will be a lot like making a movie.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| September 18, 2003 | - Governor Gray Davis of California said that California has "people from every planet."
| Source:
San Francisco Chronicle
|
| September 17, 2003 | -
Los Angeles banned lap dancing.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| September 16, 2003 | - Arnold Schwarzenegger claimed to have been lying when he boasted years ago about having group sex; he said that he was just trying to impress people and promote body building.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| September 2, 2003 | - The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission announced a settlement with energy companies that benefited from market manipulation in the California
energy crisis two years ago.
The companies agreed to pay about $1 million in fines, or about 3 cents for every Californian, though the energy scam cost the state $8.9 billion, or $250 per citizen.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| August 23, 2003 | - The Earth Liberation Front destroyed a number of Hummers and other SUVs at a car dealership in West Covina, California.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| August 20, 2003 | - Mary Carey, the porn actress who is running for governor in California, offered to go on a date with anyone who contributes $5,000 to her campaign.
| Source:
Reuters
|
| August 13, 2003 | - Sylvester Stallone's mother said that her dogs, which she believes to be psychic, have predicted a victory for Arnold Schwarzenegger in the California recall election, and an apocalyptic Christian preacher named Jack Van Impe claimed that he had been contacted by Condoleezza Rice, who he said asked him for an outline of what the end of the world will be like.
| Source:
MSNBC.com
|
| August 5, 2003 | -
Arnold Schwarzenegger appeared on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno and announced his candidacy for governor in the California recall election; other candidates include the former child-actor Gary Coleman, the pornographer Larry Flynt, a porn star named Mary Carey, and Arianna Huffington, a newspaper columnist.
“This is America,” said Carey.
“I am just as dignified as Arnold Schwarzenegger, and I can speak English.”
| Source:
CNN.com
|
| July 19, 2003 | - Federal authorities said that 1,100 pounds of ammonium nitrate, the explosive chemical used to blow up the Oklahoma City federal building, were stolen from quarries in Colorado and California.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| June 30, 2003 | - A samurai swordsman killed two people in an Albertson's supermarket in Irvine, California.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| June 28, 2003 | - The court also ruled that a California law that retroactively abolished the statute of limitations on sex crimes is unconstitutional; California's attorney general said that the ruling will lead to the release of about 800 child molesters.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| April 8, 2003 | -
Alameda, California, laid off every one of its 635 teachers.
| |
| April 1, 2003 | -
Federal energy regulators concluded that the California energy crisis of 2000-2001 was created by widespread market manipulation and misconduct by Enron and 30 other energy companies but signaled that they were unlikely to overturn $40 billion worth of long-term contracts that resulted from the scheme.
| |
| March 18, 2003 | -
Governor Gray Davis of California apologized for the involuntary sterilization of 19,000 people by the state between 1909 and 1964.
| |
| March 11, 2003 | -
Scientists in California reported that Mars has a molten core.
| |
| February 4, 2003 | -
Resolutions opposing an American invasion of Iraq were passed in Multnomah County, Oregon; Cleveland, Ohio; Tacoma, Washington; Nederland, Colorado; Amherst, Massachusetts; and Topanga, California.
| |
| February 4, 2003 | -
Two boys in California were arrested for murdering their mother, cutting off her head and hands, and dumping the body in a ravine; the boys told police that they had learned their technique from The Sopranos.
| |
| January 21, 2003 | -
Administrators at the University of California at Berkeley refused to permit the Emma Goldman Papers Project to use the following Goldman quotations in a fund-raising letter: “In the face of this approaching disaster, it behooves men and women not yet overcome by war madness to raise their voice of protest, to call the attention of the people to the crime and outrage which are about to be perpetrated on them”; and “We shall soon be obliged to meet in cellars, or in darkened rooms with closed doors, and speak in whispers lest our next door neighbors should hear that freeborn citizens dare not speak in the open.” The resulting outcry shamed the university's chancellor into reversing the decision.
| |
| January 21, 2003 | -
Governor Gray Davis of California proposed spending $220 million on a new state-of-the-art death row.
| |
| December 31, 2002 | -
Syphilis was on the rise in California.
| |
| December 31, 2002 | -
A town in California was sold on eBay for $1.78 million.
| |
| December 10, 2002 | -
California lifted the statute of limitations on sex-abuse cases, angering Catholic bishops there.
| |
| November 19, 2002 | -
The Pentagon hired actors to play hecklers in a fake Arab town that was set up in southern California to help troops prepare for the Iraqi invasion.
| |
| November 12, 2002 | -
Federal investigators issued subpoenas to Duke Energy, Reliant Resources, and the Williams Company in connection with an investigation into price manipulations during the recent California energy crisis.
| |
| November 5, 2002 | -
American warplanes were practicing bombing runs in southern Iraq, and President Bush declared that Iraq “has made the United Nations look foolish.” New Hampshire was considering naming a mountain after Ronald Reagan, and a town in California was thinking of changing its name to “Got Milk?” The European Union unveiled a draft for a new constitution as part of a plan to add 10 new member nations; new names were also being contemplated, including “the United States of Europe.” Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, the former president of France, said that “we need a name which gets across our brand.”
| |
| October 15, 2002 | -
We're moving on.” A sign of the new orientation was the theme of the party conference: “Representing the Vulnerable.” The Bush Administration joined the automobile industry in opposing California's new requirement that manufacturers sell hybrid electric cars in the state to help satisfy emissions targets.
| |
| September 24, 2002 | -
A scientist from the City of Hope in California created genetically engineered flies that turn gay when it gets hot.
| |
| September 3, 2002 | -
A California man was arrested for torturing and dissecting his daughter's guinea pig because he thought it was a robot with a camera in its head sent to spy on him by government agents.
| |
| August 27, 2002 | -
Calling him “a good man” who can “bring a breath of fresh air” to politics, President Bush campaigned for Bill Simon Jr., a California candidate for governor who codirects an investment firm that was ordered to pay $78 million last month for fraud.
| |
| August 20, 2002 | -
Ed Headrick, the designer of the modern Frisbee, died in California.
| |
| August 13, 2002 | -
In Berkeley, California, 1,130 mothers nursed their children together at the Berkeley Community Theater and set a world record for suckling; the previous record was held by 767 mothers in Australia.
| |
| July 30, 2002 | -
Parents in California were complaining about a middle-school teacher who duct-taped her students to the floor to show them what it felt like to be on slave ships.
| |
| July 16, 2002 | -
The schoolgirl from California whose atheist father successfully challenged the constitutionality of the Pledge of Allegiance is a Christian and has no qualms about reciting the pledge, her mother told the press.
| |
| June 11, 2002 | -
Air Force Lt. Col. Steve Butler was suspended from duty for publishing a letter to the editor in a California newspaper in which he called President Bush “a joke.” President Bush was asked about the recent report by the EPA that contradicted many of his previous statements on global warming: “I read the report put out by the bureaucracy,” he replied, and then he reiterated his opposition to doing anything about global warming.
| |
| May 21, 2002 | -
A 13-year-old boy in California was facing jail time for shooting a spitball that accidentally hit another boy in the eye; the boy, who has a heart condition and has undergone heart surgery twice, was convicted of causing serious bodily injury and mayhem and could be sent to prison for eight years.
| |
| May 21, 2002 | -
The University of California at Berkeley established the Center for Peace and Well-Being.
| |
| May 21, 2002 | -
Medical
marijuana advocates were complaining about the quality of the government-grown pot being provided to patients in California.
| |
| April 30, 2002 | -
California's state assembly was considering legislation to limit the weight of school textbooks because of concerns about small children carrying heavy backpacks.
| |
| April 23, 2002 | -
An appeals court in California ruled that a “Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire?” contestant was not libeled when two radio announcers in San Francisco called her a “local loser,” a “big skank,” and a “chicken-butt.” The court said that the terms were “too vague to be capable of being proven true or false.”
| |
| March 19, 2002 | -
Eighty clowns turned out for the Million Clown March in Santa Cruz, California. After picketing aimlessly for a while, the group piled into three tiny cars and drove off. “For those brave enough to be out as clowns,” noted the organizer, “the world can be a cold and unwelcome place.”
| |
| February 26, 2002 | -
In Los Angeles a man was arrested for trying to carry a very large fire cracker onto an airplane.
| |
| February 12, 2002 | -
A federal appeals court in California declared that sentencing shoplifters to life in prison under the state's “three strikes” law was cruel and unusual punishment.
| |
| January 29, 2002 | -
A woman from Jacksonville, Florida, was taken in for psychiatric evaluation by police in northern California after she made some “unusual statements” at a hotel, thus interrupting her 10,000-mile taxi ride to Alaska.
| |
| January 15, 2002 | -
Redwoods in California appeared to be infected with a mysterious deadly fungus.
| |
| November 27, 2001 | -
Al Gore decided to become vice chairman of an obscure financial services company in Los Angeles after he failed to persuade anyone on Wall Street to hire him.
| |
| November 13, 2001 | - Federal agents, who now believe the anthrax to be the work of a lone domestic terrorist, still have not gotten around to locating all the labs in the United States where the bacteria can be legally handled, though they were busy cracking down on medical
marijuana in California and assisted suicide in Oregon.
| |
| October 16, 2001 | - Argenbright Holdings Ltd., an airport security contractor, was in trouble again for hiring convicted felons to screen passengers at Philadelphia International Airport; the company, which last year was fined $1.2 million and placed on probation for a related offense, has also committed major violations at La Guardia, Logan, Dulles, Los Angeles, and Reagan National airports.
| |
| October 9, 2001 | - Abdo Ali Ahmed, an American citizen, was murdered in East Reedley, California, for being an Arab.
| |
| October 2, 2001 | - Rodney King was arrested in California for exposing himself.
| |
| September 11, 2001 | - Sudden oak death, a mysterious disease that causes its victims to weep sap, was killing trees in California.
| |
| September 4, 2001 | - Secretary of the Interior Gail Norton placed America's oldest sanitary landfill on the National Register of Historic Places, right along with Walden Pond and Monticello, before noticing that the Fresno, California, dump was a federal Superfund site, whereupon it was stripped of its historic status.
| |
| August 28, 2001 | - A California appeals board ruled that a law prohibiting topless dancers from touching, caressing, and fondling their own bodies is an infringement of the constitutional right to freedom of expression.
| |
| July 17, 2001 | - A judge in California ruled that Kaiser-Permanente, a health-maintenance organization, did not have to cover prescriptions for Viagra, the popular anti-impotence drug.
| |
| July 3, 2001 | -
Californian matadors were fighting bulls, gently, with velcro-tipped banderillas.
| |
| June 26, 2001 | - Some California counties were paying poor people to move away.
| |
| May 15, 2001 | -
California was suffering from rolling blackouts.
| |
| April 10, 2001 | -
San Diego banned the use of the word “minority,” deeming it offensive to minorities.
| |
| April 3, 2001 | -
California executed Robert Lee Massie, who uttered the following last words: “Forgiveness.
| |
| March 27, 2001 | - Another teenager shot up a school in California.
| |
| March 20, 2001 | -
California's
Republican Party was trying to convince Arnold Schwarzenegger to run for governor.
| |
| March 13, 2001 | - A fifteen-year-old boy smiled as he murdered two classmates and wounded over a dozen others in Santee, California.
| |
| February 6, 2001 | - In response to the continuing energy crisis in California, President Bush continued to affirm that pollution was the solution.
| |
| February 6, 2001 | -
Mexico was selling fifty megawatts of power a day to California.
| |
| January 23, 2001 | -
California was forced to impose blackouts for the first time since World War II; George W. Bush said that he was opposed to price caps on wholesale power and suggested that California simply relax its environmental regulations and allow power companies to go full tilt. He recently gave the following analysis: “The California crunch really is the result of not enough power-generating plants and then not enough power to power the power of generating plants.” Much of California's electricity is produced by plants in Texas.
| |
| January 16, 2001 | - Governor Gray Davis of California threatened to take over power plants if necessary to get the state's electric supply under control; he said that energy
deregulation was “a colossal and dangerous failure.”
| |
| January 2, 2001 | - There were wildfires in Florida and California and on the Alaskan tundra.
| |
| 0, 2000 | - Scientologists were digging tunnels in southern California, which was still burning.
| Source 1:
The Valley Chronicle
Source 2:
The Guardian
|
| 0, 2000 | - the Navy made plans to alter the barracks at Naval Base Coronado in California after satellite imagery showed the buildings were arranged in a swastika.
| Source:
Los Angeles Times
|
| 0, 2000 | - An apparition of the Virgin Mary appeared on a football-sized rock in California, and the face of Christ was found in the wood paneling of the men's room of an Ikea in Glasgow.
| Source 1:
KansasCity.com
Source 2:
STV
|
| November 21, 2000 | -
California was running low on power again.
| |
| November 14, 2000 | -
California
voters approved a measure requiring drug offenders to be sentenced to treatment rather than prison.
| |
| November 7, 2000 | - Anthony Dwain Lee, an actor, was shot through a glass door by Tarriel Hopper, a Los Angeles
police officer, at a Halloween party, when Hopper arrived at the party in response to a noise complaint and saw Lee, through a glass door, holding a fake gun.
| |
| October 31, 2000 | - Montrose Chemical Corporation agreed to compensate
Californians for a gigantic DDT deposit just off the coast of Los Angeles, the result of thirty years of offshore dumping.
| |
| October 24, 2000 | - Aventis CropScience reached an agreement with government officials concerning the cleanup of California's Iron Mountain copper mine, one of the most toxic Superfund sites in America; water from the mine is so acidic it will dissolve a steel shovel in less than a day.
| |
| October 24, 2000 | - Richmond, California, unveiled a monument to Rosie the Riveter.
| |
| October 10, 2000 | - Thousands of Chinese who worked as slaves for Japan in World War II filed suit in California against Japanese companies that might have profited from their servitude; Japanese military occupiers enslaved over ten million Chinese on the mainland and some 50,000 in Japan.
| |
| October 3, 2000 | - The Los Angeles transit strike continued; some 500,000 mostly poor commuters were still stranded.
| |
| September 26, 2000 | -
Los Angeles transit workers were out on strike.
| |
| September 19, 2000 | - A police officer in California accidentally shot an eleven-year-old boy in the back with a shotgun during a drug raid.
| |
| September 12, 2000 | - A United Airlines passenger jet had to take evasive action near Los Angeles to avoid a collision with an F-117 stealth fighter jet.
| |
| September 5, 2000 | - The Supreme Court issued an emergency stay preventing California from allowing the medical use of marijuana.
| |
| August 22, 2000 | -
Police fired tear gas, pepper spray, beanbags, and rubber bullets into a crowd of protesters after a Rage Against the Machine concert outside the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles. According to one report, the police were tired and wanted to go home but hippies and anarchists refused to leave.
| |
| August 15, 2000 | - Oak trees were dying of a mysterious fungus in California.
| |
| August 8, 2000 | - DNA Sciences, a new dot com company in California, established a “gene trust” and invited people to volunteer DNA samples for scientific study; the company, which expects to make a profit, will not compensate DNA donors.
| |
| August 8, 2000 | - Argentine ants have formed a 600-mile-long colony in California.
| |
| August 8, 2000 | -
California was in the midst of a power shortage; residents faced the prospect of rolling black outs and many began, hesitantly, to question the wisdom of energy
deregulation.
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| August 0, 2000 | -
California farmers facing severe drought were increasingly dependent on dowsers, or “water witches,” to identify the best spots for drilling wells.
| Source:
The New York Times
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| July 25, 2000 | - In California, a federal judge ruled that the government had failed to present convincing arguments against the medical use of marijuana.
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| July 25, 2000 | - Hippies were said to be massing in the Californian desert in preparation for the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles; Mayor Richard Riordan promised to use rubber bullets if they tried any nonviolent civil disobedience.
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