"Homies" For The Offense?

I dunno, maybe I'm just too P.C. But doesn't anyone find the whole "Homiès South Central" line of clothing (and its $150 price tags), while an obvious parody of the luxury Hermès line, even a little bit offensive? Come on. "Homies"? South Central? It's not even subtle. I can guarantee you none of the Kitson shoppers sporting these sweatshirts would ever set foot in the real South Central... it's just... mind boggling.

The South L.A. Tree Massacre

(Pic via LA Weekly)

Sadly lost in the excitement about the arrival of the Space Shuttle Endeavour has been the move to chop down nearly 400 trees in L.A.'s poorest neighborhoods. The trees had to come down in order to drive the shuttle from LAX to the California Science Center -- yet there was never any discussion or warning that this would happen, and never an attempt to try an alternative. The L.A. Weekly looks into the lies and spin that led to the mass tree removal. A snippet:

Until the moment Inglewood residents awoke to buzzsaws outside their homes on Sept. 3, few people knew of California Science Center president Jeffrey N. Rudolph's controversial plan to hack down more than 370 magnolia, coral, bottlebrush, eucalyptus, sycamore and pine trees that line the 12-mile shuttle route from LAX.

"This is unbelievable!" well-known wetlands activist Marcia Hanscom says with disgust.

She views the destruction of nearly 400 trees — after zero public notice or involvement — as "symptomatic of deeper problems: Here in L.A., it's OK to bulldoze a wetland away because 'it will come back.' The same disconnected thinking leads to approval of something like this tree massacre: 'We'll just plant more!' "

Few people realize that the city and the museum got away with, well, tree murder, by abusing an obscure section of L.A.'s municipal code that was actually meant to protect, not destroy, trees. Those rules normally apply to "house moving."

A&E's 'The Peacemaker' Looks at L.A.'s Gang Wars

Ice-T is the executive producer behind A&E's new series "The Peacemaker: L.A. Gang Wars," a look at the battle between rival gangs in South L.A.

"The Peacemaker" centers on gang mediator Malik Spellman as he looks to hammer out truces between bitter enemies. A&E picked up five half-hour episodes of the show, which premieres tonight -- Thursday, Dec. 16 -- at 10 p.m.

Here's more on Spellman via A&E:

A violence prevention counselor by day, Spellman is on a mission to bring peace to the troubled neighborhoods he’s lived in for 30 years. For the last two decades, he has dedicated his life to ending gang violence, putting it all on the line to mediate truces between adversaries sometimes separated by less than one city block.

It's not light holiday programming.

Who Says Los Angeles Homes Are Overpriced?

A recent episode of TLC's "Flip That House" featured a home that sold for just $189,000! OK, granted, the home was 375 square feet... with no bedroom... and it was located in South Los Angeles.



Oh, and the house was scary. Real scary: Look at the bathroom above. The flipper completely gutted the place, redoing everything and adding two bedrooms (500 square feet, for a total of 875 square feet). He spent $90,000 on the flip, and put the house back on the market for around $385,000.

Makes our tiny Glendale house look a little more roomy. By the way, we were quite impressed by the speed with which the 500 square feet was added: By the end of two weeks, it was pretty much done! So why did it take nearly six months for our 400 square foot addition?