Free Republic

While growing up around Burbank, one of many suburbs butting up against Los Angeles proper, Melissa Perez and her friends would spend their summers riding around their neighborhood on horseback. “We were like the little brats on our horses,” Perez laughs. From early morning until sundown, the pack of young equestrians would sneakily traipse through the hills and horse trails tucked into Griffith Park, where they technically weren’t allowed to go. Perez would have such a blast that she’d sometimes forget to eat lunch, snacking on her horse’s carrots whenever she got peckish. The Burbank Rancho Equestrian District sits just...

Popular comedian and “America’s Got Talent” contestant Perry Kurtz died in a hit-and-run incident Thursday at the age of 73. The beloved comedian was involved in a fatal collision in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Tarzana at roughly 11:20 pm, according to TMZ. Initial reports indicate he died after a gray Honda Civic struck him. Members of the Los Angeles Fire Department pronounced Kurtz dead on-scene immediately upon their arrival, according to The New York Post. Sources connected to law enforcement said police have arrested a suspect on suspicion of felony hit-and-run causing death, according to TMZ. A press release...

Hello and happy Thursday. There are 81 days until the election, and today we are talking about stayin’ alive — for the Harris campaign, the Trump whatever-it-is and for us voters who have 11-plus weeks to go.And for democracy. Don’t forget democracy!First, I know you’ve seen the AI-generated video of Donald Trump and Elon Musk dancing to the Bee Gees’ “Stayin’ Alive.” Trump also posted it on his Truth Social, where truth goes to die. This bromance is hard to watch. Musk’s power and privilege seem to be veering him into Howard Hughes-weird territory, where his crazy theories are matched...

The suggestion that boxing could be missing from the 2028 Los Angeles Games is one of those historic moments for both sport and the Olympic Games. One of the founding sports of the modern Olympics, boxing has been a core component of every Reinstatement Games since 1904. It appeared in St Louis alongside other events like wrestling, but turbulence regarding governance, ethics, and sports integrity has it teetering. The following article digs into this history, why it led to an International Olympic Committee (IOC) decision, and what that means more widely in boxing within the Olympic movement.

Los Angeles lawman William Hammel tamed one of the West’s wildest towns with hard work and Horseless CarriagesPolice Chief Hammel, courtesy J.R. Sanders Los Angeles, California. Not everyone’s picture of a wild-and-woolly Western town—even though Wyatt Earp, who spent his last years there, claimed Tombstone in its heyday “wasn’t half as bad as Los Angeles.” Policing the City of Angels, and the 4,000-square-mile county of coastline, desert and mountains encompassing it, took a special breed of lawmen. Men like Billy Hammel. Native Angeleno William Augustus Hammel was born March 13, 1865. The son of a doctor and educated at Santa...

Perhaps I'm the only one who was kind of relieved to see the Olympic games draw to a close yesterday. For some reason I just found them to be extremely aggravating this year, sucking up all the headlines in the news cycle and featuring endless plaudits for two males who were beating up women in the boxing ring. (Excuse me... I understand we're supposed to call them "women with a Y chromosome" now.) But the curtain had barely fallen when people were already talking about the next summer Olympic Games in 2028. They will be coming to Los Angeles that...

A man is recovering after being brutally attacked and robbed earlier this month in downtown Los Angeles by a mob of young people on bicycles. Carlos Saucedo reports on Aug. 11, 2024.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said her city is working to make the Summer Olympic games car-free when they’re held in her city in 2028. “We’re already working to create jobs by expanding our public transportation system in order for us to have a no-car Games,” she said in a Saturday release. “And that’s a feat for Los Angeles, as we’ve always been in love with our cars. We’re working to ensure that we can build a greener Los Angeles.”

Two Southern California offices were named Tuesday in an Internal Revenue Services scandal where offices singled out Tea Party organizations during the 2012 election. Offices in El Monte and Laguna Niguel came under fire after allegedly targeting conservative social welfare groups with the words “tea party” or “patriot” in their names in the national scandal. IRS officials sent questionnaires to the groups, probing about their donor lists and requesting other information after the groups filed for tax exempt status.

BARSTOW, Calif. (KABC) -- A preliminary magnitude 4.9 earthquake struck the Barstow area Monday afternoon, rattling a large portion of Southern California, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The quake struck around 1 p.m. at a depth of nearly six miles. Shaking was felt in Calabasas, Los Angeles, Glendale and beyond. No injuries or damages were immediately reported.

Hollywood's video game performers announced they would go on strike Thursday, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. The strike — the second for video game voice actors and motion capture performers under the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists — will begin at 12:01 a.m. Friday. The move comes after nearly two years of negotiations with gaming giants, including divisions of Activision, Warner Bros. and Walt Disney Co., over a new interactive media agreement. SAG-AFTRA negotiators say...

Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa (D) will run for governor of California in 2026 after current Gov. Gavin Newsom reaches his two-term limit. The Los Angeles Times reported on Tuesday: Villaraigosa, who has been out of elected office since leaving Los Angeles City Hall in 2013, joins a crowded field of high-level Democratic candidates that includes Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis, former state Controller Betty Yee, state Sen. Toni Atkins, and state schools Supt. Tony Thurmond. All are vying to succeed Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is serving his second and final term in office.

After the motion was met with resentment, Democratic National Convention chairman Antonio Villaraigosa had to call the vote three times to reinstate language into their party platform that recognizes Jerusalem as the capital of Israel as well as the words "God-given" in a passage about employment

A Boston-based cybersecurity company has hired violent Los Angeles Antifa extremist Chad Loder as its Vice President of Security Solutions. Loder has a history of violent extremism and has been permanently banned from the social media platform X, formerly Twitter, for inciting violence. He has publicly supported domestic terrorists and cold-blooded murderers, including Antifa gunman Michael Reinhoel and Antifa bomber Willem Van Spronsen. Loder has been named the VP of Security Solutions at CyberSN and will work alongside the company's founder and CEO Deidre Diamonds, according to CyberSN, a cybersecurity workforce risk management and strategy group. [snip] Loder, a far-left...

Now that President Biden has dropped out of the 2024 presidential race and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to be the nominee, it will ultimately be up to Democratic National Convention delegates to formally select a new nominee for their party. While many associate the convention system with less-than-impressive nominees, such as the obscure senator Warren G. Harding, the record isn’t that bad. And even Harding managed to win the presidency

A new terrorist movement is emerging in America. Just as every cell in the human body has a complete copy of our genetic code, so too every terrorist rally is a microcosm of the entire movement threatening America, Israel and the world. The mob that converged on Congregation Adas Torah in a Jewish neighborhood in West LA was smaller than the thousands that had terrorized communities in New York and London, but all the elements that make up the pro-terror side were represented outside the synagogue. The PLO terror flags waved by the rioters represented more than just the cause...

A George Soros-funded district attorney cut a deal with a Los Angeles man to avoid prison time after an armed robbery, and now authorities are accusing him of murdering a tourist, the Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday. Prosecutors under the helm of L.A. County District Attorney George Gascon agreed to a plea deal with Leroy McCrary, which gave him a suspended three-year prison sentence after he was convicted of armed robbery, with McCrary now being accused of murdering a woman while out on probation, according to the L.A. Times. Left-wing billionaire George Soros’ California Justice & Public Safety PAC gave...

The alleged leader of an armed robbery crew charged with killing a New Zealand tourist last week outside Newport Beach’s Fashion Island mall had been placed on probation for stealing a Rolex at gunpoint in Santa Monica.He avoided prison time in that case after Los Angeles County prosecutors agreed to a three-year suspended sentence, according to interviews and records reviewed by The Times.Leroy Ernest McCrary, 26, now faces a special circumstances murder charge that could carry the death penalty after authorities allege he ran over Patricia “Trish” McKay, 68, during a July 2 robbery attempt.Orange County prosecutors say McCrary and...

Across the country, copper and other valuable materials have been stolen from streetlights, statues and even gravesites, costing millions to repair. The 6th Street Bridge in Los Angeles has been cast into darkness after its wiring was stolen.Credit... The 6th Street Bridge in Los Angeles is wired to glow with colorful lights celebrating the city’s spirit. But the bridge, known as the “Ribbon of Light,” goes dark at night now. So do stretches of the busy 405 freeway and dozens of street blocks across the city. In St. Paul, Minn., a man was recently hit by a car and killed...

Officials at Denver International Airport said United Flight 1001 -- a Boeing 757-200 -- landed at DIA just before 11 a.m. after a wheel on the rear landing gear fell off the plane upon takeoff at LAX. No injuries were reported among the 174 passengers or seven crewmembers. United says an investigation is now ongoing to determine what caused the wheel to fall off. The wheel has since been recovered in Los Angeles. Allen Stubblefield was traveling from southern California to Iowa with a connecting flight in Denver. He flies for work often and has never been part of an...