All of the must-read news about the Golden State in one place.
Hi, I’m Mike McPhate, a former California correspondent for the New York Times. I survey more than 100 news and social media sites daily, then send you a tightly crafted email with only the most informative and delightful bits.
Each weekday at about 6 a.m., you’ll get an email like this.
Good morning. It’s Wednesday, May 20.
- San Diego mosque guard prevented graver tragedy.
- Multiple wildfires rage across Southern California.
- And Carpinteria is the quintessential weekend escape.
Statewide
1.
Xavier Becerra “is overly cautious.”
Steve Hilton is plagued by “the misguided belief he could accomplish big things without the Democratic Legislature.”
Tom Steyer “has made too many promises to too many interest groups.”
After months of messaging, news coverage, and debates, there is no clear successor to Gov. Gavin Newsom. New York Times Opinion assembled a panel of analysts from the worlds of academia, journalism, and policy to assess the candidates across a range of topics.
- A new poll showed Hilton and Becerra virtually tied at 22% and 21%. Steyer, who has been flooding TV, radio, and the internet with ads, appeared to still be alive at 15%. L.A. Times | CalMatters
2.
Therapists are seeing a surge in political anxiety as clients report feeling emotionally exhausted, fearful, and trembling with anger. Veronica Calkins, a Southern California therapist, said this is the first time in her career that she has seen people initiating therapy because of political anxiety. “It’s rooted in a lack of control or some kind of helplessness — that this is happening, and I am unable to influence the outcome,” she said. “No matter what I do, nothing is going to help.” Politico Magazine
3.
Panum Crater in the Eastern Sierra formed only about 700 years ago, making it a newborn in geological terms. When rising magma encountered groundwater, it generated steam that set off a cataclysmic explosion, blasting rock into the sky and leaving a crater half a mile wide surrounded by a ring of ash and pumice. The inner dome was formed as magma oozed out of the vent and hardened. NASA Earth Observatory shared recent satellite imagery of the “volcanic medley” of the Mono–Inyo Craters.
- A mellow trail follows the rim of Panum Crater, with brilliant views of Mono Lake. Here’s a nice trip report.
Northern California
4.
“Whale, 12 o’clock!”
A troubling rise in gray whale deaths from ship strikes in the San Francisco Bay led to the launch this week of new AI-powered detection technology that alerts mariners to slow down or reroute when whales are nearby. The system, called WhaleSpotter, relies on thermal cameras that scan the waters day and night for the warm breath of whales when they come up for air. Scientists say famished whales are increasingly entering the bay in search of food as warming temperatures disrupt the food web they rely on. Wall Street Journal | A.P.
5.
Google is changing its search box for the first time in 25 years. On Tuesday, the tech giant said artificial intelligence inspired it to overhaul the dimensions of the search field to be bigger, allowing longer questions and uploads of photos and videos in queries. The search engine will also include agents to help people track topics, make reservations, and monitor their health. “The future of Google,” wrote The Verge, “is a search box that does everything.” N.Y. Times | Bloomberg
6.
Once an internet joke, sperm racing has blossomed into a $50 million business. Reporter Daniel Waite Penny spent a week at the Sperm Racing offices in San Francisco for a report in New York Times Magazine:
“Sperm Racing seems to represent the final phase of a cultural transformation taking place in the tech industry. In the ’10s, Silicon Valley fostered a rapacious and disruptive business culture that nevertheless spoke in … progressive platitudes. The ’20s have proved quite different: The Valley has embraced an openly masculine and competitive posture — or at least it wants to project that image. And here in one start-up was its most bluntly literal expression.”
7.
In 2020 and 2021, the award-winning French documentary photographer Maxime Riché visited Paradise to tell the story of the community’s survivors after California’s deadliest fire. “Some still cling to a personal mythology specific to the pioneer cultures of the American West,” he told a French magazine. Others, he said, seemed unable to escape. He shot on infrared film, transforming greens to red, evoking flames. The photos, collected in a new volume titled “Paradise,” are haunting and gorgeous. Lenscratch
- See more from “Paradise.” 👉 MaximeRiche.com
Southern California
8.
Amin Abdullah, who was among the three men killed in the Monday attack on the Islamic Center of San Diego, felt he had a calling in his job as a security guard to keep people safe. When he saw the two teenage gunmen, he reached first for his radio, ordering a lockdown, then for his firearm, engaging in a shootout, Police Chief Scott Wahl said on Tuesday. After the gunfight, the attackers entered the mosque and found the rooms locked or empty. The delay, Wahl said, allowed time for everyone to get into hiding: “His actions, without a doubt, delayed, distracted, and ultimately deterred these two individuals.” N.Y. Times | Times of San Diego
- Hawaa Abdullah, a daughter of Abdullah’s, said he took the job so seriously he would skip meals: “He wanted to save his food until after he left the job because he was afraid that if he went on his break, something bad would happen.” S.D. Union-Tribune
- Here are ways to help the victims.
9.
The authorities said the young perpetrators in the San Diego mosque shooting — Cain Clark, 17, and Caleb Vazquez, 18 — met online, where they bonded over shared hatreds. When they decided to kill, they livestreamed themselves in a video that later circulated around the internet. A 75-page manifesto, apparently written by the gunmen, espoused animus toward Jews, Muslims, Blacks, and gays. In one passage, purportedly written by Vazquez, he complained about being short and his lack of success with women. N.Y. Times | CNN
10.
At least 10 wildfires burned across Southern California on Tuesday, forcing fresh evacuations in Riverside and San Diego counties. Four civilians and two firefighters were injured, officials said. At one point, three civilian drones forced the grounding of firefighting aircraft in the Jurupa Valley. The largest active blaze was on Santa Rosa Island, which fire officials deprioritized to focus on mainland blazes threatening homes. By late Tuesday, it had spread to more than 27 square miles, nearly a third of the island. KTLA | L.A. Times
- Track the fires across California.
11.
In May, the Leona Valley in the high desert west of Palmdale is usually humming with families who come to pick cherries from one of the agricultural region’s popular U-pick cherry farms. This year, the farms are empty. The weather has been so warm that the trees produced no fruit. In Los Angeles County, average temperatures in the six months from October were the warmest on record in 131 years. One orchard owner said it was the first crop failure in 23 years. L.A. Times
12.
Carpinteria, a quiet beach hamlet tucked between Ventura and Santa Barbara, is easy to miss. But, according to a travel piece in the New York Times, it is “the quintessential weekend escape.” In short, Carpinteria is a Beach Boys song, the piece said:
“It’s a town of fish tacos and aguas frescas and a highly walkable main street and Victorian bungalows that all seem to have been sealed in a bubble. A town where shaggy-haired teenagers skateboard to the beach, and little kids run around in pajamas before bed.”
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