Nation Jul 30 The changing face of California’s water war As California suffers through an historic drought, with penalties for wasting water going into effect this week, something unusual is going on: the state and the farmers seem to be agreeing on how to manage groundwater. Or how not to…
Health Jun 18 A new approach to death by snake Despite their notoriety, snakes -- according to some enthusiasts -- aren’t getting the attention they deserve, especially when they bite people, which they do with some frequency. The World Health Organization estimates that between 94,000 and 125,000 people die every…
Politics Jun 26 San Francisco Wakes Up to a Celebration for Same-Sex Marriage Sue Rochman, center, and Robin Romdalvik, right, with their son Maddox Rochman-Romdalvik celebrate upon hearing the U.S. Supreme Court's rulings on gay marriage at San Francisco City Hall. Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images SAN FRANCISCO -- 6:30 a.m. at City…
Politics Nov 01 An Election Off the National Radar A sign supporting Proposition 37, which calls for the mandatory labeling of genetically engineered foods, is seen in front of a home in Glendale, Calif., on October, 19, 2012. California could become the first state to enforce labeling of genetically…
Science Sep 18 Climate Change From Different Perspectives Anything dealing with climate change is bound to provoke an argument. And our story on Berkeley physicist Richard Muller's recent conversion to a believer in man-made global warming, which he made in an op-ed in the New York Times, certainly…
Science Sep 17 Climate Change Skeptic Says Global Warming Crowd Oversells Its Message // It was about 105 degrees in Chico, Calif., about three hours north of Sacramento, when we arrived at the offices of one of the nation's most read climate skeptics. Actually, Anthony Watts calls himself a pragmatic skeptic when…
Politics Jul 16 Corralling the Gay and Lesbian Vote Community activists attend a San Francisco fundraiser in June, raising money for one of the city's two major gay and lesbian Democratic clubs. Photo courtesy Reese Aaron Isbell. More than 30 years ago -- June of 1982 to be exact…
Politics Jul 13 California Prisoners, Politicians Ponder Impact of Supreme Court Ruling California Men's Colony; Creative Commons photo courtesy flickr.com/javan Prisoners probably pay more attention to the news - at least some of the news -than many of the rest of us. They have a lot of time on their hands.
Science Mar 25 The Panic Button: High-Tech Protection for Human Rights Investigators There's a panic button included in a software program provided by a Palo Alto, Calif.-based nonprofit called Benetech. The program itself is designed to safely store data about torture, murder, killings and other human rights abuses in countries around…
World Aug 27 Katrina Five Years Later: New Orleans Is a State of Mind It's very hard for me to separate my own experiences in the aftermath of Katrina from the flood of other impressions I've wallowed in since 2005. I've watched HBO's "Treme" and Spike Lee's "If God is Willing and…