Disney a rencontré une dernière fois le réalisateur James Gunn (“Les Gardiens de la galaxie”) afin de lui confirmer son licenciement pour avoir publié des propos polémiques sur Twitter.

L’affaire est entendue ! Selon Variety, après une ultime discussion avec le réalisateur James Gunn, le président du studio Disney Alan Horn a pris la décision définitive de le licencier. Il y a environ un mois, d’anciens tweets du metteur en scène des Gardiens de la Galaxie avaient refait surface dans lequels il se moquait de sujets comme le viol ou la pédophilie. Des personnalités de droite et d’extrême droite avaient décidé de faire ressurgir ces messages afin d’épingler publiquement le réalisateur, fervent opposant à Donald Trump.

La réaction de Disney ne s’était pas fait attendre et aujourd’hui le couperet tombe : James Gunn n’est plus le bienvenu dans la maison de Mickey. Certains producteurs de Marvel Studios avaient rencontré Disney afin d’essayer de faire plier le studio, et les acteurs avaient affiché leur soutien au réalisateur par une lettre ouverte. Rien n’y a fait.

Qu’en pense Kevin Feige ?

Le producteur Kevin Feige n’était pas en ville lors de l’ultime rendez-vous entre Gunn et Disney, ce que Variety interprète comme un signe de son accord avec la firme. Dès son retour, Feige va devoir trouver un remplaçant à Gunn pour la mise en scène des Gardiens de la Galaxie 3, qui devait commencer son tournage début 2019.

Il est très probable que le script de James Gunn, terminé, soit conservé pour le film, mais le nouveau réalisateur devrait y ajouter sa patte avant que le coup de clap ne soit donné. Repartir avec un scénario neuf reviendrait à perdre du temps pour Marvel Studios, qui devrait changer de date de sortie envisagée pour Les Gardiens de la Galaxie 3 (2020), le temps qu’un nouvel auteur se penche sur cet univers que James Gunn connaissait comme personne, puisqu’il en était l’adaptateur depuis les origines.

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1/11

Sen. Kamala Harris, center, speaks to the media after addressing hundreds of airport workers, Uber and Lyft drivers, janitors, and city and county workers preparing to march on Los Angeles International Airport in a job action on Oct. 2.  

(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

2/11

Sen. Kamala Harris reacts to a supporter after a rally in North Las Vegas on March 1.  

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

3/11

Sen. Kamala Harris speaks at a Planned Parenthood event during the state Democratic Party Convention in San Francisco on May 31. 

(Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times)

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Sen. Kamala Harris speaks at Los Angeles Southwest College on May 19. 

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

5/11

Sen. Kamala Harris speaks at the Human Rights Campaign gala in Los Angeles on March 30.  

(Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times)

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Sen. Kamala Harris speaks at a campaign rally in Ankeny, Iowa, on Feb. 23.  

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

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Sen. Kamala Harris at a campaign rally in Bettendorf, Iowa, on Feb. 24.  

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

8/11

Sen. Kamala Harris campaigns in Irmo, S.C., on Feb. 16. 

(Logan Cyrus / For The Times)

9/11

Sen. Kamala Harris announces her presidential bid at a rally in her hometown of Oakland on Jan. 27. 

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

10/11

Star Jones and Sen. Kamala Harris at the Black Enterprise Women of Power Summit in Las Vegas on March 1.  

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

11/11

Sen. Kamala Harris gets a backstage hug from her godson, Alexander Hudlin, before kicking off her presidential campaign on Jan. 27 in Oakland. 

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

Kamala Harris quickly made the most of her national role when she arrived in the U.S. Senate three years ago, electrifying Democrats as an assertive antagonist toward the incoming Trump administration. That self-assurance set the foundation for her presidential run.

But her forceful demeanor belied the risk-averse approach to politics that she’d long established in California. Those competing instincts were among the main obstacles blocking her quest for the Democratic nomination. On Tuesday, Harris abandoned the campaign.

In the end, she lacked a central reason to run, beyond ambition and a notion — expressed by advisors and others close to the senator — that now was her moment, and she should seize it. A core argument for her candidacy or a deep set of convictions would have lent ballast to her campaign. Instead, voters would repeatedly walk away from events enthused about Harris, but wondering what she believed in and stood for.

“The problem ultimately was one of rationale and purpose,” said Paul Maslin, a Democratic consultant with a long track record in California politics. “Who was she? Why was she running? I don’t think it was clear.”

The daughter of a breast cancer researcher from India and an economist from Jamaica, Harris, 55, had plenty of attributes to make her a singular political figure, not least her racial background and relative youth in a crowded Democratic field dominated by white septuagenarians. Her career as a former California attorney general, San Francisco district attorney and violent-crime prosecutor in Oakland offered law-and-order credentials that, in theory, could play well in a general election against President Trump.

But her candidacy was felled by the enduring strength of former Vice President Joe Biden’s support among African Americans. As a woman of color running to be commander in chief, she was especially burdened by the fraught politics of race and gender. A poorly structured campaign gave way to infighting and public feuding.

Her failings aside, Harris was to a considerable extent a victim of these political times and the obsession Democrats have with defeating Trump. She was an inspiration to many voters, especially African American women, who were thrilled by the promise of her candidacy.

But this is no time for idealism, many said, suggesting the country was too racist and misogynist to elect anyone but an establishment white male — a cold-eyed calculation that has worked to Biden’s benefit.

Ultimately, though, her campaign ended because of the most common of reasons: lack of money. After a holiday weekend in Iowa of trying to chart a path forward amid growing challenges, Harris made the decision on Monday to quit the race and announced it to supporters in an email on Tuesday morning.

“I’ve taken stock and looked at this from every angle, and over the last few days have come to one of the hardest decisions of my life,” she wrote.
Underscoring how hastily the end had come, a super-PAC formed by former Harris aides had just begun spending $1 million on television advertising in Iowa when the news broke. The group immediately canceled the ad buy.

The TV spot focused on what made Harris a national star: her lacerating questioning of Trump appointees in Senate hearings. Voters often cited those moments on the campaign trail, relishing the idea of Harris similarly eviscerating Trump in the general election. Harris herself argued she was best fit to prosecute the case against Trump.

“I have taken on Jeff Sessions, I’ve taken on Bill Barr, I have taken on Brett Kavanaugh,” Harris said in her final Democratic debate. “I know I have the ability to do that.”

Throughout the campaign, Harris distinguished herself best in tightly choreographed settings, such as her flashy launch rally in downtown Oakland before more than 20,000 people.

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Most consequential was her deftly executed takedown of Biden in the first Democratic debate over his fight against mandatory school busing as a U.S. senator in the 1970s. Her emotionally charged recollection of being bused across Berkeley as a young girl to a mostly white elementary school left the former vice president nearly speechless. Her poll numbers spiked afterward.

“I thought that campaign was really going to take off from there,” said Aimee Allison, founder of She the People, an advocacy group promoting women of color in politics.

But in the following days, Harris lost the moral high ground as she mangled answers to questions about whether busing would remedy today’s racial inequities in education.

For longtime Harris watchers, the lost momentum was symptomatic of a mushiness that predated the 2020 campaign. In California, Harris’ cautious instincts meant she lacked a strong public presence on controversial issues of the day, particularly on criminal justice matters.

In her 2016 Senate race, Harris branded herself as “fearless,” a purposeful attempt by her campaign to compensate for perceived timidity.

Aides say Harris shed some of her bet-hedging tendencies in the Senate as she took on Trump with heated rhetoric. In a hyper-partisan Congress, she was free from the tightrope she’d walked as attorney general in clashes between law enforcement and civil rights groups.

Still, Harris’ reluctance to take bold stands in California hobbled her entire presidential run. A few days before her Oakland rally, the New York Times published a damaging op-ed by Lara Bazelon, now a law professor at the University of San Francisco, who faulted Harris for opposing criminal justice reforms or staying silent as they were debated.

“It was deeply problematic for her to use the word ‘progressive’ to describe her prosecutorial record, because it was so profoundly inaccurate,” Bazelon said Tuesday.

If Harris had described herself as “a pragmatic law-and-order centrist,” Bazelon said, that would have been consistent with the “fairly conservative, cautious positions she took as D.A. and attorney general.”

While detractors saw waffling, supporters described her style as deliberate and steeped in preparation.

“The bar was higher for her, as a woman and a person of color,” said John A. Pérez, former California Assembly speaker, who advised her campaign.

One of her biggest missteps was on healthcare. Harris was an early backer of “Medicare for all,” aligning herself with the party’s progressive flank. After she flippantly said she would do away with private insurance during a CNN town hall, her campaign offered confusing explanations. She ultimately released a plan that embraced aspects of Medicare for all, but allowed for some private insurance. The plan came under attack from both progressives and moderates.

The campaign’s disorganization was reflected in its ever-shifting mottos (“For the people,” “Justice is on the ballot” and “Dude gotta go,” alluding to Trump) and messages, at times contradicting each other. Harris rejected her progressive opponents’ calls for big structural change, emphasizing instead a “3 a.m. agenda” of solutions to pocketbook worries that keep Americans up at night. But she also proposed eliminating the Senate filibuster to pass a $10-trillion climate change program.

Some of the mixed signals were due to strife among her campaign staff, insiders said, including a disagreement between Harris’ sister, Maya, the campaign chairwoman, and other senior aides on how to navigate the senator’s criminal justice record. The operation was structured with two heads — Maya Harris and campaign manager Juan Rodriguez, who is also a partner in the consulting firm run by her top advisors — which slowed decision-making.

“As a candidate, she had all the right attributes, and in the moments a campaign doesn’t fire on all cylinders, candidates and their campaign infrastructure have to share in that responsibility,” Pérez said.

Harris often boasted that she had never lost an election, but the massive scale of a California campaign can be hard to translate to the small states with early presidential contests.

“Iowa and New Hampshire are the anti-California,” said Don Sipple, a strategist for former Gov. Pete Wilson’s ill-fated 1996 presidential run. “You have to develop a relationship where you sit in people’s living rooms, you attend coffee klatches eight or 10 times, where they get to know you. That doesn’t happen in California.”

Not all of Harris’ troubles were self-inflicted. The campaign originally was planned around a strong showing in South Carolina, where black voters exert tremendous influence. But Biden has maintained solid support among black voters, to the detriment of Harris and New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, the remaining black candidate in the race.

“Biden has most of them, and the ones he doesn’t have were not automatically going to go to Harris or Booker just because they are black,” Maslin said.

The ascendance of Pete Buttigieg, the little-known mayor of South Bend, Ind., undercut Harris’ strength with big-money donors. Susie Tompkins Buell, a top San Francisco fundraiser for Democrats, was an early supporter of Harris, but also was drawn to Buttigieg.

“He is showing great leadership by the effectiveness and harmony in this campaign,” Tompkins Buell said Tuesday. “He started slowly and has steadily developed and grown. It has felt organic. Kamala burst on the scene and couldn’t sustain.”

As Tuesday drew to a close, a Harris aide posted a video on Twitter of the former candidate dancing in her Baltimore headquarters with campaign aides.

Harris, looking more lighthearted than she had in weeks, shimmied and sang along as a Beyoncé song played. Its title: “Before I Let Go.”

Times staff writers Mark Z. Barabak and Seema Mehta contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — 

Before she announced an impeachment inquiry against President Trump in September, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi worried it might provoke a backlash from voters who thought Congress had better things to do.

That didn’t happen. Instead, voters headed straight for their partisan corners: Democrats rallied behind impeachment, Republicans closed ranks behind Trump.

It’s unlikely that Pelosi ever saw impeachment winning enough converts in the Republican-controlled Senate to make Trump the first U.S. president to be removed from office. The GOP appears, if anything, more united behind Trump now than before the process began.

But the televised impeachment hearings served an unexpected purpose that should give hope to Democrats desperate to beat Trump next year.

The proceedings provided a preview of the Democrats’ most powerful argument against Trump. If you have any doubt, look at the House Intelligence Committee report released Tuesday.

It argues that Trump has abused presidential power for his own personal and political gain. He has hijacked foreign policy and obstructed justice. He has destroyed institutions and undermined alliances. He is unfit for office.

The unspoken message: Impeach first, then vote him out of office.

“Trump is facing the worst political scenario he could,” Republican strategist Mike Murphy, a frequent critic of the president, told me. “This is turning into the world’s longest campaign commercial to not reelect Donald Trump.”

Even if the Senate votes to acquit Trump in a trial, the likely outcome at this point, it could help mobilize Democratic voters next fall.

“They’ll turn out like crazy,” Murphy said. “Trump will be stuck on the defensive…. It’s a net plus for the Democrats.”

Democratic strategist David Axelrod, who helped Barack Obama win the White House in 2008, says the turmoil that constantly surrounds the president — including impeachment — may prove his undoing.

Impeachment will hurt Trump because “it adds to the overall perception of chaos that surrounds him,” he told me. “If Trump loses [in 2020], it will be because people decide that we just can’t do this for another four years.”

Axelrod warned his fellow Democrats against broadening impeachment into a collection of partisan grievances against Trump.

“The best thing Pelosi and other Democrats can do is continue to play this absolutely straight … and avoid playing into the Republican narrative that this is all a politically motivated, bloodless coup,” he said.

Pelosi and her lieutenants never planned to make impeachment part of the 2020 campaign; indeed, they spent months tiptoeing around it.

No longer. A new impeachment-focused video by House Democrats is aimed against Republicans in Congress, some of whom could be vulnerable next year if they stand by the president.

Democrats who fretted that impeachment would backfire, the way it did against Republican lawmakers who impeached Bill Clinton two decades ago, can probably breathe a sigh of relief.

In 1998, most voters didn’t think Clinton’s impeachment was warranted. This time, the public is more closely divided.

A polling average compiled by the political website Five Thirty Eight this week found that 48% of Americans favor the president’s impeachment and removal, against 44% opposed.

Almost all Democrats favor Trump’s removal, almost all Republicans are opposed, and independents are divided. About 1 in 10 voters, depending on the poll, say they haven’t decided or don’t know.

But Democrats appear more united and more intense in their feelings than Republicans. Almost half of all voters, most of them Democrats, say their view of Trump is “very unfavorable.” Only about a third say their view of the president is “very favorable.”

There are still lots of unknowns, of course. No president has ever sought reelection after being impeached. And no challenger has ever run a presidential race during an impeachment trial. Both appear likely to happen.

If the Senate holds a trial in January, before the first primaries, it will pull several candidates off the campaign trail, including Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and Amy Klobuchar.

Moreover, if the country is transfixed by a dramatic trial, the winners won’t get as much positive media attention as they normally would.

So expect jousting in the Senate over whether the trial should be fast or slow.

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If the Democrats see no prospect of convicting Trump, they may seek a quick trial. If Republicans want to complicate the Democratic primaries, they may look to slow-roll it.

But once the trial ends, even a Trump acquittal may help the challenger, not the president.

That’s what some analysts believe happened in 2000, almost two years after Clinton’s acquittal. He wasn’t up for reelection, but his vice president, Al Gore, lost in a race so tight it was decided by the Supreme Court.

“The conventional wisdom is that the impeachment of Bill Clinton helped the Democrats, but my view from inside the Gore campaign is that it helped the Republicans,” Tad Devine, a strategist who worked for Gore, told me. “It allowed George W. Bush to promise that he would restore honor and dignity to the White House — and it worked.”

In the impeachment case against Trump, the jury is still out. But so far, the evidence is weighing mostly against the president, not his accusers.

WASHINGTON — 

Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Torrance) is listening to every impeachment podcast he can as he drives around his district. Rep. Mike Levin (D-San Juan Capistrano) catches up with news clips at the end of each day and watches snippets from the Intelligence Committee’s public hearings on his flights back and forth from Southern California.

Rep. Salud Carbajal (D-Santa Barbara) pores over a white binder with every scrap of impeachment information his staff can find. He wants the research categorized and annotated as he prepares for one of the biggest decisions of his life, whether to impeach President Trump.

“I’m trying to devour as much as I can within the limited spare time that I have,” Carbajal said. “I’m trying to be as thorough and as educated as I can, because it’s that important of an issue.”

Congress’ probe of Trump’s actions toward Ukraine and whether they justify impeaching him is quickly moving into a new phase this week as the action shifts to the House Judiciary Committee. That panel is scheduled to start formal impeachment proceedings Wednesday with a hearing featuring constitutional law experts designed to educate members on what exactly is impeachment and what actions by a president merit that punishment.

The hearing provides a tacit acknowledgment that many people — even members of Congress — may not fully grasp what impeachment is. So before the next steps begin, let’s review.

Who will House Judiciary Committee members hear from?

The committee is bringing in four experts, Noah Feldman, a Harvard Law professor; Pamela Karlan, a Stanford law professor; Jonathan Turley of George Washington University law school and Michael Gerhardt, a law professor at the University of North Carolina.

Feldman has argued that an actual crime is not necessary to impeach a president and has written in opinion columns that Democrats have legitimate grounds to impeach Trump because he has abused the power of his office.

Karlan is a former Obama administration Justice Department official who has not been vocal about the impeachment proceedings. She is well known in legal circles for her work of voting rights and political processes and has argued several cases before the Supreme Court. Karlan was a law clerk for Justice Harry Blackmun.

Gerhardt, a former Al Gore campaign official, gave a similar presentation to Congress when the Judiciary Committee was considering impeaching Clinton. His book “Impeachment: What Everyone Needs to Know” describes itself as a nonpartisan “primer for anyone eager to learn about impeachment’s origins, practices, limitations, and alternatives.”

The one expert called by Republicans, Turley has written extensively about Trump and impeachment and has criticized Democrats’ for moving too quickly and being too narrowly focused in the impeachment process.

Although committee panels in Congress normally feature more witnesses called by the majority party than the minority, Republicans say they are upset they were allowed to call only one expert. In a letter Monday, Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.) asked Judiciary Committee chairman Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) to expand the panel and let the minority party call the same number of witnesses as Democrats. He pointed out that 19 academics with a range of opinions were called to educate members during the Clinton impeachment. Nadler has not responded.

What will they say?

Nadler said in a statement announcing the hearing that the point of the hearing is to “explore the framework put in place to respond to serious allegations of impeachable misconduct like those against President Trump.”

Expect a lot of talk about what the framers of the Constitution intended when they created impeachment, what they meant by the phrase “high crimes and misdemeanors,” what standards Congress should use as it examines the evidence, and whether the accusations against Trump rise to the level of impeachment.

Why does Congress have this power anyway?

Having just thrown off a monarchy, the writers of the Constitution were concerned about giving too much power to the executive, the position now known as the president, and having no recourse if that power were abused. So, at the very end of Article II of the Constitution, which set up the executive branch, they inserted 31 words that would give the legislative branch power to try, convict and remove a president, or certain other federal officials, for “treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”

The writers of the Constitution didn’t want to tightly define high crimes and misdemeanors but gave broad examples of what it should include. Legal experts describe it as an offense against the public trust at large, not necessarily a crime defined by law.

James Madison wrote in 1787 that there had to be a way to defend against “incapacity, negligence or perfidy of the chief executive” because the president might “pervert his administration” or “betray his trust to foreign powers.” Alexander Hamilton described the standard in 1788 as “abuse or violation of some public trust.”

Legal experts also stress that this punishment was not intended to be used when Congress disagrees with the president’s policy decisions. (This is why Pelosi and other Democratic leaders have refused to bring articles of impeachment against Trump for policies they don’t like, such as family detention at the southern border.)

Impeachment is an Americanization of British and Colonial law that allowed parliament to police political offenses that subverted the government or public trust, though not those committed by the crown. The Americans narrowed the list of what offenses could be impeachable and expanded it to include the head of government.

Does the evidence against Trump warrant impeachment?

That is up to the 435 representatives in the House.

Individual House members have to decide whether the evidence collected rises — in their opinion — to the level of impeachment. The Constitution set no standard of evidence that has to be met like the “reasonable doubt” standard in the judicial system, though legal experts have suggested a standard closer to a preponderance of evidence, also known as probable cause.

During the Clinton impeachment hearings, the House Judiciary Committee was reluctant to set any formal burden of proof, stressing that it had “clear and compelling evidence,” but that such a finding wasn’t required.

Similarly it’s up to individual senators to decide if the evidence the House presents warrants removal from office. Even though the proceeding is called a trial, it is not a criminal proceeding. There’s no specific standard of evidence that has to be met as there is in the judicial system. Counsel for presidents in previous impeachment cases have argued that the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard used in criminal cases should also be the standard senators adopt; House managers who have presented impeachment cases have argued for a lower standard.

Pop quiz. Does impeachment mean removal from office?

Nope (it’s a common misconception). Think of impeachment as similar to having charges brought against the president. The Senate holds the trial and decides whether to remove the president.

The Senate has never removed a president. Presidents Bill Clinton and Andrew Johnson were impeached by the House, but not convicted by the Senate. Each finished his term.

With a Republican majority, the current Senate is unlikely to get the two-thirds vote necessary remove a Republican president.

As a whole, the process doesn’t often lead to removal from office. The House has impeached 19 individuals: 15 federal judges, one senator, one Cabinet member and two presidents. The Senate has convicted just eight of them, all federal judges.

Can the Supreme Court overturn the Senate if it convicts or stop the House from impeachment?

President Trump has tweeted a few times that the Supreme Court should step in to stop the impeachment proceedings, but the framers of the Constitution specifically sought to keep this from happening. They put the power to remove a president solely in the legislature’s hands.

The Supreme Court backed that up in 1993 when a federal judge from Mississippi challenged his removal. The Constitution makes impeachment “a bridle in the hands of the legislative body upon the executive branch,” the court said.

One caveat is that the Senate proceedings are overseen by the chief justice. That keeps the vice president, who is normally the presiding officer of the Senate, from overseeing a trial that could potentially elevate him to the presidency.

What else do you need to know before the hearing?

It could be a long day. The Judiciary Committee is one of Congress’ largest committees, and every representative gets a chance to ask questions.

The resolution that sets the ground rules for impeachment gives the chairman and ranking members, or a designated staff member, up to 45 minutes to ask questions at the beginning of the hearing. If you don’t normally watch committee hearings, it’s worth knowing that high-profile hearings — especially ones with some of the most conservative and liberal members of Congress like this — can devolve quickly into speechifying and pontificating as some committee members try to get attention during their five minutes of questions. Setting aside up to the first hour and a half for concentrated, direct questioning allows the chairman to set the tone for the entire hearing.

After that, all 41 members of the committee get their five minutes. If they all stick to that time limit (a big if) that’s an additional three hours and 40 minutes of questions.

And it’s just the first day

Further impeachment hearings haven’t been scheduled yet, but at least a few more are expected.

The committee held multiple hearings over six months when considering articles of impeachment against Nixon. It held four hearings in two days before voting on articles against Clinton.

The Intelligence Committee report has to be introduced and weighed in some way by the Judiciary Committee, likely with a presentation of the facts by the committee’s staff counsel who did much of the witness questioning in that committee. The Judiciary Committee will also look at Republicans’ rebuttal.

The Judiciary Committee could call witnesses to testify, and Republicans on the committee have the option to call witnesses or offer evidence of their own, though only if a majority of committee members agree.

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So far, Trump has refused to cooperate with the investigation or allow high-ranking officials to comply with subpoenas for testimony or documents, and his lawyers turned down an invitation to participate in Wednesday’s hearing. That could change, and they still have the ability to participate in future hearings and question witnesses if the president changes his mind.

If the Judiciary Committee recommends articles of impeachment, then the House will debate them and hold a vote.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi insists there is no timetable for impeachment, so there is a chance this could slip into 2020. Still, Democratic leaders are thought to want the process wrapped up before Christmas, so a whirlwind two and a half weeks could be ahead.

Then it’s time for a Senate trial, which could last weeks, but that’s a story for another day.

The House Judiciary Committee today will hold its first impeachment hearing, signifying a new — and unpredictable — step in the Democrats’ inquiry into President Trump’s conduct toward Ukraine. The Judiciary Committee, made up of some of the most partisan members of Congress, is expected to be more rambunctious than the Intelligence Committee.

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Doc Rivers’ eyes had not deceived him.

The halftime box score the Clippers coach stared at Tuesday night at Staples Center was, in fact, accurate: His team had made 50% of its shots, including nine three-pointers, in the first two quarters. And still, the Clippers led Portland, which had made 51% of its shots, by only three points.

Wasn’t it only two days before that Rivers had said his team’s defense was further along than its offense?

“We just said something’s going to give, one way or another,” Rivers said of his halftime message. “Either we’re going to start defending or we’re going to have a tough night.”

They chose the former.

Chastened after a porous first half, the Clippers closed off Portland’s driving lanes to the rim, took away good three-point looks and didn’t allow Carmelo Anthony to add to his charmed beginning with the Trail Blazers over the course of the final 24 minutes en route to a 117-97 victory.

“Just imposed our will on the defensive end,” said forward Montrezl Harrell, whose campaign for the NBA’s top reserve continued after 26 points and nine rebounds, with no turnovers, in 30 minutes.

In their last game at Staples Center before beginning a six-game trip, the Clippers (16-6) improved to 13-1 at home. Paul George scored 25 points and Patrick Patterson scored 19 off the bench, with George making six three-pointers and Patterson making five.

Though the Clippers have outscored opponents during first, second and fourth quarters this season, they ranked 18th in the league in third-quarter plus-minus entering Tuesday, outscored by an average of one point per game. That usually has set up a need for a dramatic fourth quarter, and the Clippers have become one of the NBA’s best teams in clutch situations.

Such late heroics were not needed against Portland, which pulled its starters with 7:41 to play trailing 102-80.

“We played defense,” George said.

That cushion was built during the third quarter, which the Clippers won by 10 after Anthony, the Western Conference’s reigning player of the week, and the team’s celebrated backcourt of CJ McCollum and Damian Lillard made two of their 11 combined field goals.

“They’re great players, we’re just sending a lot of people at them,” Rivers said of Portland’s dynamic backcourt, which had averaged more than 49 points together entering Tuesday. “We’re doubling a lot, we’re able to switch with bigger guys that can move their feet.”

Anthony finished with nine points. McCollum led Portland (8-13) with 20 points and Lillard added 16, and they combined to make 14 of 32 field goal attempts, including two each of their combined 15 three-point shots.

The Clippers built off their blueprint from their Nov. 7 victory against Portland, in which Lillard missed all four attempts in which he was guarded by Maurice Harkless, the former Trail Blazers forward.

Lillard won several matchups Tuesday against Harkless, including hitting a deep three-pointer in the opening quarter when Harkless didn’t extend his 7-foot wingspan in time to contest an attempt. But in the third quarter, Lillard missed all five shots he took, and Harkless was usually in the vicinity.

“I don’t know how many teams you can put your power forward on the other team’s point guard,” Rivers said. “Because of our size we’re able to do that.”

Without JaMychal Green, who did not play since bruising his tailbone in Sunday’s victory, Patterson played 26 minutes — double his season average — but was a release valve when things went wrong offensively. Kawhi Leonard scored 11 points, making three of 15 shots, but when his drives were cut off in the second quarter, he found Patterson open in the corner twice for three-pointers.

“Teammates just found me,” Patterson said. “And my shot seemed to fall.”

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Veteran Westchester coach Ed Azzam chose not to retire, so the Comets welcomed him back on Tuesday in an opening game of the Comets’ tournament by delivering career victory No. 900 in a 73-20 victory over Horace Mann.

Westchester will play Santa Monica on Thursday in a quarterfinal game at 6 p.m. Santa Monica defeated Gardena 60-50. The other quarterfinal will match Renaissance against St. Bernard at 7:30 p.m. Renaissance held off Long Beach Poly 52-50. Koat Keat scored 30 points. Ben Jones had 14 points for the Jackrabbits. St. Bernard defeated Hart 85-54. Damion McDowell scored 21 points and Reece Dixon-Waters added 19.

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No. 1 Sierra Canyon made its home debut before a packed crowd. The Trailblazers scored the game’s first 10 points en route to an 87-35 victory over Granada Hills. BJ Boston scored 25 points and Terren Frank 17. The Trailblazers (5-0) face a test against Santa Clarita Christian on Wednesday night at CSUN.

Chaminade stayed unbeaten with a 72-53 win over Santa Barbara in the Simi Valley tournament. Keith Higgins scored 24 points, Kenneth Simpson 23 and Abe Eagle grabbed 12 rebounds.

Oxnard improved to 5-0 with a 70-32 win over Golden Valley. Stacy Johnson scored 19 points. Valencia defeated Santa Paula 101-22. Noah Veluzat finished with 23 points and 10 assists. Sherman Oaks Notre Dame defeated University 105-85. Ben Shtolzberg had 32 points.

King-Drew (3-0) put itself in contention for a City Section Open Division spot with a 44-39 win over El Camino Real at Maranatha. Kalib LaCount scored 15 points. King-Drew and Washington Prep could be the teams to beat in the Coliseum League with Crenshaw.

Brentwood rallied for a 68-64 win over Culver City. Brayden Thomas had 16 points and Christian Moore returned from an injury to score 15 points. Freedom Rhames made a key three late in the game. Tyler Wiley had 21 points for Culver City. Pasadena defeated Palisades 63-54.

Damien defeated Marshall 75-26. Malik Thomas finished with 23 points.

In a top girls matchup, defending Open Division state champion Sierra Canyon defeated defending City Section Open Division champion Granada Hills 69-40.

Howdy, I’m your host, Houston Mitchell. Let’s get right to the news.

FOOTBALL

Sports reporter Nathan Fenno has an incredible story on former USC football star Kevin Ellison. You can read the whole story by clicking here. If you don’t believe me, here’s an excerpt that should lead you to read the whole thing:

The brains arrive at all hours in white cardboard boxes stamped “RUSH!” Inside each package is an inch-and-a-half-thick foam liner and a red bag protecting an ordinary white plastic bucket.

When a courier service delivered Kevin Ellison’s brain to the Bedford VA Medical Center near Boston just after 2 p.m. on Jan. 22, Dr. Victor Alvarez performed the routine he has done so many times that he’s stopped counting.

The neuropathologist unpacked the box, weighed the brain and examined it for contusions or hemorrhages. He snapped dozens of pictures with various exposures to capture differences in shape and color not apparent to the naked eye.

Alvarez processes most of the brains donated to the partnership between the Department of Veterans Affairs, Boston University CTE Center and the Concussion Legacy Foundation. He moves with care and speed, knowing each brain represents a family searching for answers.

Ellison’s family donated his brain to be studied for CTE, or chronic traumatic encephalopathy, the devastating neurodegenerative disease found in people who have suffered repeated head trauma but can be diagnosed only after death. Football players are its most prominent victims.

It had been three months since Ellison died at age 31 — and nearly a decade since his days on the football field as a hard-hitting defensive back, team captain and fan favorite at USC. He went on to play one season for the San Diego Chargers. The three words tattooed on his left arm summed up his approach to life: “Be the best.”

Ellison had been living in an apartment behind his mother’s home in Inglewood. He had earned an economics degree in college, but at the end he no longer drove and struggled to keep jobs. He had a headache that never really left. His neck hurt and he felt dizzy. He couldn’t sleep, heard voices, talked to the sky.

Sometimes the old Kevin returned, his mother recalled. But she could tell when the darkness approached. His grin faded. His eyes wandered. He took long showers to escape, the sound drifting into the living room….

To read the rest, click here.

Read more

Dylan Hernandez: So long as football thrives, the Kevin Ellisons will pay the toll

Video: How CTE changes everything about football

LAKERS

The Lakers beat the Nuggets, 105-96, improving to 18-3 this season, bouncing back from a loss to the Dallas Mavericks.

Against the second best team in the Western Conference, a bruising defensive powerhouse that entered the night tied for the best defensive rating in the NBA, the Lakers scored 60 first half points and did enough the rest of the game to secure the win.

LeBron James scored 23 points and Anthony Davis scored 25. Rajon Rondo and Dwight Howard also scored in double figures. The Nuggets were led by guard Jamal Murray, who scored 22 points.

Read more

Dwight Howard’s a force in new role with Lakers

CLIPPERS

Chastened after a porous first half, the Clippers closed off Portland’s driving lanes to the rim, took away good three-point looks and didn’t allow Carmelo Anthony to add to his charmed beginning with the Trail Blazers over the course of the final 24 minutes en route to a 117-97 victory.

“Just imposed our will on the defensive end,” said forward Montrezl Harrell, whose campaign for the NBA’s top reserve continued after 26 points and nine rebounds, with no turnovers, in 30 minutes.

In their last game at Staples Center before beginning a six-game trip, the Clippers (16-6) improved to 13-1 at home. Paul George scored 25 points and Patrick Patterson scored 19 off the bench, with George making six three-pointers and Patterson making five.

COLLEGE FOOTBALL PLAYOFF RANKINGS

1. Ohio State

2. Louisiana State

3. Clemson

4. Georgia

5. Utah

6. Oklahoma

7. Baylor

8. Wisconsin

9. Florida

10. Penn State

11. Auburn

12. Alabama

13. Oregon

14. Michigan

15. Notre Dame

16. Iowa

17. Memphis

18. Minnesota

19. Boise State

20. Cincinnati

21. Appalachian State

22. USC

23. Virginia

24. Navy

25. Oklahoma State

If the season ended today, these would be the projected New Year’s six bowl games:

Fiesta Bowl in Glendale, Ariz. (Playoff semifinal Dec. 28)

No. 1 Ohio State vs. No. 4 Georgia

Peach Bowl in Atlanta (Playoff semifinal Dec. 28)

No. 2 Louisiana State vs. No. 3 Clemson

Cotton Bowl in Arlington, Texas (Dec. 28)

No. 7 Baylor vs. No. 17 Memphis

Orange Bowl in Miami Gardens, Fla. (Dec. 30)

No. 10 Penn State vs. No. 23 Virginia

Rose Bowl in Pasadena (Jan. 1)

No. 5 Utah vs. No. 8 Wisconsin

Sugar Bowl in New Orleans (Jan. 1)

No. 6 Oklahoma vs. No. 9 Florida

The final rankings will be released Sunday.

RAMS

The Rams put kick returner JoJo Natson on injured reserve because of a hamstring injury. Natson, 25, has averaged 22.2 yards per kickoff return, and 7.8 yards per punt return.

Rookie running back Darrell Henderson is expected to replace Natson for kickoff returns on Sunday against the Seattle Seahawks at the Coliseum. Rookie Nsimba Webster is expected to replace Natson for punt returns.

KINGS

Kings coach Todd McLellan made sure to be clear on two points Tuesday afternoon, during a discussion with media members about the state of coaching in the NHL amid a recent wave of player abuse and mistreatment allegations that has swept across the league.

“I think the line between right and wrong is pretty clear,” McLellan said, before adding: “I think players and coaches, 99.9% of the time, do a real good job of not crossing the line.”

Several serious instances when coaches have erred, however, have made their way to the forefront in the past couple of weeks, setting into motion an existential debate within the sport about what is acceptable, and what is not.

“The best analogy I can use is, my elementary school experience was completely different than the elementary school experience that my kids went through,” McLellan continued. “No one stands in the corner anymore. No one puts their heads on their desks. Ears aren’t pulled. You don’t go to the principal’s office to see or get the strap.

“Society has changed. The coaches that I had growing up did a tremendous job for me as an individual. Hockey and life. I’m appreciative of them. The soft side, but the hard side as well. They helped me by being hard on me sometimes. I hold no ill will to any coaches that were direct with me or pushed me — not physically — but pushed me to become a better player. Challenged me.”

Read more

Luc Robitaille makes the rounds to ensure Kings stay relevant in L.A.

DODGERS

Dodgers officials recently met with pitcher Stephen Strasburg and third baseman Anthony Rendon, two of the top free agents on the market.

Both players are clients of Scott Boras and have spent their entire careers with the Washington Nationals, the team that knocked the Dodgers out of the National League Division Series in October en route to winning the World Series.

The Dodgers have not landed a marquee free agent beyond re-signing Justin Turner and Kenley Jansen since Andrew Friedman was hired to head the front office five years ago. The Dodgers have made offers to prominent players, only to be outbid by other teams. Just last winter they met with Bryce Harper and presented the outfielder a rich, short-term deal. He elected to sign a 13-year, $330-million contract with the Philadelphia Phillies.

To lure Rendon or Strasburg, they’ll likely need a more aggressive approach.

YOUR FAVORITE SPORTS MOMENT

What is your all-time favorite local sports moment? Email me at [email protected] and tell me what it is and why, and it could appear in a future Sports newsletter.

This moment comes from David Pohlod of Oak Park:

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In 1984 my high school buddy took me to my first baseball game in San Diego. Saw Tony Gwynn get a hit. But unfamiliar with the game, at the seventh-inning stretch, I thought the game was over and started to leave the stadium. In 1986 my new girlfriend (now wife) declared: “…no dates out this week, World Series comes first…,” so I became a baseball (Padres) fan.

Naturally, I became a Gwynn fan. In the 1998 World Series, Game 1, Gwynn hits a home run in the fifth. After the series, Gwynn gives an interview in San Diego and states (with that big beautiful grin of his): “Man! I saw that home run on the big screen in the stadium, my swing was perfect, it was a home run that put us in the lead, and I looked great on national television!”

He was just so happy to help the Padres get a shot at the title. Miss that guy a ton.

TODAY’S LOCAL MAJOR SPORTS SCHEDULE

All times Pacific

Lakers at Utah, 6 p.m., Spectrum Sportsnet, 710 ESPN

Washington at Kings, 7 p.m., FSW

BORN ON THIS DATE

1868: Baseball player Jesse Burkett (d. 1953)

1930: Baseball player/manager Harvey Kuenn (d. 1988)

1931: Hockey player/coach Alex Delvecchio

1938: Equestrian Richard Meade (d. 2015)

1955: Kings player/executive Dave Taylor

1956: Basketball player Bernard King

1957: Baseball player Lee Smith

1957: Race car driver Raul Boesel

1961: Football player/coach Frank Reich

1963: Pole vaulter Sergey Bubka

1971: Boxer Shannon Briggs

1973: Basketball player Corliss Williamson

1985: Fencer Ibtihaj Muhammad

DIED ON THIS DATE

1944: Baseball player Roger Bresnahan, 65

AND FINALLY

Dave Taylor vs. Wayne Gretzky. Watch it here.

That concludes the newsletter for today. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, please email me at [email protected]. If you want to subscribe, click here.

It’s Thanksgiving morning. The temperature is in the low 50s. There’s a few rain drops. Lake Balboa Birmingham football players are walking onto their field for practice.

Sophomore Arlis Boardingham, who is 6 feet 4 and 205 pounds, arrives wearing a wool mask that covers his entire face except for his eyes. He’s also wearing a thermal long sleeve shirt under his jersey, gloves and compression pants. It’s as if he’s prepared to play at Lambeau Field in Green Bay during a snow storm.

“I don’t like to be cold,” he says. “My parents always tell me, ‘If you stay ready, you don’t have to get ready.’”

If you want to meet a 15-year-old with big plans, big dreams and big days ahead, it’s Boardingham, a receiver and defensive end who has all the qualities of someone going places.

“He’s still a puppy,” coach Jim Rose said. “When he becomes a dog, watch the bite on him.”

With size 15 shoes and growing strength, Boardingham is already making an impact. He’s closing in on 50 receptions with 10 touchdowns for an 8-4 Birmingham team that makes its first appearance in a CIF state championship bowl game, hosting Oxnard Pacifica on Saturday night in Division 2-A.

Rose said Boardingham is “10 times better’’ than he was as a freshman.

“If he’s 10 times better next year, holy cow. Watch out,” Rose said.

In helping Birmingham win the City Section Open Division championship game last week with a 27-20 win over Wilmington Banning, Boardingham dragged along four Banning players before finally being taken down on a 42-yard pass reception. He takes great pride when the ball is in his hands.

“It feels like you’re in control,” he said. ‘You’re the one in power. I like being able to control the destiny of the game. I like holding that responsibility and accountability of making or breaking a game.”

Boardingham’s father, Don, is Birmingham’s track coach. Boardingham’s first athletic event was running 100 meters as a 5-year-old.

“I was nervous but I knew I was going to be good,” he said.

He’s always been bigger and taller than most. He thinks he’ll end up at 6-5, 225 pounds. Rose believes Boardingham will be 245 pounds. “I think he’s going to be a monster,” Rose said.

Boardingham doesn’t go around boasting. He’s focused on pursuing his goal of playing football in college and beyond. He said after playing against City Section power Harbor City Narbonne last season, he learned plenty.

“It was a wakeup call,” he said. “I learned there’s better players out there and more players that could do what I could do. I didn’t like that.”

He immediately hit the weight room and started to work on running better pass routes. He’s also a long jumper and triple jumper. He finished second in the triple jump as a freshman at the City Section championship meet last spring at 43 feet 9 1/2 inches. His goal this spring is to reach 50 feet and make the state finals.

First, Birmingham will enter uncharted territory with its first state bowl game. The Patriots are considered the underdog against Southern Section Division 6 champion Pacifica (13-1), which has a terrific running back in Malik Sherrod (1,469 yards rushing, 34 TDs) and a big-time linebacker in Caleb McCullough.

“It’s an opportunity to make Birmingham history,” Boardingham said. “Everybody is nervous because we don’t know much about Pacifica, but we’re excited.”

L.A.’s elected leaders are on the brink of passing a law that would deprive them of one of their biggest sources of political money — real estate companies with projects pending at City Hall.

Under the proposal, those companies and their executives would be prohibited from giving directly to the election campaigns of city candidates. But enforcement of those new restrictions could still take a while — more than two years.

The prolonged timeline has drawn complaints from critics, who say it will allow incumbent council members in the March 2022 primary campaign to preserve one of their key advantages over challengers.

Rob Quan, an organizer with the group Unrig L.A., said he believes council members slow-walked the new donation restrictions so they could continue collecting checks from real estate interests — and improve their odds of staying in office in 2022. As many as seven incumbents could seek re-election that year.

“Developer money tends to follow the people holding power, not the people challenging power,” said Quan, whose organization is looking to reduce the influence of money in L.A. politics.

The proposed ordinance, scheduled for a vote Wednesday, comes little more than a year after FBI agents raided the home and offices of Councilman Jose Huizar, who for years ran the powerful council committee that greenlights large-scale real estate projects. It also comes as a developer in Harbor Gateway is facing bribery and campaign money-laundering charges tied to city approval of an apartment complex in 2015.

Backers within City Hall say the new fundraising restrictions will help address a longstanding perception that real estate interests have undue influence over planning decisions, among the most important powers wielded by the city’s elected officials.

Council members first proposed a ban on developer donations in January 2017, when city leaders were trying to defeat a ballot measure that would have barred the approval of many large-scale development projects. After voters rejected the measure, the proposal languished. But it was revived in the wake of the FBI raids.

With so many delays, campaign finance reform advocates had resigned themselves to the idea that new fundraising restrictions would not be in place in time for the council’s March 2020 primary election — or any runoff election held in November.

But last month, the council’s rules committee backed an ordinance that also would not go into effect after the March 2022 city primary election.

In other words, candidates could continue taking as much as $800 from each developer during the primary, but would be barred from doing so if they found themselves in a runoff for the November 2022 election.

Officials said the delay would be needed as long as council members insist on having a developer database in place to coincide with the new restrictions, which will take several months to set up. By the time it is up and running, fundraising will already have begun for the March 2022 primary, ethics officials said.

Having the new rules go into effect as part of the November 2022 runoff campaign would “provide certainty for campaigns and all those impacted,” said David Michaelson, chief assistant city attorney, in a memo to council members.

Asked about complaints from activists about the delays — and the fact that council members would continue collecting developer money for two more years — a spokesman for council President Herb Wesson said that his committee, which vetted the new rules, took up the ordinance two months after it was drafted by city lawyers.

Councilman David Ryu, who has spent years pushing for the new restrictions, said through a spokesman that he is not happy with the proposed delay in enforcement. Ryu wants the rules to apply to both the 2022 primary and any runoff, said Estevan Montemayor, the councilman’s deputy chief of staff.

“He’s disappointed that’s not the case and he plans to amend the language [of the ordinance] when the item is before the full City Council,” Montemayor said.

Tyler Joseph, policy director for the Ethics Commission, said an electronic filing system would not be needed for enforcement of a ban on developer donations. Measure H, which prohibited bidders on city contracts from making campaign donations to city candidates, did not require such a database when it was approved in 2011, he said.

“While having a filing system is important for disclosure and transparency, the commission has always been in favor of applying the ban as soon as possible,” Joseph said in an email.

With Mayor Eric Garcetti, City Atty. Mike Feuer and City Controller Ron Galperin all facing term limits, contests for citywide offices will be wide open in March 2022. Fundraising for those citywide races begins in March 2020.

In addition, as many as seven council members — Gil Cedillo, Bob Blumenfield, Monica Rodriguez, Curren Price, Mike Bonin, Mitch O’Farrell and Joe Buscaino — have the opportunity to run for re-election in 2022. Fundraising for those seats is scheduled to start in September 2020.

Any race in which the top two vote-getters fail to secure 50% of the vote would head to a runoff in November 2022. Political experts say they don’t expect most council contests to result in a runoff, given the city’s long history of re-electing incumbents.

Under the proposal heading to the council, elected officials at City Hall would still be able to ask real estate developers pursuing L.A. projects to make contributions to their favored charities and governmental initiatives — a practice known as “behesting.”

In addition, developers would continue to have the power to make unlimited donations to “independent expenditure” committees, which support specific candidates but do not coordinate their efforts with them. L.A. cannot legally limit who gives to those committees or how much they can donate.

Advocates of campaign finance reform have voiced disappointment that the proposal before the council is not more ambitious. And Rey López-Calderón, executive director of the watchdog group California Common Cause, said he thinks it’s outrageous that council members are planning such a lengthy delay for enforcement of the new rules.

City leaders should move ahead with the developer donation limits “whether or not they can 100% enforce it,” López-Calderón said.

“It will be great when they update their systems and get a database” to track developers with pending projects, he said. “But what they need to do right now is show the public that they’re serious about changing the culture of Los Angeles City Hall.”

Times staff writer Emily Alpert Reyes contributed to this report.

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