At first, they thought it was fireworks -- but it wasn't. How a Las Vegas concert went from melody to mayhem
LA Times' HAILEY BRANSON-POTTS/BEN POSTON/MATT PEARCE/KATE MATHER: "Pop pop pop pop pop. As bullets rained onto the crowd gathered on the Strip for three days of country music, Travis Phippen’s training kicked in."
"The off-duty emergency medical technician crawled from one victim to another, more than a dozen in all. They lay helpless and bleeding among the cowboy hats and plastic beer cups that concertgoers had dropped in panic when the shooting started."
"Phippen plugged wounds with clothing. As he worked, a woman next to him was shot in the head."
READ MORE related to Las Vegas Shooting: When the shooting stopped, 59 distant lives ended together at a Vegas country music concert -- LA Times' JOE MOZINGO/SOMALI KOHLI/MELISSA ETEHAD; The mystery of Stephen Paddock -- gambler, real estate investor, mass killer -- LA Times' RUBEN VIVES/HARRIET RYAN/JOSEPH SERNA; Santa Clara woman on same hotel floor as Las Vegas shooter recalls horror: 'I turned out the lights' -- The Chronicle's JILL TUCKER/LIZZIE JOHNSON; Fake news rose to top of Google, Facebook results after Las Vegas shooting -- WaPo's MARISSA LANG; Wife of SFPD officer confirmed dead in Las Vegas attack -- The Chronicle's JENNA LYONS; Las Vegas shooting unlikely to result in federal gun-control -- The Chronicle's JOE GAROFOLI; Trump calls Las Vegas shooter 'sick' and 'demented man' -- AP's JONATHAN LEMIRE/CATHERINE LUCEY
Feds give CA poor reviews on tracking foster care
California Healthline's BARBARA FEDER OSTROV in Capitol Weekly: "The federal government has given California bad marks on monitoring the well-being of children in foster care."
"State officials were slow to investigate complaints of abuse or neglect, failed to notify investigators of serious sexual abuse allegations and didn’t follow up to ensure cases were resolved, according to an audit released by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Inspector General."
"In some cases, investigations took more than a year to complete, according to the Sept. 23 report. It said these problems arose either because officials didn’t follow procedures or because they had not been properly trained to handle complaints. An audit released in May by the inspector general revealed similar deficiencies in the foster care agency of Texas."
New law bans interfering with a state audit, after UC tampering
The Chronicle's NANETTE ASIMOV: "Anyone who knowingly interferes with the duties of California’s independent state auditor will be fined up to $5,000 under a bill signed into law Monday by Gov. Jerry Brown."
"Under the law, which will take effect on Jan. 1, people who obstruct a state audit “with intent to deceive or defraud” will have to pay the fine."
READ MORE related to Education: USC professor detained after 'breakdown' led to active shooter scare on campus -- Daily News' RYAN FONSECA/STEVE ROSENBERG
Slow arrival of hurricane aid revives statehood debate in Puerto Rico
LA Times' MOLLY HENNESSY-FISKE: "Puerto Ricans have long felt like second-class U.S. citizens."
"The island lacks voting representation in Congress or any power in presidential elections. Nearly everything costs more, including healthcare. And now, amid the devastation of Hurricane Maria, Puerto Rico has another reminder of its status as a non-state: the slow arrival of federal assistance."
"President Trump’s explanation for the difficulty of providing aid only reinforced its sense of isolation. “This is an island, surrounded by water,” he said. “Big water. Ocean water."
Why losing Tom Petty feels like losing a piece of ourselves
LA Times' MIKAEL WOOD: "F*** you sing karaoke, you’ve probably performed “American Girl.” If you play guitar, you’ve likely strummed “Learning to Fly."
"And if you’ve driven a car while celebrating some personal achievement or another, you’ve almost certainly belted out “Free Fallin’” at the top of your lungs as you drummed the steering wheel, just like Tom Cruise in that indelible scene from “Jerry Maguire."
"That’s how widely the music of Tom Petty reached over the course of his decades-long career, which came to an unexpected close when this most universally beloved of classic rockers died at age 66 after he suffered cardiac arrest at his home in Malibu."
Supreme Court set to decide whether partisan gerrymanders have gone too far
LA Times' DAVID G. SAVAGE: "he Supreme Court on Tuesday will take up a once-in-a-decade challenge to partisan gerrymandering,a process that since 2010 has allowed Republicansto control power in at least half a dozen states where the voters are closely divided."
"The justices will take a close look at Wisconsin, where Republicans drew an electoral map after the last census that was designed to ensure they would retain a 60-vote supermajority in the state Assembly even if a majority of the state’s voters chose Democrats."
Tom Price may be gone, but the Trump administration's sabotage of Obamacare is moving ahead at full speed
LA Times' MICHAEL HILTZIK: "Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price is gone, ushered out of office last week after being caught causing $1 million in unnecessary taxpayer expense by chartering private planes and taking military aircraft around the country and the world instead of flying commercial, like normal people."
"This looks like a case in which the right thing has happened for the wrong reason — or at least for an incomplete reason. The grounds for Price’s ouster should have been his atrocious management of the most important program under his jurisdiction, the Affordable Care Act. Instead of acting to make Obamacare work better for all Americans, Price took every step within his power to undermine the law in ways that will cost American families millions of dollars."
READ MORE related to POTUS45/Beltway: Trump to Puerto Rico: 'They have to give us more help' -- AP's JILL COLVIN; As ties fray, US to tell Cuba to remove most diplomats -- AP
Average CEO has to make do with $253,088 in montly pension payments
LA Times' DAVID LAZARUS: "In 1998, about half of all private-sector employers in the United States offered newly hired workers a defined-benefit pension for their retirement."
"By 2015, that percentage dropped to just 5%, according to the consulting firm Willis Towers Watson."
Caltech physicists share Nobel Prize for finding of ripples in fabric of universe
AP: "Three scientists on Tuesday won a Nobel Physics Prize for their roles in detecting faint ripples flying through the universe — gravitational waves predicted a century ago by Albert Einstein that provide a new understanding of the universe."
"Sweden’s Royal Academy of Sciences announced that the winners are Rainer Weiss of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Barry Barish and Kip Thorne of the California Institute of Technology."
"The three were key to the first observation of gravitational waves in September 2015. When the discovery was announced several months later, it was a sensation not only among scientists but the general public."
