Dunkin’s new $6 breakfast gets boost from ‘Love Island USA’ cast

• September 6, 2024

Skirmishes continue in this summer’s fast food value wars as the season draws to an end.

The latest chain to enter the fray is Dunkin’, which came out with a $6 Meal Deal. It includes a Bacon, Egg, and Cheese Sandwich on a bagel, Hash Browns and choice of a medium hot or iced coffee.

The Massachusetts-based quick service chain brought together six cast members of “Love Island USA” to promote the deal fully dressed. The premise is that Dunkin’ serves the kind of breakfast they would enjoy when they’re not at a villa in Fiji.

For fans, they were Leah Kateb, Miguel Harachi, JaNa Craig, Kenny Rodriguez, Serena Page and Kordell Beckham. The reality series streams on Peacock, but you can watch them lusting over hash browns in a Dunkin’ Instagram post.

In addition to the no-frills breakfast, Dunkin’ introduced its fall menu, which brings back its Maple Sugar Bacon Breakfast Sandwich on a croissant, its Apple Cider Donut, Loaded Hash Browns, and of course, Pumpkin Spice Signature Latte.

New this year is Almond Spice Ice Coffee and Dunkalatte, described as the brand’s first-ever coffee milk latte.

Meanwhile the McDonald’s $5 or $6 Meal Deal that started it all is still available.

dunkindonuts.com

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​ Orange County Register 

Vance calls school shootings a ‘fact of life’ at Arizona rally

• September 6, 2024

Greg Bluestein | (TNS) The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance told rallygoers in Arizona on Thursday that school shootings are a “fact of life” and that officials need to bolster security to prevent violence like the deadly rampage this week at a northeast Georgia high school.

“If these psychos are going to go after our kids, we’ve got to be prepared for it,” said Vance, the running-mate of former President Donald Trump. “We don’t have to like the reality that we live in. But it is the reality that we live in. We’ve got to deal with it.”

It brought backlash from supporters of Vice President Kamala Harris, who brought up the shooting at Apalachee High School in Barrow County to renew calls for gun restrictions, enhanced background checks and more security.

“Trump and Vance have railed against commonsense reforms and federal bipartisan gun safety legislation that would protect innocent lives,” said Alex Floyd of the Democratic National Committee.

“As Trump and Vance put the gun lobby ahead of the American people, voters are ready to reject their dangerous and out-of-touch agenda in November.”

At the Arizona rally, Vance described the shootings as an “awful tragedy” committed by an “absolute barbarian.”

“I don’t like that this is a fact of life,” Vance said. “But if you are a psycho and you want to make headlines, you realize that our schools are soft targets. And we have got to bolster security at our schools. We’ve got to bolster security so if a psycho wants to walk through the front door and kill a bunch of children they’re not able.”

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©2024 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Visit at ajc.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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Rep. Michelle Steel’s race with Democrat Derek Tran in CA-45 shifts to ‘Republican toss up’

• September 6, 2024

In the closely watched race in California’s 45th congressional district, election forecasts have begun to swing toward being more favorable for Democrats.

Election analyst Cook Political Report today changed its rating of the race from “lean Republican” to “Republican toss up.” Democrat Derek Tran, an attorney, is vying to unseat two-term incumbent Rep. Michelle Steel, R-Seal Beach, to become the first Vietnamese American elected to represent Orange County’s Little Saigon in Congress.

“Democrats now believe they have a strong nominee in Derek Tran, a Vietnamese American attorney who could make inroads with typically Republican-leaning voters in Little Saigon,” Cook Political Report’s Erin Covey wrote in her analysis of the race.

Covey also pointed out that Tran, a first-time candidate, outraised Steel in the second quarter. In the period that covered April to June, Tran reported his best fundraising quarter yet, raising $1.3 million to Steel’s $1.1 million. As of June 30, Steel still maintains a cash lead.

Last week, Inside Elections, a newsletter that provides campaign analysis, also recently changed its rating of the race from “lean Republican” to “tilt Republican.”

Both rating changes come as the race in the 45th has grown increasingly more volatile in recent weeks. Steel’s campaign recently accused Tran of misleading voters about his Vietnamese language proficiency and also criticized him for his previous work as an attorney defending a client accused of sexual assault.

CA-45 is a majority-minority district where the largest Vietnamese community outside of Vietnam resides. The district also picks up Cerritos and Artesia in Los Angeles County, both where Asian residents make up the largest racial group.

“For some reason after two cycles of being proven wrong, inside the Beltway prognosticators still give precedence to (the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s) spin over Michelle winning every cycle — this year, they are falling for Democrats’ nonsense that someone who is a serial liar and represented an alleged rapist is the ticket to beating Michelle — they were wrong before, and they are wrong now,” said Lance Trover, Steel’s spokesperson.

DCCC spokesperson Dan Gottlieb said “the ground has completely shifted beneath Michelle Steel’s feet in California’s 45th, and Republicans are clearly panicked as their desperate attacks continue to fall flat.”

On Friday, Cook Political Report also shifted five more races toward Democrats and two toward Republicans.

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Excellent teams at Mohs girls volleyball tournament at Edison

• September 6, 2024

The Dave Mohs Memorial Tournament at Edison has its usual collection of standout girls volleyball teams.

Among the 29 teams are Mater Dei, last year’s CIF Southern Section and CIF State top-division champion, and Cathedral Catholic of San Diego that is No. 9 in the MaxPreps.com national rankings. Mater Dei is No. 14 in those rankings; the Monarchs swept No. 3 Mira Costa of Manhattan Beach on Thursday.

Mater Dei was No. 1 in the Orange County preseason rankings. Other county top 10 teams in the Mohs tournament No. 2 Huntington Beach, No. 3 Santa Margarita, No. 5 JSerra, No. 7 San Clemente, No. 9 Newport Harbor and No. 10 San Juan Hills.

A link to the schedule is here.

​ Orange County Register 

Rams rookies Jared Verse and Braden Fiske bonded by competition

• September 6, 2024

In January of 2023, Jared Verse walked out to Florida State’s practice facility with a group of teammates. Dripping in sweat from their session in the weight room, they were set to do some field drills and work on pass rush moves.

Already on the field, his shirt also soaking wet, was a new teammate who had just transferred into the program. A shoulder surgery had him in a sling, but he was still working on a one-armed cross chop.

For Verse, a gym rat who himself had offseason surgery a year ago after transferring to FSU and had to sit out winter workouts, this raised his antenna. But there was still a shadow of a doubt in his mind.

“Whenever you go to a new place, you always want to show them your work ethic. So I’m like, ‘Oh, he’s just trying to show us what he’s about,’” Verse said. “And as time went on, I was like, ‘Oh, this is just who this guy is.’”

That new teammate was Braden Fiske, and those early workouts were the beginning of a genuine respect and close friendship that seemed poised to end after one season together. But as fate would have it, the Rams had different plans, drafting both the outside linebacker Verse and the defensive tackle Fiske with their first two picks in April’s draft.

The organization bet on Verse and Fiske’s work ethic and chemistry to lead them into their post-Aaron Donald future. In Sunday’s season opener against the Detroit Lions, the pair will have a primetime opportunity to show the world what the Rams saw in them.

Anything you can do

Verse’s newfound respect for Fiske’s work ethic in Tallahassee quickly morphed into a competitive instinct that infected both pass rushers.

How much weight did he bench press? How many reps did he do? How long was he in the cold tub? When the team ran sprints to atone for penalties, Fiske looked for Verse in the line and, without fail, the pair finished each heat hip and hip.  It didn’t have to be about football. Verse liked to talk about how he could beat Fiske in basketball, not a terribly impressive brag given that Fiske never played the sport competitively.

Even into November, with Florida State chasing an ACC title, the pair were trying to one-up each other’s personal records in the weight room instead of taking it easy on themselves late in the year.

“My biggest challenge especially during the season was to keep them from killing each other,” Florida State strength coach Josh Storms said, “because there was no end to how far they would push each other.”

And yet, Storms always assigned Verse and Fiske to the same rack, or next to each other. Because as they pushed each other, they set an example for their teammates around them. And as they pushed each other, they each got better.

“Something I learned in this game is you got to find people like-minded, and when you find people like-minded you’re able to do great things because it’s somebody that pushes you and it’s competitive,” Fiske said.

Despite that competition, it never came at the sake of the on-field product.

As they pushed each other to stay in the Seminoles’ practice facility longer and longer, eventually they came to watch film together late into the evenings. While breaking down opposing offenses, they came up with game plans of how they could get each other opportunities at the quarterback. They were willing to take turns absorbing double-teams to allow the other a one-on-one opportunity.

It was this chemistry that would jump off the tape when the Rams studied the duo ahead of the draft.

“It’s like a marriage, there’s give and take to everything and you gotta learn to compromise and you gotta learn when your opps are,” Rams defensive line coach Giff Smith said. “And that’s when you really come together. It has to be in unison and you have to be able to play off each other and you have to be willing to do the dirty work sometimes so the other guy has his opps.”

Perhaps marriage is a good metaphor for the pair, considering how they can bicker.

Florida State’s Jared Verse, right, and Braden Fiske react after a sack against Louisville in the ACC Championship on Dec. 2, 2023, in Charlotte, North Carolina. (Photo by Isaiah Vazquez/Getty Images)

‘Yin and yang’

To be clear, Fiske and Verse have more in common than not, right down to their backgrounds.

Fiske is the son of steel mill worker and a nurse. He grew up watching his parents work long, odd hours with no days off. He learned that people depend on you to show up to work, and that you owe it to them to do so with full effort.

“That’s where I feel the best at the end of the day when I lay down in bed,” Fiske said. “Like, ‘All right, I put in a complete day of work, I checked all the boxes whether that was for the film, the weight room, the training room, taking care of my body, eating right, sleeping right.’ Just making sure all the boxes are checked.”

Verse’s father is a former Marine who started working night shifts as an engineer following his service. His mother did marketing for hospitals, and the family moved around often as she climbed her profession’s ladder.

They worked long hours, but Verse noted how his mother made time for his football games, or any of his five siblings’ activities. And while his father slept during the day, he always woke up in time to make sure there was food ready when the kids got home from school.

“That kind of dedication just to be in your kids’ lives and help them be better versions of the themselves,” Verse said, “it would be almost disrespectful to them to not show my full capabilities.”

Out of high school, both had to earn their way up the collegiate ranks. Fiske started at Western Michigan, while Verse could only get an opportunity at Division II Albany.

They didn’t necessarily have all the physical tools they needed to earn a Power 5 scholarship out of high school. But they had something else.

“I’ve seen some people with all the potential in the world fizzle out because they didn’t put in the work,” Verse said. “And I didn’t always have that. I wasn’t the fastest, I wasn’t the strongest, any of that, but if I put in the work, I can pass all those people just from my work ethic. I believe that work beats anything; talent, your abilities, anything like that.”

For all those similarities, as you speak with Verse and Fiske, they seem like the type of pairing you’d find in a buddy cop comedy.

Fiske is all midwestern, stoic and observant. Rams head coach Sean McVay compares his demeanor, focus and concentration to Donald’s. Verse is just as locked into the details, but his mouth is always running. He can be heard from the sidelines of the Rams practice field, telling teammates how he can beat them at any given activity.

“It’s like a yin and yang,” McVay said. “I think there’s a good balance because that’s authentically who they each are. Sometimes you have to tell Jared, ‘Hey man, be quiet, get in the huddle and play the next snap.’ Braden is just kind of just taking it in.”

At first, Fiske was taken aback by Verse’s verbosity. Soon, it became part of the routine.

“I got so used to it, I was like, get the hell away from me,” Fiske joked. “It’s not so much what’s said, it’s the amount that’s said. It’s just constant. It’s just like, ‘Jared, we get it, you won. All right, cool.’”

Reunited

There’s a certain cruelty in meeting a friend too late in life, not getting the chance to spend more time together. That was the most likely scenario when Fiske transferred to Florida State in the final year of his and Verse’s collegiate careers. They got their year together, and then would go onto the NFL and the life lottery of the draft.

This reality didn’t sink in for Verse until after Florida State’s triumph in the ACC championship game, a result punctuated by a fourth-down sack by Fiske that allowed the Seminoles into the victory formation.

“I didn’t even think about the fact that me and him were possibly going to go to different teams, which was a high possibility until the last game, until that play, everybody’s celebrating on the field,” Verse said. “The flight home, I’m like, ‘Damn. That could have been one of my last times with him.’ That was the first time it hit me.”

But then came the phone call from Rams general manager Les Snead to Fiske that changed everything. The pause in Fiske’s voice when he realizes what team is calling him, and what that means. The shrieking, uncontrollable excitement from Verse when McVay tells him who’s on the other end of the phone call. The tears in Fiske’s eyes when Verse is given the phone.

Who’s cutting onions? pic.twitter.com/fj3RZaH63Z

— Los Angeles Rams (@RamsNFL) April 27, 2024

On the opposite side of the country, Storms was at a Florida State softball game with other members of the football staff. As they watched the game, they had ESPN playing on their phones, waiting to see where their Seminoles were going in the draft.

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Apparently, they weren’t the only ones, because when the Rams selected Fiske, a ripple went through the crowd as fans realized the two defensive standouts were reunited.

“For fans, it’s cool, two of our guys went to the same team,” Storms said. “But for those of us on the inside of the program here that had watched those two bond together, the friendship they built, when you saw the Rams take both those guys, that’s special. You’re not just getting two great players, but the way they are together, that can have a giant, giant impact if they can both get off to a strong start to their careers, that can really shape what that defense can become for years to come from now simply because of who those two are when they’re together.”

​ Orange County Register 

Del Mar horse racing consensus picks for Friday, September 6, 2024

• September 6, 2024

The consensus box of Del Mar picks comes from handicappers Bob Mieszerski, Terry Turrell, Eddie Wilson and Kevin Modesti. Here are the picks for thoroughbred races on Friday, September 6, 2024.

Trouble viewing on mobile device? See consensus picks

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Infighting derails Westminster City Council; new rules didn’t initially help

• September 6, 2024

The Westminster City Council again is in turmoil with infighting. City business again is suffering.

Last week’s Westminster City Council meeting started at 4 p.m. on Wednesday. It ended after 5 a.m. on Thursday. It was the council’s second 10-plus hour meeting this summer. A lot of what the council managed to accomplish dealt with motions it was supposed to hear two weeks prior, such as approving contracts for street improvements around town and a playground renovation at Tony Lam Park.

“With the infighting, we can’t concentrate on the business at hand to take care of what the city needs,” said Mayor Chi Charlie Nguyen.  “We’ve been pushing back items, and this affects residents in the city of Westminster.”

As an institution, the Westminster City Council is no stranger to drama and dysfunction. A previous iteration of the council censured then-mayor Tri Ta and also Nguyen when he was then vice-mayor. A censure is a formal and public condemnation of a councilmember’s behavior.

This summer, another round of volleys to censure councilmembers has bogged down city business and led to institutional reforms. Though they were to take effect immediately, the reforms didn’t seem to have much consequence at last week’s meeting.

The council voted 3-2 to amend the way members can bring agenda items to discussion and to limit how long any member can speak on an item without receiving majority approval to continue.

Before, any two councilmembers could ask the city manager to schedule the discussion of an item. Moving forward, a majority of the council will have to agree to add any agenda item requested by a councilmember other than the mayor. In Westminster, councilmembers are elected by voters in one of four districts, while the mayor is elected citywide.

Councilmember Amy Phan West called the change a convenient way for the majority, who she calls a “gang of three communist dictators,” to silence ideas they disagree with.

“For the mayor to exempt himself, that’s unacceptable,” she said in an interview. In a statement she made on her social media accounts, Phan West said the rule “mirrors the tactics of authoritarian regimes that stifle dissent and disregard the will of the people.”

Nguyen pointed out that the new rule returns Westminster to the way previous councils conducted business, and he defended the mayoral exemption.

“The mayor is responsible for the whole city, not only for one district,” he said. “And the main thing is if we have an emergency item that comes up, the mayor needs to be able to put that up for discussion if the urgency demands it cannot wait until a vote at the next meeting.”

“I’m not abusing the system,” he said. “I’m doing what needs to be done in order to get the city moving forward.”

A second rule intended to limit the length of discussions on existing agenda items to two rounds of five-minute comments unless additional time is approved by a majority vote purportedly took effect immediately.

But after that vote, Phan West and Councilmember NamQuan Nguyen steamrolled the limits, despite repeated warnings from the mayor, proceeding to talk for the vast majority of more than four hours of discussion about agenda items for which other councilmembers did not support extended dialogue.

In an interview, Phan West refused to commit to abiding to the new city rule. “We have freedom of speech,” she said. “I will continue to defend freedom of speech.”

The rule states that if a councilmember does not adhere to the policy or willfully disrupts a meeting, they will be warned to stop three times and if they continue they may be removed from the meeting.

“When a councilmember continues speaking over another member, I have to give a warning,” Charlie Nguyen said. “I don’t want to silence anyone. I don’t want to mute anyone. But I need to get the meeting in order. It is my responsibility to do that. At the same time, I don’t want to remove anyone from the meeting. The goal is to get everyone together and talk about trying to resolve the problem together for the benefit of the community.”

When it comes to discussions about conduct and protocols, the council is divided three against two, with newcomers Phan West and NamQuan Nguyen typically pitted against council veterans Charlie Nguyen, Carlos Manzo and Kimberly Ho, who terms out this fall.

Phan West, elected in 2022 fresh off a primary loss to represent U.S. House District 47, was censured in August by her colleagues for allegations she violated the city’s ethics policy in several ways, including using brash language on the dais, filing a false police report against Manzo and trespassing across a construction site on her dirt bike — among a potpourri of other claims.

West says the allegations are politically motivated. “Maybe they don’t like how I speak so bluntly,” she said.

“I’m not a career politician,” she added, although she has twice run for Congress and said she might run again for public office when her council term ends in 2026. “I will speak from my heart, and I will never be polished or politically correct, you could say.”

Last week, she and NamQuan Nguyen motioned and seconded censure of Charlie Nguyen and Ho, spending about two hours unfurling their allegations against their colleagues. Both of those motions failed when in front of the full council. Phan and NamQuan Nguyen spent awhile arguing for the city to ask voters to appoint rather than elect its mayor — the deadline to add any such measure to the ballot this November has passed and Westminster voters denied that very measure in a 2022 election.

During the discussion, Phan West made derogatory comments about the mayor. She later acknowledged she could have handled that conversation more respectfully.

“I was frustrated because I felt silenced over and over and targeted by a new rule by a group in power that doesn’t care about each individual district’s voice,” she said.

She said the mayor has struggled to keep meetings in order, arguing his warnings to her about crosstalk at the dais are unfair while she says he’s allowing his supporters to heckle her from the audience.

Charlie Nguyen said the new resolution is fair for everyone.

“If we run meetings according to Robert’s Rules of Order and we respect each other, then we don’t need to have additional policy put in place,” he said. Robert’s Rules of Order is the foremost guide for parliamentary procedure for public governing bodies across the United States, including city councils and committees.

The last council meeting also ran long because Phan West and NamQuan Nguyen skipped a two-hour closed session during which city officials were supposed to discuss pending legal issues behind closed doors. It was at least the third time this summer that both have missed a closed session, a pattern that has at times caused public business to get pushed back until later in the evening.

Then, throughout the meeting, the two councilmembers intermittently left the dais together without announcement, interrupting their colleagues while speaking and causing the council to lack quorum on issues when another member needed a recusal or when an exasperated Charlie Nguyen sometimes joined them.

When the two councilmembers walked out of the room at one point, Manzo called their behavior childlike and said it was “the most unprofessional behavior I’ve ever seen in my life.” He later, in an interview, said he regretted his comments as he strives to improve the professionalism at the dais.

Phan West said she comes from the private sector. “I’ve never seen,” she said, “a toxic working environment like this in my whole life.”

The Westminster City Council’s first full meeting with the new rules in place is scheduled for Wednesday, Sept. 11.

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Greg Wallis: We need democracy to work for all the people, not just a chosen few in Sacramento

• September 6, 2024

Democracy depends on everyone having their chance to speak. This is especially true in the state legislature when we are debating important public policy issues. Over the past two years, I have been proud to represent the residents of the 47th District. I have always worked in a bipartisan manner to deliver real solutions for California’s working families.

Unfortunately, bipartisanship and the democratic process were absent over the weekend at the California State Capitol.

Instead, what transpired was undemocratic.

Instead of being a place for open debate and democratic discussion, it became a showcase of single-party control. Using rule changes to bypass the traditional democratic process, dissenting voices were shut down and ignored, and the time for Assemblymembers to debate bills was cut from five minutes to just 30 seconds.

These were not trivial matters. The most important bills of the two-year legislative session—bills that demand thorough public debate—were relegated to the bottom of the file, last in line for consideration, and faced the most scrutiny.

We even witnessed the presiding officer of the Assembly refuse to recognize a sitting member of the Assembly when he passionately objected to the rule changes and the degradation of the “People’s House” into a tool of illiberal democracy.

Several members—on both sides of the aisle—attempted to speak on a bill that was supposed to be up for debate but were not even recognized by the Chair, despite our rights and responsibilities as elected Assemblymembers to speak on behalf of our constituents. This silencing is disrespectful to the nearly 500,000 people we each represent.

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What happened Saturday night was entirely undemocratic and indefensible. Silencing members, cutting off debate, and refusing to hear opposing bills is the opposite of democracy. It is an attempt to circumvent the very institutions that uphold our democratic process to rush through an agenda full of half-baked efforts that cannot stand up to thorough public scrutiny. It was a one-sided, rushed, undemocratic calamity.

This is not how we best serve the people of California, where every voice matters and the democratic process is vital to our state’s success.

Californians deserve better than the Legislature’s version of democracy—a false system that appears balanced on the outside but undermines the principles our nation was founded upon. It is genuine balance that will bring us back to a process that serves all Californians—a process that fosters stability, thoughtfulness, and the creation of well-vetted legislation that withstands scrutiny from both sides of the aisle.

What we need are real solutions to the crises we face—housing, insurance, electricity, homelessness, climate change—and real leadership to protect our democratic process. We need to work together, reach consensus, support each other, and collaborate across the aisle. We need democracy to work for all the people, not just a chosen few.

Greg Wallis represents California’s 47th Assembly District.

​ Orange County Register