Police say it appears the initial cause of a fight involving between 100 and 150 students of teens at a South Los Angeles high school was friction between black and Latino gang members, KNBC’s Doug Kriegel reported.

The Locke High School melee, which began in the cafeteria near the end of the lunch period around 1 p.m., resulted in the arrest of four people.

Three students were arrested on suspicion of fighting and a non-student was arrested for allegedly having a knife, said Susan Cox of the Los Angeles Unified School District. Read more »

Russian oil magnate Roman Abramovich has bought the Colorado ranch of surgical-equipment tycoon Leon Hirsch for $36.3 million. Together with another house purchased for $11.8 million in February, this brings Mr. Abramovich’s known real-estate investments in the area to almost $50 million.

The latest purchase is of a 14,300-square-foot, split-level house in Snowmass, near Aspen, set on 200 acres. It has 11 bedrooms, 12 baths, a media room, a climate-controlled wine room with a tasting area, a hot tub and a spa.

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By Patrick J. Buchanan

“I have a much broader base to build a winning coalition on” than Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton has told USA TODAY.

She cited an Associated Press article “that found how Sen. Obama’s support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me.”

“There’s a pattern emerging here,” said Hillary. “These are the people you have to win if you’re a Democrat in sufficient numbers to actually win the election. Everybody knows that.”

The Democratic Party can’t win with just “eggheads and African-Americans,” Paul Begala added helpfully.

What Hillary and Begala are saying is politically incorrect, but it is also patently true. Hillary was describing what may now fairly be called the Hillary Democrats — a.k.a. the ex-Reagan Democrats who did not vote for Obama and may defect to John McCain. Read more »

Kevin MacDonald had just completed the first in a series of books that would come to define him. Awaiting feedback from his publisher 15 years ago, MacDonald sent his manuscript to a colleague in the psychology department at California State University Long Beach (CSULB). The feedback was not encouraging.

“What troubles me most is that your criticism of Jews may be taken seriously by groups and individuals who both fear and hate Jews,” Martin Fiebert wrote in a 12-point reply. “Your manuscript, unintentionally perhaps, reinforces the stereotype that all Jews, be they assimilated or not, are clannish, deceptive, and exploitive. I’m sure you would be dismayed to find that your book has a treasured place in the bookcases of neo-Nazis along with ‘Mein Kampf’ and the ‘Protocols of Zion.’” Read more »

NEW YORK - Big corporations give him money. Presidential candidates seek his endorsement. He has influential friends in Congress and the governor’s mansion. The Rev. Al Sharpton has emerged over the past decade as perhaps the nation’s most prominent civil rights leader, a status that was demonstrated again this week when he led protests against police brutality that briefly shut down six of Manhattan’s major bridges and tunnels.

But he still carries baggage from his early days as a fire-breathing agitator: Government records obtained by The Associated Press indicate that Sharpton and his business entities owe nearly $1.5 million in overdue taxes and associated penalties. Read more »

PHOENIX - DMX was arrested on drug and animal-cruelty charges following an overnight raid on the rapper’s house Friday, authorities said. The 37-year-old rapper, whose given name is Earl Simmons, initially tried to barricade himself in his bedroom but emerged when a SWAT team entered his north Phoenix home during the 3 a.m. raid, sheriff’s spokesman Capt. Paul Chagolla said.

The arrest and search warrants stemmed from indictments for felony drug possession and misdemeanor animal cruelty charges. He made an initial court appearance Friday where bail was sent at $7,500, said his local attorney, Cameron Morgan. Morgan said he expected bail to be posted quickly. Read more »

BERLIN, GERMANY — A Soviet soldier heroically waves the red flag, the hammer and sickle billow above the Reichstag. Yevgeny Khaldei photographed one of the iconic images of the 20th century. But the legendary image was manipulated to conceal the fact that the Soviet soldiers were looting. An exhibition of Khaldei’s work opens in Berlin this week.

It was early on the morning of May 2, 1945 and Yevgeny Khaldei had gone to the Reichstag, the German parliament building in the center of Berlin. Three hours earlier the last German commander left in the capital had capitulated, but there was still sporadic fighting going on. Khaldei had his Leica camera with him–and a Soviet flag. MORE>>>>>

Long before the first rapper stopped snitching or any Mafiosi swore an oath of omertà, there was the Jewish law of mesira.

The tenet that forbids Jews from informing on fellow Jews is one of the hurdles facing Brooklyn prosecutors probing the April 14 attack on a black man by two Jewish men, sources told the Daily News.

Authorities - invoking a complaint long cited in cases involving rappers - said the initial probe was hindered by the local Hasidim’s refusal to cooperate.

One source suggested the Orthodox community was taking a page from the rap world’s “stop snitching” handbook. But it was actually lifted directly from the Code of Jewish Law. Read more »

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — A University of Florida football player who played his high school ball at Sandalwood High School is accused of identity theft after using the credit card of a fellow UF student after she was killed last year in a motorcycle accident. Jamar Hornsby, 21, turned himself in Friday morning on charges of credit card theft and fraudulent use of a credit card. His attorney, Huntley Johnson, said they learned that a judge had issued a warrant for Hornsby’s arrest on Thursday. Read more »

After four years and a number of embarrassing public-relations gaffes, Seattle Public Schools plans to cut its controversial Office of Equity, Race and Learning Support as part of a central office shake-up.

The move is part of the first phase of a staff reorganization aimed at saving money, helping departments collaborate more and better aligning resources with the goals in Superintendent Maria Goodloe-Johnson’s upcoming strategic plan.

The reorganization will go into effect in July and will merge some departments in the district’s “learning and teaching” division, elevate some positions and combine others. Read more »

WASHINGTON - Depression, teens and marijuana are a dangerous mix that can lead to dependency, mental illness or suicidal thoughts, according to a White House report being released Friday.

A teen who has been depressed at some point in the past year is more than twice as likely to have used marijuana as teens who have not reported being depressed — 25 percent compared with 12 percent, said the report by the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.

“Marijuana is a more consequential substance of abuse than our culture has treated it in the last 20 years,” said John Walters, director of the office. “This is not just youthful experimentation that they’ll get over as we used to think in the past.” Read more »