Over at the Orange County Register, ace reporter Peggy Lowe writes tonight on Orange County Sheriff's Department blog news that two of indicted ex-Sheriff Mike Carona's Yes Folks (YF) quit today: assistant sheriffs Jo Ann Galisky and Steve Bishop.

Somehow the third and final major YFer embarrassment, Acting Sheriff Jack Anderson, remains . . . sitting atop the massive police agency, repeatedly uttering four words: "I am the sheriff' and waiting, nervously, for guidance from Carona/GOP operative Mike Schroeder.

Can the public and the honest people at OCSD ever get decent leadership? I ask this to you, Janet Nguyen.

Today's developments prefaced an upcoming unflattering grand jury report on the brutal killing of a man in pre-trial custody in October 2006. The Carona-Galisky-Bishop lie, oops, line was that a deputy standing feet away from the lethal beating (that lasted, perhaps, 20 minutes) suffers from severe ADD. They proposed that he remained clueless to the gory killing because, drum roll, he was too busy watching TV.

According to the new public employee union contract, jail deputies are required to work only during regularly scheduled TV commercials and not at all during sporting events or the airing of porno.

There's good news though. Galisky--who recently hired a criminal defense lawyer (no, really!)--won't join the unemployment line. She's announced that she will head a new private detective firm with Carona and Bishop: Blatant Liar, Screw Em & Duh, LLP.

They'll specialize in sexual harassment, illegal eavesdropping, misuse of public property and unnecessary government employee travel abroad cases. Galisky's focus? Evidence elimination and grand jury preparation tactics.

The ultra-trustworthy Full Disclosure Network reports that other notables are set to participate in the firm too. Don Haidl will supply employee perks--free boats, cash and Bible-based pep talks, but only if he gets to wear a Blatant Liar, Screw Em & Duh badge. Thanks to a grant from a mysterious individual with mysterious interests, Brian Sun and something like nine other Jones Day lawyers will work as, uhhh, "free" employees. Incarcerated Las Vegas titty bar owner Rick Rizzolo and ex-federal prosecutor Wayne Gross, a Carona apologist, have already signed on as clients. Meanwhile, Reg columnist Frank Mickadeit--who lives with Gross!?!?!--is waiting for final instructions from Schroeder before he writes a flattering column on Galisky's new business.

-- R. Scott Moxley / OC Weekly

We offer our condolences to longtime Weekly photographer John Gilhooley, whose stepdaughter Paige D'Agostino passed away last Friday.

"She received a heart transplant in 2000 and after 7 plus years she had a heart attack and did not make it. Paige was 18," writes John.

There will be a memorial concert for her in Sunset Beach on Sunday, and you're all invited to come and perhaps make a donation to help the family with her medical bills. Details below:

It's February 29th, the fifth Friday in February, and the Register has failed us again.

Journalism is supposed to be objective, but that doesn't mean it can't be good. Our daily rag doesn't seem to get that. Case in point: in yesterday's story regarding the FAA's grounding of the Great Park Balloon, here's what the Reg deemed quote-worthy:

“I think we are pretty confident that we operate a safe attraction out there but as with everything there’s always room for improvement. So we hope to take care of any outstanding issues so we can get back to normal operations as soon as possible,” Burgess said.

The visitor's center will remain open and the public is free to come tour the balloon and surrounding areas, [Great Park operations manager Rod] Cooper said.

“We are going to get it up and running as soon as we can,” said Great Park Interim CEO Sharon Landers. “We are definitely being very cautious.”

Yawn. Dull. BORING! Especially when the actual language of the complaint involved is absolutely bitchen. Balloon co-pilot Jonathan Bradford claimed the balloon operators displayed a "cavalier attitude" towards FAA regulations, cultivating a "culture of unsafe behavior." Chief Pilot Gary Stevens called Bradford an "inexperienced trainee" whose accusations were "ridiculous and unprovable."

Bad news, Gary. You ain't the judge of what's provable. Read on for more actual information on the complaint.

Check out our cover boys the Holechek brothers as they pose for pictures and direct some pick-up shots for the movie:

It is frequently said, by critics, of the romantic comedies that Hollywood churns out that “if you’ve ever seen a movie before, you know exactly what’s going to happen.” In the case of PENELOPE, one doesn’t even need to have seen celluloid projected upon screen.

As the opening phrase “Once upon a time” suggests, anyone who has ever heard a fairy tale knows what direction the story will take, though there is admittedly no evil step-parent in this case, and the only wicked witch is but a minor player who long ago placed a curse upon the Wilhern family that the next girl child born to them would have the face of a pig, until such time as one of her own kind could love her for who she is.

The Wilhern family live in a big country estate that is also somehow smack-dab in the middle of a city whose central core looks like New York, with outskirts cribbed from both London and the movie MOULIN ROUGE. Motor-scooters exist in this world, as do spy cameras and two way mirrors; yet reporters bang away on manual typewriters, and there is clearly no Internet, for if there were, pig-nosed Penelope (Christina Ricci) would have zero problem finding a man – there are undoubtedly porcine fetishists out there.

And they will surely beat off to this movie for ever and ever (finally, for them, something besides the Muppet Movies).

Not exactly as sexy as water for chocolate, but still.

Those crafty bastards over at Sunlight Foundation have cranked out the latest version of their watchdog tool for the Senate, Congress, committees, lobbyists and legislature: Open Congress.

We've recently added more ways to access the info created by the public on OpenCongress: helpful comments, votes on hot bills, social networking about your interests, and more.

To find out how these new features bring you closer to what's really happening in Congress, visit today's announcement on our blog:

http://www.opencongress.org/articles/view/431-New-Features-on-My-OpenCongress

Even if you haven't joined "My OpenCongress", you can help make our
site more useful. We hope you'll take a few minutes to fill out this
new user survey, your feedback is really important:

http://websurveyor.net/wsb.dll/11719/opencongress.htm

It's been exciting to watch the "My OpenCongress" community grow over
the past weeks and start discussions on just about everything in
Congress. We have lots more features to release in the months ahead,
so please stay tuned and let us know what you think!

Thanks,

David & the "MyOC" Team

Get it? See the relevance? OC Weekly, MyOC? That's right, baby. Copyright infringement. Just kidding.

The site is quite cool in that within minutes you can not only tabulate how a particular representative has voted or track not just the passage of a bill through committees but details on the sponsorship of said bill as well. For professional and citizen journalists, that's like talking about the texture of the lace teddy you're going to wear to the Equestrian Suite at the Madonna Inn. Or maybe that's just me.

Since moving to Santa Ana from a much larger Hollywood apartment, my home life has been a constant battle against clutter and trash, a struggle I generally lose. I can't invite anyone over to visit due to the shame of my omnipresent pile o' crap.

But I feel a whole lot better about it after reading today's Register story that highlights a home in Villa Park:

Sixteen live cats, four dead, a 3-foot pile of feces in the middle of the living room and a urine-soaked floor...Officials found cat feces in the living room and debris inside the home, across the street from Villa Park Elementary School on Center Drive. The kitchen was reported to have no running water, and baths and toilets were semi-operational or not working at all.

Four dead cats were found inside the home – two behind a piano. Several of the cats found were also suffering from burns on their paws, believed to have been caused by the urine on the floor, Amormino said. Animal Control officers confiscated 14 cats, two kittens and found two cat skulls.

My crushed beer can "collection" suddenly doesn't seem so bad.

Apparently it's not just happy cows that come from California.The Times reported earlier today that the state Department of Public Health has released a list of Southern California food retailers linked to the Chino-based slaughterhouse responsible for the largest beef recall in United States history.

The USDA ordered the recall of 143 million pounds of beef Sunday after the Humane Society released a video of workers at the Westland/Hallmark Meat Co. shoving sick and/or crippled cows with forklifts, shocking them with electric prods, dragging them with chains and shooting water up their poor little cow noses.

While no illnesses have been linked to the recalled beef, it may still be nice to know if that steak you ate two weeks ago came from the Chino plant or if it came from a happier slaughterhouse on another side of the dead animal rainbow.

To view the Times article and list of restaurants click here.

Tomorrow, those boob tube rubes known as the Parents Television Council will impart its Entertainment Seal of Approval™ (their trademark, not our lame irony) on the Trinity Broadcasting Network. "We commend the TBN Networks for upholding the positive values that families hold dear," states a PTC press release. "Our culture seems to grow ever more resistant to what is best for the family and this includes many broadcast and cable networks. The TBN networks stand out for their excellent programming that the entire family can watch and enjoy together." The release goes on to claim TBN viewers "can be assured they'll be watching programs that are devoid of inappropriate and offensive messages." Guess that means the snake charmers who fill the TBN airwaves and remain the subject of an IRS probe qualify as family programming for the PTC, eh?

We recently heard from a reader in Santa Ana who received a copy of the "Republican Party Census Document," along with an introductory letter from the RNC stating that "your answers will represent the views and opinions of ALL Republican voters living in your voting district...Unless we hear from YOU, we will not have an accurate BLUEPRINT -- a full legislative agenda and campaign plan -- and a unified Republican Party.""

Problem is, our reader is not now nor has she ever been a registered Republican. However, it's hard to imagine the survey actually matters in determining a platform, since every question is so ridiculously skewed. A few samples, after the jump...