1900 Year

Assembly candidate Rob Wilcox, who pledged two months ago not to take campaign contributions from insurance companies, has received $1,900 this year from insurance agents, a Van Nuys insurance brokerage firm and the owner of a Woodland Hills insurance agency, campaign records show. Wilcox made the promise in a code of ethics he urged four other Republicans to sign in their race to succeed retiring Assemblywoman Marian La Follette (R-Northridge) in the 38th Assembly District.

New tax forms are never a welcome after-Christmas present, but the Internal Revenue Service tried to play Santa Claus on Wednesday by unveiling next year's 1040 with the promise that the forms to be mailed to taxpayers next week contain few changes from last year. IRS officials said taxpayers would be able to use their 1987 tax returns as a guide to filling out the new forms.

A conservative political group launched an ad in New Hampshire and Iowa on Thursday, arguing that Democrat Howard Dean would raise taxes and comparing the front-runner to losing presidential candidates George S. McGovern and Michael S. Dukakis. The Dean campaign immediately responded to the Club for Growth's commercial, saying it would broadcast its own ad this weekend countering the criticism.

President Reagan will ask Congress to deny federally guaranteed loans to all college students with family incomes above $32,500, a move that would lock out hundreds of thousands of students from the loan program, an Administration source said Saturday. Reagan's fiscal 1986 budget would also restrict eligibility for Pell Grants--outright federal stipends of up to $1,900 a year--to students from families with incomes of $25,000 or less.

Discipline is rigidly enforced, you can't wear jeans and you have to serve 100 hours of community service during your junior and senior years. Despite those aspects of life at Mater Dei, Orange County's largest Catholic high school, almost half of those who apply are turned away.

Could Vladimir Guerrero be headed toward a coronation in which he trades his ugly, pine-tar-smeared batting helmet -- "If he ever gets hit by a pitch there, the ball will stick," Angel Manager Mike Scioscia says -- for a Triple Crown? Any such celebration would be the first since Carl Yastrzemski won the American League Triple Crown while serving as left-field architect of the Boston Red Sox's "Impossible Dream" in 1967.

Shocking upset? If the Seattle Seahawks were to beat the favored Raiders at the Coliseum this afternoon, that would be an upset. But the biggest upset of all is that the Seahawks and Raiders are at the Coliseum. No one would have predicted that nearly eight months ago, when the Northridge earthquake left the 71-year-old L.A. Coliseum looking more like the 1,900-year-old Rome Colosseum. But it's amazing what a massive reconstruction project and $60 million can do.

The 1,900-year-old ceramic jar from China's Han Dynasty once belonged to Mme. Chiang Kai-shek, its owner said. He claimed a $50,000 tax deduction in 1976 when he donated the artifact to KQED, San Francisco's public television station. The Internal Revenue Service disputed that value. It said the jar was cracked on one side and that a hole had been drilled in the bottom so it could be used as a lamp base.

Before they became among the best their sports had ever seen, Pete Sampras and Tiger Woods were Southern California teenagers performing in old, venerable tournaments that had been around since the turn of the 20th century. Before the first Rose Bowl was played in Pasadena in 1902, tennis was played in Ojai. Before the first Santa Anita Handicap was run in 1935, golf was played at country clubs all around Los Angeles. And before the CIF State track meet started in 1915, Carpinteria played host to hosted its first track meet.

As property taxes roll into the state coffers this month, a number of civic activists, politicians and lobbyists are pushing for a ballot initiative next year that would substantially change Proposition 13 by making it easier for local governments to impose or raise non-property taxes. Momentum has also built to return control of property tax allocations to local governments, allowing them to keep most of that revenue rather than have it disbursed by the state.