Michael Kinsley talks with Newsweek’s Brian Braiker about his next job as Los Angeles Times opinion editor:

BB: You’re going to be spending half your time in Seattle. How much of your job will entail thinking about California–specific issues?

MK: A lot. They just won the Pulitzer Prize for editorials about California state government, so there are people there who know a lot more about California than me. But my first piece in a national publication was about California politics in the Washington Monthly— it was about 1975 or something. It was about the Imperial Valley and water and land and all that “Chinatown” sort of stuff.

BB: I grew up in Los Angeles and that’s a fascinating topic. Are you boning up on your L.A. politics?

MK: It is like “Chinatown.” Fascinating is a good way to put it. I’m not going to have to force myself to get interested in California. I went to Amazon and I’ve ordered all of [California historian] Kevin Starr’s books and textbooks and the Mike Davis City of Quartz. I’m going to do some homework.

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