Commentary: Slain L.A. Times columnist Ruben Salazar matters more than ever, 55 years later

The afternoon sun glimmered off the ocean as I drove down MacArthur Boulevard in Newport Beach to fulfill a promise.

This September marks five years since I debuted as a columnist for The Times. My first dispatch was from the mausoleum niche at Pacific View Memorial Park that holds the cremains of one of my predecessors, Ruben Salazar.

Exactly 55 years ago, Salazar was killed in an East Los Angeles bar by a tear gas canister launched by an L.A. County sheriff’s deputy that tore through his head. He was one of three people who died that day during the Chicano Moratorium , a rally against the Vietnam War that out-of-control cops turned into a melee.

Salazar was only eight months into his columnist gig. He was a well-respected Times veteran who had done stints covering immigration, a