I’m a Rare and Precious Baby. So Pay Me. California has a child shortage and Zócalo’s youngest columnist ever, one-week-old Sam Mathews, has a solution: pay him. “Many countries offer payments to children via parents or special accounts,” Baby Mathews writes. “Treat me like the rare and precious resource I am in this graying state and tie more benefits to me.”

War Simulation, Overpopulation, and Impossible Equations. What’s one of the most popular video games of all time, the best way to combat overpopulation, and the purpose of paradoxes? Find out in this week’s Six-Point Inspection.

China’s Kinder, Gentler Show Trial. The proceedings of Communist official Bo Xilai, who was tried for corruption and abuse of power, had all the trappings of a film script. The five-day trial was live-blogged for China’s more than a half-billion Internet users, and transcripts were widely disseminated. But New America Foundation fellow Hao Wu, who looks back at China’s other “trial of the century” of the “Gang of Four” in 1980, says that the relative transparency of the trial and the diversity of public opinion are positive indications of China’s overall direction.

The Fall Gusts That Bring Out L.A.’s Crazy. The Santa Ana Winds have long been a part of Southern California culture and myth. These hot, dry gusts of autumn wind that sneak up on Los Angeles residents have been praised and cursed in poetry, literature, and song. So what does our collective fascination with the Santa Ana Winds say about L.A. culture?

See You at the Polls … Or Else. Australia requires all eligible voters to cast a vote on Election Day. And since compulsory voting was introduced in 1924, voter turnout has never fallen below 90 percent. Aussie Ariel Bogle makes the case for why compulsory voting would work in the United States.

Next week …

Michael Lind on why we shouldn’t look for an American political center …

On Thursday at the California Endowment, Washington Post columnist and American Prospect editor Harold Meyerson visits Zócalo to discuss: Can The Left Survive Without Labor?