At a poker table, perhaps nothing is more disturbing than a well-tanned man. This is a man of luxury. Has the time in his schedule to lie beneath the sun so that it may color him. Or worse, he has the time and money to lie in a tanning booth…
It’s crunch time in the Republican VP sweepstakes. If Florida Gov. Charlie Crist wants to win, he has to outrun the rumor that he’s light in the loafers. Getting engaged was a good start, but he needs an extreme makeover to be straight enough for the family values crew. Refer…
— So what would you do if some anonymous blog commenter called you an eye-rapist? A fellow, who I won’t name for obvious reasons, was recently deemed just that on this very blog. The fellow then wrote me an email with the subject line “Besmirched” asking that I exercise my…
Well, URS is no longer the king of the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. Lucky the San Francisco-based firm got out without criminal charges. Commissioner Stacy Ritter and her lobbyist husband Russ Klenet are fortunate on the same score. The husband-and-wife team’s underhanded and secret lobbying/governing connection marks one of the…
Gail Gedan-Spencer was a part-time copy editor at the Sun-Sentinel best known for co-writing one of the newspaper’s more popular blogs, The Skinny. Then she was axed by the newspaper during the recent bloodletting. Now she’s started her own blog, The Laid-Off Gourmet. Let’s show some Pulp support over there,…
Florida is shifting to Obama — and that means John McCain might be shifting to Charlie Crist as his running mate. Or at least that’s what writer Tom Bevan on the Wall Street Journal’s political blog thinks McCain will (or should) do. There’s no doubt that with Obama leading in…
Another voice has emerged in the slowly growing movement to figure out what in the hell is really going on with Charlie Crist’s $1.75 billion buyout of U.S. Sugar. The media coverage of this secretive and misguided deal so far has been laughable. I’m no big fan of lawyer Dexter…
A smiling, stubbled man known simply as “Toast” lines up styrofoam cups, uncorks the Patron tequila, and begins dishing out shots. One for the executive producer, Steve “Branzig.” One for show stuntman “OMG Mike.” One for the studio guest, Christian Finnegan. One for the reporter. One for himself (Toast is…
So Tailpipe gets married, and his new wife brings along a 6-year-old son. This is, oh, better than three decades ago. Eugene is a sunny kid with a kind of inner quiet. Disarmingly watchful — so watchful, in fact, that Tailpipe starts to think, after a year or two, that…
Ivan sits in the passenger seat of a dusty white SUV, fidgeting nervously. The trim Uruguayan shakes a Marlboro loose from the pack and stares out the window as if he’s searching for something. He has the rough hands of a carpenter but is dressed more like a J. Crew…
Somebody stop Charlie Crist. Stop the Florida governor from hawking Alligator Alley to foreign companies. Stop him from leasing the 78 miles of fenced and flat highway stretching across the Everglades to investors who will bleed motorists dry with higher tolls and no accountability to the people. Stop him from…
Alligator Tears I almost shed a tear (“Shark Huggers,” Amy Guthrie, July 12). Those poor sharks and everybody hating them. They are so misunderstood. So what if they kill ten to 20 people a year? There are plenty of people to go around! What are the lives of people versus…
Tributes are popping up about Sun-Sentinel managing editor Sharon Rosenhause, who is departing the newspaper today. Sentinel reporter Gregory Lewis calls her the “diversity queen” in his paean on his blog and Unity News, connected to the recent Unity/National Association of Black Journalists conference, described her as a champion for…
Two more job losses to report, one at the Sun-Sentinel, the other at the North Broward Hospital District. We’ll start with Thomas Swick, the Sun-Sentinel’s travel writer, who is among the recent cut of 50-plus newsroom staffers. He was apparently out of the country on Friday, so he learned about…
Charlie Crist had a great chance to bring some diversity to the Broward County bench when he replaced County Court Judge Jay Spechler, but instead went with one of his old fraternity brothers at Florida State. Instead of going with one of three black applicants in a county where there…
It’s been an historically bad month for South Florida newspapers. Hundreds of jobs lost, lots of tears, existential fear, lost hope, and teeth-gnashing. Most of those who have left the newspapers will be busy trying to find new jobs and build new lives. But what of those who remain? One…
The Sun-Sentinel is laying off numerous staffers today and by the time its over 20 percent of the newsroom will be gone. That amounts to about 55 employees. About half have either already taken the buyout voluntarily or been laid off. The remainder will be informed today that they are…
Remember when the news hit that Broward County Commissioner John Rodstrom was laid off from Wachovia? He gave up some big income — nearly $900,000 last year alone. But don’t feel too sorry for Rodstrom: He made $58,900 this morning alone. No, he didn’t hit a lottery ticket at the…
Florida turns out world-class tennis players like California produces surfers and the Dominican Republic yields nimble-footed infielders. To watch Andy Roddick or Maria Sharapova (Russian-born but trained in Bradenton) on the court is to be awed by blazing serves, passing shots, and breathtaking volleys with little thought for what it…
The sheriff’s candidate called “Shak” says he wants to bring everyone closer together in Broward County. But so far, Shahruck Dhanji, the first Muslim to run for the office, hasn’t even been able to keep together his own political machine, which recently broke down into a sea of allegations that…
We’re slouching around a wooden picnic table, killing time before our final game of the season, when my softball coach asks me the question I’ve been dreading for months: Are you in a relationship? It sounds like a harmless inquiry. But it’s one that will force me out of the…
