Gunz for Hire

Reports of the death of South Florida’s top political website, Politics1.com, were greatly exaggerated. Both the Miami Herald and the Sun-Sentinel published stories back in January 2005 stating that Ron Gunzburger, the lawyer and political animal who runs Politics1, was killing the massive site. They reported the news based on…

After School Special

When Crush — the Thursday-night indie-rock dance party — announced the Broken Hearts Ball especially for singles, I couldn’t resist. I mean, isn’t the ideal time to meet someone new when he’s rebounding and vulnerable? Ignoring the event flier’s lure of a “fiddy dollar bar tab” to be awarded to…

Mayor Mara, Annotated

Hollywood Mayor Mara Giulianti is no fan of this weekly rag. But when New Times Staff Writer Trevor Aaronson e-mailed her several to-the-point, politely worded questions about a recent vote, even we were surprised by the tone of her reply. As a courtesy to readers, we’ve provided her message, with…

Letters for March 9-15, 2006

The Art of the Rip-Off Mara & Co. are the best at what they do: “Slush Money” (Trevor Aaronson, February 23) was a great article. It is nice to see that you guys have not forgotten about our great government over here in Hollywood. If it is not sludge or…

Swept Away

Ah, sweeps. That magic time of year when our local television stations pull out all the stops to get us to tune in. Four times a year, local news programs roll out their best stuff in the scramble for Nielsen ratings and supremacy in the viewing market. For some, that…

Magazine Copy Rights

When Palm Beach Post crime reporter Stephanie Slater read the story in the glossy Boca Raton Magazine, she broke down and cried right there in the newsroom. It was like she’d been robbed. Slater, who also serves as president of the Florida Press Club, complained to editors that her work…

A Nearly Religious Experience

From the outside, the Falcon House in Delray Beach is respectable, dignified even, with pink impatiens lining the walkway to the 1925 tan stucco building. Inside the Chicago-style bar, however, the walls, lights, and photographs glow like the red coals of hellfire. If décor was any indication, I was in…

Letters for March 2-8, 2006

Buddy’s Two Hats The longest NY minute ever: Bob Norman has hit a nerve again with his exposé, “The GOP’s Buddy” (February 23) about Buddy Nevins, who wears two hats as the Sun-Sentinel’s political reporter and political columnist. Norman is fearlessly intrepid in the best tradition of the free press…

The Rave’s Back, Baby

In a grungy nightclub near train tracks in Hollywood, there’s a strange time warp going on. Like the millennium never happened, nearly 200 ravers fill the four rooms of X-it Nightclub. There’s a woman who seems to have forgotten to wear pants, her black underwear and thigh-high tights on display…

Slush Money

Hollywood is so eager to give developers unfettered access to public money that city officials recently helped to create what amounts to a slush fund. By forming a private foundation, lobbyist Alan Koslow, former city employee Cynthia Berman-Miller, and other Hollywood political insiders now control millions of dollars worth of…

The GOP’s Buddy

The Lauderdale Beach Republican Club had a problem: There was a Democrat in the house. Or in the resort, to be specific. The Clarion Beach Resort in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea. Club founder Bob Wolfe invited Sun-Sentinel political reporter Buddy Nevins to address the flock at its monthly meeting on February 6 at…

Bumping Ugly

When Night Rider met Coyote Ugly, two tight-bodied bartenders stood atop the bar, just like in the Hollywood movie. Except that one was bent over and the other was slamming her hips into the ass of her co-worker in a manner that can be described only as “banging.” (Gotta wonder…

The Divine Wager

Tailpipe is happy to confirm that there really is a functioning racetrack in southeastern Broward County now, complete with occasionally predictable nags, a splendid oval-shaped dirt-and-turf running track, and an elegant new lemon-colored clubhouse. Gulfstream Park, in the midst of a $171 million renovation, has escaped from the wilderness of…

Invitation to a Stomping

First thing to go wrong was the patriotic opening. The flag-waving DVD wouldn’t fire up on the projection screen above the arena; then the Hollywood Police Department’s Honor Guard came in too soon, plodding in through the wrong gate. Of course, it wasn’t like anyone would notice among the folks…

Letters for February 23-March 1, 2006

Sinners We Can’t help ourselves — things happen: Is New Times branching into the pimping business, as it flaunts a provocatively attired, heathen bimbo, on the front cover (“The Night Rider,” Marya Summers, February 16)? This violates the tenets of the Holy Bible, as to how God/Jesus desires women to…

Access Hollywood

Maria Jackson and Helen Chervin happily give tours of their Hollywood neighborhood. It’s not a tour you’ll find in a promotional pamphlet. In fact, city officials admit that they “surrendered” this neighborhood a long time ago. But Jackson and Chervin haven’t. On a recent weekday afternoon, Jackson and Chervin, notebooks…

Temperament Kills

It was the kind of news story that merits only a few short sentences in the daily newspaper. Last month, a man had been killed trying to cross I-595 on foot. Both the Miami Herald and South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported the death of Jason Louis Livers as digest items, just…

Stop the Internets!

Kids at St. Thomas Aquinas High School are learning a tough lesson about MySpace.com: It isn’t really their space at all. The Archdiocese of Miami, which owns the private Catholic school, has taken over the networking Internet site, at least as far as St. Thomas students are concerned. One student…

Red Dollars, Blue Pennies

Even in its infancy, Florida’s 2006 race for guvna is controversial. Last month, the Broward Republican Party broke with convention and endorsed Attorney General Charlie Crist for governor over state Chief Financial Officer Tom Gallagher. Broward’s political types alleged that the premature endorsement was intended to push big money into…