In a parody of Sally Field’s infamous Oscar acceptance speech, readers of a new book are exclaiming, “I dislike it! I really dislike it!”That’s the response from a small band of movie buffs who’ve taken to the Internet to denounce Oscar Fever, a factually challenged study of the Academy Awards…
Out of Bounds Personal foul: I don’t believe I have ever responded to a New Times article in the 11 years I have served in elected office in Tempe, but now I must. The story and cover (“Quarterback Sneak,” John Dougherty, August 16) is so biased and over the line…
On John Vanderslice’s second LP, printed lyrics have been replaced with a series of handwritten letters from Jesse, our strange protagonist who is trapped in Antarctica, lost without GPS coordinates or Internet access. After a few listens, it becomes clear that each of these lonely and reflective missives corresponds to…
In 1989, CIGNA Healthcare of Arizona informed policyholders it would no longer cover long-term speech and physical therapy. Three-year-old Ryan Ewers, who weighed 17 pounds and couldn’t talk, eat or stand to have his skin touched because of complications at birth, needed those therapies for any hope of one day…
In late June, David Hans Schmidt placed a birthday card on the grave of his infant son Ben, who died eight years ago at birth. A month later, New Times wrote about Schmidt’s rollicking campaign to milk $6.5 million in damages from the county for Jefferson Davis McGee, who had…
Margie Newman was horrified when her 11-year-old grandson, Shane, ran in the house one day with a nosebleed that soaked two towels. The culprit of the nosebleed, as well as her other grandson’s migraines and rashes, Newman says, is the stinky stuff called biosolids that lies on farmland just 100…
Taking It in the Shorts Grid ‘n’ bear it: Instead of Tempe Mayor Neil Giuliano on the cover (“Quarterback Sneak,” John Dougherty, August 16), that should be all the residents of Maricopa County that Cardinals owner Bill Bidwill is — ah — er . . . “standing over.” Boy, did…
Delay of game during a football contest is a minor penalty — merely a five-yard infraction. Further delay in building the Arizona Cardinals’ proposed $331 million “multipurpose facility” is far more serious. And that’s what looms on the horizon. Weeks and possibly months of delay. If construction doesn’t begin by…
[Tom Swift] suddenly stopped, and reached around for his electric rifle, which he was carrying at his back. “What is it?” asked Ned in a whisper. “I don’t know, but it’s some big animal there in the bushes,” was Tom’s low-voiced answer. “I’m ready for it.” — Tom Swift in…
For nearly 20 years, society tattletale Danny Medina, publisher of Arizona Trends, has tickled the Valley’s upper crust with his newspaper columns detailing marriages on the rocks, failing fortunes, cosmetic surgeries gone awry and other low life among the high life.Couched in a catty, chatty style that even the late-period…
The U.S. Department of Justice is making inquiries regarding conditions at the Arizona Department of Juvenile Corrections, New Times has learned.The inquiries are based on a New Times special report, “Slammed” (“The Kids Are NOT Alright,” Amy Silverman, July 5), which revealed poor conditions at ADJC since 1998, when a…
Under the Gun Cheap shot: A police officer has the right under some circumstances to kill (“A Life That Almost Happened,” Amanda Scioscia, July 26). With this awesome power comes great responsibility. This does not mean that each and every time a police officer shoots someone that he was correct…
In the end, it all came down to the girl. A 13-year-old girl with long, curly hair who captivated and charmed the heart of an older boy who should have known better. But love has a way of making danger appear distant, of bridging the gap between age and family,…
In a stretch of the lower Colorado River below Lake Mead, wildlife biologists are worried that fish are losing their gender. Chemical-laced wastewater, they fear, is giving fish what amounts to a sex change.The phenomenon, called gender-bending, has already shown up in fish nearby, in the Las Vegas area, where…
After stubbornly refusing for more than a year to sign off on efforts to obtain a $10 million grant that could end the euthanasia of dogs and cats in Maricopa County, Arizona Humane Society Director Ken White has buckled under pressure from Valley animal welfare groups and media scrutiny and…
Native American runners will set off Saturday on a grueling 200-mile course from the Hopi mesas to downtown Phoenix to protest more than three decades of groundwater pumping by the world’s largest private coal company.Marathon runners from Hopi, Acoma, Zuni and Navajo tribes will participate in the run that will…
Culture Schlock Nix the niche marketing: A few years back, a Southwest Supermarket tried moving into the vacated ABCO at 67th Avenue and Peoria. I don’t think it stayed open for even a full year. Of course, I’m sure there was the usual culture clash when a Latino-oriented supermarket opens…
After slugging it out in L.A.’s shithole-dive bar-club scene, the best-looking band in leather since Girlschool finally delivers its first full-length album with one foot in the gutter and the other planted firmly in the crotches of MTV’s endless battalion of carefully pierced ‘n’ primped Hot Topic rockers. The quartet’s…
For a month or so this spring, the most confusing sign in Phoenix was the one on the broad beige façade of Southwest Supermarkets’ new Phoenix store, at Seventh Street and McDowell Road. Its green and orange corporate cursive reads “SW Desert Market.” But on a warm afternoon late in…
The Arizona Supreme Court on July 16 upheld the death-penalty conviction of James “Butch” Harrod in the 1988 execution of Phoenix heiress Jeanne Tovrea. While the high court’s unanimous ruling pushes the 48-year-old Harrod one step closer to execution, it does nothing to get to the bottom of one of…
It was a small victory for Chez Nous when the City of Phoenix took up sides with all the people who want to save the swanky cocktail lounge at Seventh Avenue and Indian School Road.Apparently, even the city can’t stop the interests that want to turn the site of Chez…
Dr. Michael Berens has already halted his controversial brain tumor research using beagle puppies, but he’s not out of the doghouse yet. Animal rights activists have sued Berens in federal court in California, accusing him of repeatedly submitting inaccurate information to the National Institutes of Health to obtain his research…
