When Ed Pastor, as Arizona’s ranking (and only) Democratic congressman, was asked to nominate Janet Napolitano’s successor as U.S. Attorney early in 1998, he deliberately set out to find a qualified Hispanic for the job. Pastor wanted a Hispanic, and the White House did, too, “to break the glass ceiling,”…
Officer Scott Masino began CPR even though he knew his friend was dead. Masino tried in vain to push breath into the chest of fellow cop Marc Atkinson, to get his heart to beat after it had been stopped by the gunshots. Atkinson was killed in an ambush on March…
Here We Go Again The Flash tore up this week’s column after hearing that the bank-fraud conviction of former governor J. Fife Symington III had been overturned by the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The 2-1 court ruling, announced Tuesday, states that the judge in Symington’s federal fraud trial…
Shock Doc Thanks for the excellent article on Dr. Brian “Kiss My Ass” Finkel (“The Terminator,” Amy Silverman, June 17). It brought back memories from when I was active praying on the sidewalks as part of Children of the Rosary in the early Nineties with one of today’s greatest social…
I don’t wish ill on the clerk to the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, but it’s a good thing she was sick on June 15. That was the day the Board of Supervisors met in a hastily called “special study session” to discuss the media melee over their plan to…
HELP WANTED: CANDIDATE for mayor of nation’s sixth-largest city. Qualified applicants must have some name ID and a vision for the future of this burgeoning megalopolis of 1.2 million residents and a $1.7 billion annual budget. Must gather 1,500 signatures by July 9. Should be able to raise at least…
As I walk into Dusty Macgruders, at 24th Street and Thomas, that 4 Non Blondes dim ode to twentysomething trust-fund angst called “What’s Up” trumpets through the small bar’s PA system. It is at first excruciating. A song like that is usually the first nudge for me to bid a…
Mention Lake Havasu City, and most people will pounce on the hamlet’s hellacious heat, a triple-digit mind-roaster that frequently tops out the nation’s thermometer. Either that, or London Bridge, the imported British landmark that spans a portion of the boat-studded waterway weaving through the western Arizona lakeside community. But George…
Step inside the “Vaginal Vault,” Dr. Brian Finkel’s nickname for the clinic where he performs more than 2,000 abortions a year. Finkel’s clinic, the Metro Phoenix Women’s Center, feels more like a pawn shop. Elvis Presley collectible plates and Native American rugs cover the walls, fertility goddesses and a steer…
Look, Ma, No Hands! Provoked by a heady blend of overwhelming demand and genetic tendencies toward shameless self-promotion, the Flash is pleased to turn this weekly column space over to excerpts from the “Daily Flash: A Reader’s Guide to the Arizona Republic.” The Daily Flash appears exclusively at www.phoenixnewtimes.com Tuesday…
Balkanization While online looking for an article, I not unintentionally arrived at New Times. My purpose was to take a quick look at what’s really happening in the desert and move on. Instead I wound up reading Michael Lacey’s entire story on Pavle Milic (“To Serb With Love,” June 3),…
We can hear the night watchman click his flashlight/Ask himself if it’s him or them that’s really insane. –Bob Dylan A couple of prostitutes step off the dimly lit street into the splash of white light. Their dark bodies appear as things long past the point of retrieval, their faces…
Before she burned her rear while sitting on a toilet in the kindergarten rest room, before she discovered that children were being forced to stand in the sun as a form of discipline, Nerina Kagan, an offbeat, highly credentialed music teacher from Connecticut, figured she’d found her niche teaching hip-hop…
Looking over my county government’s plan to destroy the warehouse district south of downtown Phoenix, I wonder if the schizophrenic crackheads who roam there at night came up with the concept. A jail, a morgue and a parking garage. Maricopa County intends to build this loathsome trinity on the fresh…
A gale roaring up the side of Roden Crater, blasting construction grit and sand into the gray-bearded face of artist James Turrell, is making it tough for him to describe the serenity he envisions for this old volcano northeast of Flagstaff. He retreats a few paces down a cindery embankment…
The singer bursts onto the scene from the back of the dance floor. As she struts toward the stage, her movements incorporate a kind of odd, sinless swagger, as innocent as a young girl’s first goodnight kiss. Her entrance is, nonetheless, full of sassy, pop-star self-certainty. She wears flared blue-jean…
They arrived from the Netherlands in a small cardboard box. Two bottles and a one-page disclaimer, cushioned by Styrofoam peanuts sticky from leaked chemicals. One bottle was filled with small white crystal pellets and marked “Kalium Hydroxide.” The other contained a clear liquid and was labeled “Gamma Butyrolactone.” The skull-and-crossbones…
In March, Maricopa County sheriff’s deputy Steve Barnes came forward with damning news: several of Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s deputies, Barnes said, had reported to the FBI that they and others had been ordered to surveil Arpaio’s political enemies. If Arpaio did order such surveillance, it could result in his being…
Stay Out of the Kitchen Former governor J. Fife Symington III lost an appeal this month. The decision won’t send him to prison, but it will keep Symington from doing KP in the kitchen of one of the Valley’s best restaurants, Barmouche at 3131 East Camelback. Symington recently asked Barmouche…
After a long Memorial Day of food and drinks, post 1170 of the Veterans of Foreign Wars seems sleepy and slow when we arrive. Not for long, though. If Wanda the bartender hadn’t gotten in the middle of things after the war hero and ex-boxer slapped me across the face,…
Ethnic Flood Thank you so much for penning the poignant story on my interesting friend Pavle Milic (“To Serb With Love,” Michael Lacey, June 3). His fragmented and diverse roots have sculpted him into a talented and passionate person, especially sensitive to the ethnocentric nature of Americans. His future writings…
After two days of lectures, product pitches and apocalyptic rhetoric, it is time for a panel of self-proclaimed Y2K experts to take questions from the audience. The crowd, gathered here for the Y2K Summit and Town Hall Meeting at Phoenix First Assembly Church, doesn’t disappoint. One gentleman wants to know…
