“I am not a racist,” Nancy Burnett pleads over the phone. She doesn’t see what the big deal is or why other Cottonwood residents are up in arms over her statements. But Nancy Burnett is getting used to being at the center of the fire storm in this community 100…
Except for the pimple-faced neo-Nazis putting together Molotov cocktails, the alley was empty. It was too dark that February evening in east Phoenix to see the shaved head of the youngest, an awkward sixteen-year-old with freckles and tattoos. One tattoo especially would have stood out had there been more light:…
I recently came across the results of a government study which concluded, after years of exhaustive research, that husbands do less housework and family cooking than wives. Obviously, this project was conducted by the kind of freeloading, fed-funded Einsteins who would surmise, after years of exhaustive research, that men are…
A key architect of the Victims’ Rights Initiative has been accused of sexually abusing at least three female employees. Allen Heinze, who resigned unexpectedly Friday as executive director of the Arizona Prosecuting Attorneys’ Advisory Council (APAAC), was already under fire in a $3 million sexual-harassment suit brought by Colleen Shallock,…
In the past two years, Arizona’s contingency of young neo-Nazis has doubled from 100 to about 200. This is according to the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith, a group that monitors extremist hate groups in the United States. The ADL estimates there are some 3,000 skinheads nationwide. “Phoenix is a…
The punishment of Charles Keating has begun. Even before a jury has been chosen, a California judge, eager to increase his voter-approval rating, sets a bond so incredibly high that it be comes nothing less than an indefinite jail sentence. This preposterous ruling by a judge trying to curry public…
A writer of fiction most certainly would enjoy a rare literary feast in sitting down to write a novel based on the rise and fall of Senator John McCain. McCain’s life story has all the elements required for the creation of a complex, even memorable, fictional character. His life is…
I changed planes in Boston last weekend on the way home from my vacation in Ireland. While waiting to catch the plane for Phoenix, I bought both the Boston Globe and the Boston Herald. I n reading through the two papers, I was astonished at the number of stories discussing…
Things have been pretty pleasant in Pleasant Valley in the last hundred years or so, since its name was branded on frontier legend. But folks up here by the Mogollon Rim think it might be time to set the battle lines again. Flashback to 1887. On February 2, a Mexican…
In this atmosphere of tense campaigning, where Georgia Staton, the Democratic candidate for attorney general, has been publicly scorned as a “junkyard dog” by a prominent attorney and has been deserted right and left by members of her own party, it is probably only fair to point out that she…
At Dick Mahoney’s rambling, Spanish-style house in Encanto, there are some very noticeable things: a slightly disreputable gazebo in the backyard, a swimming pool filled with silt, and a pervasive air of altogether cheerful neglect. All his books are noticeable. But most noticeable of all is the poem. “A Poem…
In the Superman comic books of my youth, the Man of Steel often hung out in the far reaches of the universe on a cube-shaped planet called Bizarro World, where all the rules of nature, logic and common sense were reversed. Green traffic lights meant stop, red meant go. Dogs…
Into the lobby of Terry Goddard’s downtown campaign headquarters, someone has just lugged a canvas banner that is painted in new campaign colors. At the moment, Goddard is sequestered upstairs with television reporters and he cannot witness this event. His absence doesn’t matter much, however, since he has become such…
Before September 11, there were seven of them. Seven candidates standing for major office who, at age 45 or younger, were a collective statement about the turnover in Arizona’s political power. There probably never had been so many youngsters clamoring to run the state before. And the sudden swarm of…
On the wall of Grant Woods’ office is a photograph, taken of him when he was at Occidental College, together with an old black man named Preacher. Woods attended the small liberal arts school in Los Angeles beginning in ’72, so he missed the pure Sixties, but there are certainly…
There is a very peculiar thing about Fife Symington’s education at Harvard, and it is that he felt persecuted there. He is not a conspiracy theorist in other ways, not the sort of arch-conservative Republican who is likely to try to hire a private investigator to look over the shoulders…
In his world, Eusebio Vielma is a rich man. Arizona’s State Compensation Fund cuts Vielma a check every month for $883.38. Of that amount, half automatically goes to pay child support for two of his youngest children. Another chunk–probably 10 percent–goes to his attorney. The rest, about $350 a month…
It sure is sizzling over at the state liquor department. In addition to the usual stuff of keeping an eye on taverns, investigators have had to contend with the allegations of crack sales at Maricopa County Attorney Rick Romley’s famous Club 902. And there’s a whole army of irate football…
Rex Ann Bills was washing her dishes one night last November when Dale Crosby barged into her unlocked trailer. Bills had been living in the northeast Arizona community of Eagar since the summer of 1987. The Michigan native liked its moderate climate and small-town intimacy. But things weren’t right beneath…
Legislator Dave Carson, noting the rising bankruptcy filings, says, “As you know, we share some very illustrious company in that respect.” Two conservative lawmakers who led the tax revolt last year and a wanna-be conservative representative are fending off tax collectors outside the legislature. Representatives Don Aldridge of Lake Havasu…
Yes, I know. I said I was going to take a six- or eight-week hiatus from Dad Zoning, and here we are almost five months later. But as any parent will confirm, time flies when you’re having babies. And it positively zooms when you choose to raise them yourself, as…
The crafty old trainer watches his new kid shadowbox in front of a full- length mirror. Fifteen-year-old Chris Campbell is working out for the first time at the Tuff Side Gym on 17th Avenue and Van Buren. Sweat pours off both of them. It’s 110 degrees outside the gym and…
