Wedge-politics guru Karl Rove is officially no longer in the House. Some perspective: *The Prince of All Things Partisan never should have been allowed around policy. The country is worse off for it. *The presidential Svengali was really, really good at one thing: Getting George W. Bush elected multiple times. He did whatever it took [...]
First, the bad news. We’re still stuck with a dysfunctional Hillsborough County Commission that can wax blissful over a sports complex but grow combative over mass transit relevance and wetlands protection. Still stuck with a faction that treats public input as a gadfly infestation. Still stuck with an element that seems clueless about the inherent [...]
Florida, as we well know, is faced with the inconvenient truth of a $1.1 billion budget shortfall and a tax system that hasn’t fundamentally changed since LeRoy Collins was governor. Ripples from the property-tax shell game have already been felt at the local level. Tampa, for example, has announced $20 million in fiscal cuts. It’s [...]
Plaudits to the University of Tampa for getting out in front of a serious undergraduate issue – student drinking – that is too often dismissed as a rite of collegiate passage. UT actually requires all its first-year students to complete an online alcohol prevention program, AlcoholEdu for College, immediately upon arrival. Some sobering statistics underscore [...]
The shakedown cruise is over. First-year Tampa City Council member Joseph Caetano has found a cause. He wants to rid the city of advertising-sign carriers, some in costume, who can be found working some of Tampa’s busier streets – such as New Tampa’s Bruce B. Downs Boulevard. He says they can be distracting to drivers. [...]
*The pre-season college football rankings of the Associated Press have USF in the top 35. That’s higher than Notre Dame. Who ever would have thought? *Devil Rays principal owner Stuart Sternberg will make the official call regarding manager Joe Maddon’s status next month. It’s expected that Maddon, a refreshingly nice guy whose team has the [...]
By all accounts, the 5-year-old, Orlando-based Florida A&M Law School has not fared well. Barely half its students pass the Florida Bar Exam; faculty quality is questionable; leadership is a vacuum and full accreditation by the American Bar Association is far from a given. It’s also worth reflecting on the irony of that site-selection charade [...]
The death of Hillsborough County sheriff’s Sgt. Ron Harrison was tragic. With the aid of perfect hindsight and some common sense, a case can also be made that it was preventable. An out-on-bail mutant with a rap sheet and proclivity for violence was the killer. Among the outraged: Fox News Channel’s “The O’Reilly Factor.” It [...]
Re: The impending resignation of Karl Rove, presidential Svengali and wedge-politics guru. A few points: *Rove, Prince of Partisan Politics, never should never have been allowed around policy. The country is worse off for it. *He was really, really good at one thing: Getting George W. Bush elected multiple times. He did whatever it took [...]
Much was made the other day when the USF football team bus – on the way from campus to Raymond James Stadium – passed a billboard of more than passing interest. The players were rubbernecking for there — near the intersection of I-275 and Fowler Avenue — was the much larger-than-life likeness of sophomore quarterback [...]
