Jesse Palmer, the popular ESPN football analyst and major babe magnet, put it succinctly: “An airplane hangar with a South Beach theme. Amazing.” Palmer was describing the 10,000-square-foot facility that had been transformed into a Super Bowl soiree site. The hangar — on the corporate-jet fringes of TIA — normally houses the Eddie [...]
Although some “just-say-no” Republicans, Special Olympics families and venerators of presidential image disagreed, most observers generally thought it was a good idea for President Barack Obama to go on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.” Put me down as one of the naysayers. And make that the stodgy, office-of-the-president-should-be-above-a-late-night-comedy-show-turn category. (And for what it’s worth, [...]
Much attention was – and is still being – paid to that post-game press conference tirade of University of Connecticut basketball coach Jim Calhoun. Some scribe provocateur asked Calhoun how he justified his $1.6 million state salary when Connecticut is running a deficit of nearly $1 billion. Before losing it on camera, Connecticut’s highest-paid [...]
The following seems unlikely to result from the current Tallahassee Legislative session: meaningful revenue reform. That’s despite the fact that Florida’s go-go-growth era is over. That’s reflected in several ways, most notably Florida’s tax (read: sales) collections, which have declined four years running – and the stabilizing end is not yet in sight. It’s [...]
Former South Florida congressional candidate Joe Garcia was one of Daniel Erikson’s interviewees for his book “The Cuba Wars.” Garcia, a former director of the Cuban American National Foundation, addressed America’s economic embargo and likened it to a religious experience for its hard-line adherents. “Cuba is almost a quasi-religious issue,” said Garcia. “The problem [...]
State of the city speeches are typically by-the-numbers presentations, even when the presenter is a quintessential communicator such as Mayor Pam Iorio. Where else can you combine stormwater sediment trap projects, an important new (New Tampa) traffic-signal installation and the elimination of 200 parking meters (Ybor City) with the groundbreaking of museums (art and children’s) [...]
Nothing is more integral to good teaching than good teachers. Not class-size limits, not magnet schools, not SpringBoard curricula, not even cell-phone bans. Without the right person in front of a class, the wrong outcomes are guaranteed. So, now it looks like Hillsborough County will have to do without as many as 150 [...]
It’s a given that those politicians making the case for maintaining Cold War relations with Cuba make no sense from the standpoint of what’s good for the United States. For those in South Florida, it’s personal. For others, it’s pandering. But it’s assuredly not what’s best for the U.S. Exhibit A: The man behind last [...]
As a former teacher, I can’t help but see a strong correlation between SpringBoard, Hillsborough County’s controversial, hands-on, interactive math and language arts curriculum program, and the availability of $30 million in federal grants to pay for it. Always sensitive to criticism about being boring or irrelevant, the education establishment has often dabbled in [...]
As if we needed further convincing. Anyone not envision Gov. Charlie Crist running for the U.S. Senate in 2010? Especially now that he’s appointed black Judge James E.C. Perry to the Florida Supreme Court? Crist, who didn’t mind sharing that Fort Myers stimulus stage with President Obama, is the Democrats’ favorite Republican. He’s [...]
