Best Political ComebackThe Diaz-Balart brothersIt was right there in black-and-white, on the cover of your Miami New Times: “End of the Diaz-Balart Dynasty.” Just weeks before election night, scores of polls showed both Mario and Lincoln — Cuban-American icons and Miami’s reps in Washington for years — trailing their Democratic…
(New Times Best of Miami issue hits the streets this week. With this post, Riptide 2.0 provides an appetizer. The main course/entire issue will appear on the website Tuesday afternoon.)Best Boy Made GoodMickey RourkeMickey Rourke’s redemption has been the stuff Hollywood makes movies about. Only an independent filmmaker made it and it…
(New Times Best of Miami issue hits the streets this week. With this post, Riptide 2.0 provides an appetizer. The main course/entire issue will appear on the website Tuesday afternoon.) Best New Restaurant Area 31, Gotham Steak, Joey’s, Sra. Martinez, and Meat MarketA five-way tie, testament to Miami’s rapidly expanding universe of…
Best Inexpensive Italian RestaurantJoey’s2506 NW Second Ave.Miami 33127305-438-0488joeyswynwood.comThe little man felt very bad,One meatball was all he had.And in his dreams, he hears that call:”You gets no bread with one meatball.”Owing to this damn recession, it’s appropriate to drag out Depression-era ditties like the one popularized by Josh White in…
Best Street Photographer Carlos Ramos (AKA Miami Fever)miami-fever.comiaminmiami.comWith the advent of the now ubiquitous camera phone and cheap broadband, almost anyone can become a famous photographer overnight. Well, not quite anyone. There’s still this little thing called talent that isn’t quite universally available yet. But Carlos Ramos definitely has it…
New Times Best of Miami issue hits the streets this week. With this post, Riptide 2.0 provides an appetizer. The main course/entire issue will appear on the website Tuesday afternoon. Best Politician Michelle Spence-Jones She was elected in 2005, and not a moment has passed without controversy for Miami Commissioner Michelle Spence-Jones…
(New Times Best of Miami issue hits the streets this week. With this post, Riptide 2.0 provides an appetizer. The main course/entire issue will appear on the website Tuesday afternoon.) Best ChefsCindy Hutson and Doug RodriguezPast honorees of this lifetime achievement-type award are Norman Van Aken, Mark Militello, Allen Susser, Pascal…
Rachel Goodrich, Tinker ToysIt has been a good year for South Florida’s quirky local indie darling Rachel Goodrich, what with a glowing shoutout from the New York Times this past December and her official debut appearance at SXSW this past spring. It was all well-deserved and timed with the October…
The Talent Farm20911 Johnson St., Ste. 111, Pembroke Pines954-438-3488Look, everyone knows about the Broward/Palm Beach holy trinity of venues for mid-sized touring acts: Revolution Live, Culture Room, and Respectable Street. But what about hyper-local spots that nurture homegrown talent, especially the kind that can’t legally get into most other venues?…
Miami, literary Shangri-La? A mecca for the bookish? It doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue. But for more than 20 years, autumn has brought a kind of inverse solar eclipse, sending some of us scurrying from the beaches, out of the malls, off the interstate, and into the comforting, ancient…
Born in the 1970s in southwest Detroit, Rolando grew up heavily influenced by his Latin rhythms and percussion. When he heard DJ Jeff Mills mix as “The Wizard,” he discovered the sounds of techno. Through a mutual friend, he was introduced to “Mad” Mike Banks and promptly became a member…
E-mail memo #34: “Miami Book Fair; writer locked himself in bookstore bathroom repeatedly yelling at concerned employees to ‘Go Away!’ When writer emerged an hour later he started to ‘freak out’ again. ‘I have a snake on me!’ writer screamed. ‘It’s biting me! It’s IN MY MOUTH!’ Writer was dragged…
Next Tuesday’s election is particularly critical to Miami-Dade County Commission District 2, which stretches from the City of Miami to North Miami Beach. The 102,000 inhabitants suffer from too much violent crime, too little business, and squalid homes. It’s currently represented by Commissioner Dorrin Rolle, who was appointed by Gov…
Let’s face it. Fidel Castro is either dead or headed that way. So, you wacky exiles, let’s head for la isla, filch el comandante’s body, and bring it home. Here are Miami New Times’s suggestions for the cadaver: 1. Use him in a campaign ad for the strong-mayor initiative. The…
I Rode for Lansky II: Despite Ms. Cynthia Duncan of Miami, who is curiously sensitive about her grandfather Meyer Lansky — “the Syndicate’s Accountant,” who ran Havana under Batista, who perfected the skim at the old Sands and Thunderbird hotels in Vegas when both were cash registers for the Chicago…
On Nov. 28 the Progressive Firefighters Association, which looks out for black firemen in Miami-Dade County, showed up in Liberty City at Fire Station #2, in solidarity with Willie Latimore, a seventeen-year veteran of the department, who’s been having the same kinds of problems with some of his co-workers that…
Ratner, schmatner, the kid lives in Ingrid Bergman’s old joint! So here’s Brett Ratner sitting next to his mom in a clean suit and a white-boy haircut at Miami Beach Senior High’s Hall of Fame alumni lunch at the Radisson Deauville. He’s kvelling. He doesn’t have an Oscar yet, but…
Mayor Machiavelli: From 2-shot distance, Alex Penelas seemed pretty lame in the Nov. 13 runoff elections in Miami Beach & the City of Miami. He endorsed both Elaine Bloom and Maurice Ferré. Further evidence that P is still laboring under the Elian curse from when he declared war on the…
En el trece de Agosto, a hidden relative? Let’s hear it for Dan Christensen at the Daily Business Review! He’s been the only reporter to shine a consistent light on the Brooks Brothers sleaziness of U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart’s campaign financing practices. This past July, when the Federal Election Commission…
Deep bow to the reader. Haven’t seen you since August 24, 2000, but now we’re back — slightly altered, updating you on the lows and highs of Miami-Dade and points south, all the way to Cuba, in politics, civic matters, culture, jokes — the news and texture of this fine…
