Over the weekend, the Pentagon airlifted a slew of reporters and a handful of family members of 9/11 victims to Guantanamo Bay to watch the latest in the trial of five prisoners.What was mostly meant as a photo op turned into a genuine, huge news story when all five detainees,…
Frail figures were bathed in flashes of red and blue police lights as wrinkled arms swung cardboard signs. Around twilight last Wednesday, dozens of Cuban-Americans, most of them elderly and angry, took turns screaming Spanish epithets into fuzzy-sounding bullhorns. “Che is a liar!” Jose Mizrahi, age 79, bellowed as he…
Apparently those popcorn muscles aren’t enough. In an interview aired a couple of minutes ago on ESPN, Dolphins linebacker, sack-master, and nonstop verbal diarrhea specialist Joey Porter said he feels for Plaxico Burress, the Giants wide receiver who recently shot himself in the leg at a nightclub. Porter also told ESPN…
If you know anything about basic physics, you probably are familiar with the law of inverse reactions. Basically, it states that any cultural event that’s greeted with a screaming protest in Miami from Vigilia Mambisa will be met by an equally welcoming reception in Cuba. It’s science.And sure enough, just…
So how do you beat the notoriously fiesty Cuban protesters in Vigilia Mambisa once they’ve set their sign-waving, bullhorn-screaming sights on your event?If you’re Steven Soderbergh, you just plain outlast ’em. Even Vigilia couldn’t make it all the way through Soderbergh’s epic “Che,” a four-hour long beast about the favorite…
Amanda Moran’s eyes widened as she walked from a blinding July afternoon into the cool living room of a red-roofed house just off South Dixie Highway in Coconut Grove. Piled like cheap toys in this ordinary suburban house, some tightly wrapped in Ecuadorian newspaper, were more than 160 pieces from…
Oh snap! So apparently Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen never really got over the shock or hilarity of Sarah Palin getting totally punked by those Canadian DJs pretending to be Nicholas Sarkozy.Because when the President-elect tried to call her yesterday, she hung up on him quicker than you can say “No normalized…
Let’s do a little thought experiment here. Say you’re a director, and you’re trying to market a new four hour long epic that’s was derided by Variety as “a commercial impossibility” after its debut at Cannes.You need to stir up a little hype, a little press. Get the kids excited…
MiMo artist Louis Dalmau is known for making art in some unusual environments. His first big — ahem, splash — in Miami came in the late ’80s when he created an underwater art installation that doubled as a reef. For this year’s Art Basel, Dalmau choose a distinctly less sexy…
Maybe it’s because Fidel finally seems to be stumbling around on his last legs. Maybe it’s because Raul, the “younger” brother who’s still older than John McCain, seems to be loosening some rules.Who knows? But Americans popular fascination with Cuba and its Miami exile community seems higher than ever. To…
No, that headline is not just a hallucination brought on by the tryptophan-induced haze you’ve been stumbling around in since stuffing that turducken down your gullet yesterday.It’s just, quite simply, the strangest post-Thanksgiving news on the planet. Somehow or another, Sean Penn, the liberal wunderkind who will forever be remembered…
You remember that scene in Heat when Robert De Niro’s badass crew perfectly executes this plan to knock over an armored truck? How they all pulled on those hockey masks, then blocked the truck’s path with a stolen ambulance, rammed it with a stolen semi-truck, and then laid spikes so…
Maybe it’s the palm trees, the sunny weather, the women on the beach. Maybe it’s the welcoming international culture. Maybe it’s the ready supply of blow. Who knows? But there’s definitely something about Miami that appeals to murderous despots and wanted criminals of all nationalities, from ex-Venezuelan dictator Marcos Perez…
So we’ve got this little economic downturn going on, in case you’ve already taken up residence in your new tent city and haven’t heard the news. But don’t worry about it. Manny knows how to cure what ails us.Miami’s suddenly superstar mayor, who has been rumored as a candidate for…
Old photo, same result Ah, the resurrected Miami Hurricanes football program. Ranked in the top 25 again! Headed to the ACC title game! Unable to stop some one-legged homeless guy from Atlanta from busting off a 15-yard run! There are many ways to prove that the AP voters have overranked…
Like doctors, prostitutes, and IRS agents, lawyers seem like a recession-proof crowd. Crime, after all, never sleeps. In fact, during most economic freefalls, lawlessness jumps quicker than a cleaned-out hedge fund manager perched on a 24th-story window ledge. So what to make of the latest laundry list of disciplinary actions…
The night gets weird long before a houseplant begins humming John Tesh tunes. It starts sometime after 7 p.m. with curious onlookers filing into a glass-walled room surrounded by the moonlit Miami Beach Botanical Garden. Leaning over a long folding table, they finger dusty rocks painted with mystical symbols and…
Greg Craig As the Herald reported this morning, several members of Obama’s new leadership team in Washington have strong enough ties to the Elian Gonzalez saga to send local Republicans into a tizzy. The AP reports this afternoon that Obama is expected to make Eric Holder the first black attorney…
Fidel and Vladimir Gundjaev The haggard remains of Fidel Castro made headlines earlier this month for meeting with a Russian Orthodox priest in Havana. The story was newsworthy mostly because the meeting produced the first photo of the ailing Cuban dictator since early this summer. But a larger question remained:…
Dennis Lehane On its 25th anniversary, the Miami Book Fair International is just that — drawing authors from around the world as varied and well respected as Salman Rushdie and Frank McCourt. Saturday morning’s marquee session, however, felt more like a hometown celebration, bringing together three of the most successful…
This man loves Mac’s Club Deuce. (Reason No. 293 why we love this man.) Better Than: Pounding cheap beers between a soul-crushing double on the saute station. The evidence, plainly, is undeniable: the best-selling books, the top-rated Travel Channel Show, the Top Chef judging gigs. Hell, even the playbills posted…
Exactly what happened. Not that there’s ever a reason for diverting a flight that makes you feel good as a passenger. But an overheating toilet? That’s just unfortunate. That’s exactly what happened to 350 passengers in the wee hours this morning on a Miami to London Virgin Atlantic Flight. The…
