Editorial Voice

Kratom: Drug Companies Want to Make It Illegal

Sari Maharani had barely opened the doors to her downtown Miami restaurant Little Lotus when she says her landlord was already trying to find a way to kick her out without just cause. Now the former paralegal of Indonsesian descent is locked in an epic legal fight with Abram Aminov,…

Back in 2002, Demetrio Perez Jr. had an epic fall from prominence. The then-Miami-Dade Public Schools Board Member was removed from public office following his 21-count federal indictment that he had been overcharging elderly tenants at his federally subsidized low income apartments in Little Havana for a decade.He ended up…

Uncle Luke, the man whose booty-shaking madness made the U.S. Supreme Court stand up for free speech, gets as nasty as he wants to be for Miami New Times. This week, Luke talks about the unfair treatment of African-American college football coaches.The firing of Jon Embree as head coach of…

Ever since she beat two separate criminal cases against her last year, Miami City Commissioner Michelle Spence-Jones has been quietly preparing for an epic take down of Mayor Tomas Regalado and Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle — the two politicians she blames for almost destroying her.Today, Spence-Jones launched the…

Hanukkah starts a week from Saturday, December 8. Screw the song, We have a new favorite take on the holiday. Bubala Please is a new Jewish cooking show on YouTube and the first episode is (of course) a tutorial on making latkes.But if you think some little white haired bubbe…

Every Friday, Riptide brings you the most eye-catching mugshots taken the previous week (or thereabouts) in Miami-Dade County. Yes, there is some mockery of bad neck tattoos, but also adulation directed at perps who just plain look more badass than we ever will. This is the italicized intro to that…

A Hialeah sugar making company owned by an ex-cocaine trafficker who wooed Hialeah and Miami-Dade elected officials into naming a street after his firm and approving $400,000 in tax breaks has been ordered to pay up a $208,000 debt. On Oct. 25, All-American Containers won a default final judgment against…

Deion Sanders Recruiting Scandal Is Hypocrisy

Sorry, Obama, Cubans Aren’t Liberals

The Miami-Dade Ethics Commission is accusing Miami City Commissioner Marc Sarnoff of failing to report a pretty sweet trip to Brazil earlier this year as a gift. Back in April, the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau covered all of Sarnoff’s traveling expenses when he and his wife Teresa traveled…

We’ve all been there. And now we totally realize that two months’ worth of rolling balls was a bad idea. But shit … It was fun. And drugs are what your 20s are for, right? DJ Laz did it. “When I was 27 or 28, I did Ecstasy for about…

Acme Bakery owner Alejandro Ortiz responded quickly and thoughtfully to this week’s restaurant review. What follows is his response:…

For this week’s cover story, I profiled Lazaro Mendez, AKA DJ Laz, the booty bass pioneer and FM radio personality who provided the soundtrack to thousands of teenagers growing up in south Florida since the late 1980s, including Banana Republican.Over the course of two months, I hung out with Laz…

Uncle Luke, the man whose booty-shaking madness made the U.S. Supreme Court stand up for free speech, gets as nasty as he wants to be for Miami New Times. This week, Luke defends a flamboyant former NFL star.The mainstream sports media has been dogging NFL Hall of Famer Deion Sanders…

Have y’all ever asked a woman to “leave them teeth out” while performing oral and then called her a “hoe” [sic]? Neither have we. ‘Cause Crossfade ain’t no crude dickheads like Chris Brown and know full well that every blowie should have a little bit of teeth have far more…

It was the summer of 1991. I was a teenager hanging with my friends at Hot Wheels Skating Center in Kendall for a concert. I can’t recall who was performing, but I will never forget the flamboyant, muscular Puerto Rican dude in a tight shimmering silver mesh shirt and skinny…

Every Friday, Riptide brings you the most eye-catching mugshots taken the previous week (or thereabouts) in Miami-Dade County. Yes, there is some mockery of bad neck tattoos, but also adulation directed at perps who just plain look more badass than we ever will. This is the italicized intro to that…

What might’ve happened if the original Thanksgiving had taken place in Little Havana, a part of Miami known for its café cubano, delicious croquetas, and out-of-control feline infestations? Well, according to a theory put forward by Pitbull on Twitter today, we might all be eating “a cat instead of a…

As we wake up this morning in honor of the Pilgrims and Indians of yesteryore by sharing a bountiful meal with friends and relatives, Banana Republican and a few of our friends in the Miami blogosphere wanted to show our gratitude to the jive turkeys passing themselves off as do…

A millionaire accused of massacring mangroves on his property narrowly won the vice-mayor’s post in yesterday’s Palmetto Bay run-off. John DuBois beat Brian Pariser by 28 votes to claim the seat.Those 28 voters apparently didn’t care that the Miami-Dade Department of Environmental Protection has tagged DuBois for “causing irreparable harm…

On Monday, Miami Circuit Court Judge Ellen Leesfield gave Miami Heat minority owner Raanan Katz a clear path to the basket. She granted him a temporary injunction to stop a formerly anonymous blogger from writing “defamatory blogs” about Katz. In her order, Leesfield also hinted that she expects Katz to…