Supporters of Democratic presidential contender Bernie Sanders will have to suck it up. There will be no do-over of Arizona’s disastrous Presidential Preference Election. Following two days of testimony this week, a Maricopa County Superior Court judge booted a lawsuit claiming fraud, illegal voting and other improprieties in the contest,…
It’s all fun and games till the U.S. Secret Service comes knocking on your door. Actually, for controversial, right-wing street artist SABO, that’s when the games began. The Los Angeles denizen, infamous for his poster of a shirtless, tatted-up, butt-smokin’ Ted Cruz, was in Phoenix for the group show “Provocative…
Standing in line for hours to cast a ballot. Cries of “voter suppression.” The finger-pointing, the recriminations, the heads hanging in shame. These all could be things of the past, at least in relation to voter angst, if a Republican effort to repeal Arizona’s Presidential Preference Election, now held up…
One of the many bouts of culture shock I endured during the years I lived in New York City was watching two grown men get into a fist fight over a dime lying on the sidewalk near the building where I worked. They both reached for it about the same…
A Mesa man, who according to police went by the online alter ego “Zel the Wolf”on the digital art-sharing site DeviantArt.com, was arrested this week for alleged online sexual contact with two 12-year-old girls and for bestiality. Mesa police say Aaron Thomas Usery, 21, engaged in virtual sexual relationships with…
Here’s a piece of advice to local newshounds: Whenever Tim Casey is kvetching about “abuse of power,” then your bullshit detector should be flashing fire-engine red. Casey, you’ll recall, has made defending various abuses of power by the satraps of Maricopa County into his personal gravy train. He’s best known…
According to a recent poll performed by Sheriff Paul Babeu’s hired hand, a plurality of likely GOP voters in Arizona’s First Congressional District apparently don’t care about the various allegations swirling about the sheriff’s use of RICO funds. Nor do these reputedly conservative voters — about 35.7 percent of the poll…
For nearly 90 minutes on stage at Phoenix’s Comerica Theater on Sunday night, comedian/commentator Bill Maher ripped into Republicans, religion, Islam, the Catholic Church and male sexual hypocrisy, but he saved special venom for presidential contender Donald Trump and his followers. Calling Trump “that douchebag from Queens,” Maher derided the…
Few Americans speak with such frankness about political correctness, radical Islam, and Donald Trump as comedian Bill Maher. Through his standup act and his long-running HBO talk show Real Time with Bill Maher, the avowed liberal and sacred-cow-killer has zero problem making his lefty pals feel uncomfortable as he challenges…
Mayke, a beautiful, energetic Belgian Malinois, would rather track rare critters for conservationists than sniff out drugs and bombs for the U.S. Border Patrol. As a result, the German-born canine spends her time with Arizona biologist Chris Bugbee, on the trail of the elusive “El Jefe,” the only known jaguar…
During a recent hearing at the Arizona House over Maricopa County’s elections fiasco, chaired by state Representative Michelle Ugenti-Rita, there was more podium-pounding and fist-pumping than at a pro-Bernie Sanders pajama party. People rightly were pissed that they had to stand in long lines to vote in the recent presidential…
Like a lumpy wad of flavorless, chewed gum, Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s recently “retired” top flack, Lisa Allen, continues to cling to Arpaio’s weathered boot-heel, working as a public-relations “vendor” on a contract basis for her old boss, from her new home in Boise, Idaho. Allen resigned effective February 2, after…
Non-Latino Arizonans have a soft spot for immigrant kids, if a new poll commissioned by a children’s advocacy organization can be believed. According to a telephone survey of voters in six states paid for by the non-profit group First Focus, a majority of non-Latino Arizonans support birthright citizenship and have…
One sentence in federal Judge Susan R. Bolton’s recent decision in the 2014 shooting death of Manuel Longoria by Pinal County Sheriff’s Deputy Heath Rankin neatly sums up the circumstances of Longoria’s unnecessary killing. Halfway through her 11-page order granting summary judgment in favor of Rankin, Pinal County, and Rankin’s boss,…
Ex-Minuteman leader and alleged child molester Chris Simcox has dropped his controversial bid to personally cross-examine two alleged child victims during an upcoming trial, according to attorneys involved with the case. Simcox, who is representing himself, told Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Jose Padilla that he was waiving his attempt…
When the big dog’s ticks, fat with blood, decide it’s time to detach themselves from their aging host, it’s safe to say that pooch is on his last hunt. So it would seem with Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s parasitic biographer and longtime lackey, Len Sherman, who for two decades has dedicated…
In a bizarre turn of events, U.S. Senator John McCain’s field director for his 2016 re-election campaign, Blaze Baggs, was arrested by Yavapai-Prescott tribal police on February 23 and booked into county jail on a charge of disorderly conduct for allegedly tearing a sign off a casino wall in Prescott…
Despite admitting to sexual intercourse with three victims of crimes he investigated for the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office, Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s favorite detective, Brian Mackiewicz avoided dismissal during recent disciplinary proceedings, and was hit with an 80 hour suspension instead. A voluminous internal investigation file recently released to New Times…
Like symptoms of the varicella-zoster virus, former state Senate President Russell Pearce, proud papa of the Grand Canyon State’s anti-immigrant-gestapo legislation, Senate Bill 1070, is back in the political game, seeking a prestigious seat on the Republican National Committee, the governing body of the national GOP. Arizona has three seats on…
From the spare prose of a Glendale Police Department report emerges the macabre scene that confronted police officers and students at Independence High School, a little before 8 a.m. on the morning of February 12. That’s when police, responding to reports of shots fired, rushed through morning traffic and parents…
When it comes to the left’s nearsighted infatuation with Vermont U.S. Senato Bernie Sanders and his pie-in-the-sky socialism, color me un-amused. Sorry all you BernBots and hashtag progressives who want me to “Feel the Bern,” because the only burn I’m feelin’ at the prospect of Bernie becoming the Democratic nominee…
Anyone remember Tom Horne? You know, the Republican political zombie and onetime Arizona Attorney General who hired his girlfriend, Carmen Chenal, as an assistant attorney general, got himself investigated by the FBI, and was witnessed riding around town with Chenal, wearing a trucker hat as a disguise, as he pulled…
