In the wake of the defeat of five anti-immigrant bills in the state Senate last week, there’s been some question about whether the boycott of Arizona over Senate Bill 1070 should continue.There’s no doubt that the boycott has been effective. Both the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and the Greater Phoenix…
Like a 15-year-old girl, Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio reached unprecedented levels of media sluttiness today when he not only felt compelled to announce how many cyber friends he has, but went so far as to lie about it, too. The Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office put out a press release…
Can someone please tell this crank about the night they drove ol’ Dixie down?As I blogged recently, the main concern of the pro-immigrant side after the defeat of five anti-immigrant bills last week in the state Senate was that under Senate rules, someone who voted against the measures could move…
According to beefy action film star Steven Seagal’s former “boss,” Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand, Seagal is not “on loan” from Jefferson Parish, as Seagal asserted recently after a massive MCSO raid on a home in Laveen, where one — count him, one — suspect was nabbed for his alleged…
They’re practically singing hosannas in the streets, the pro-immigration folks, or just those who’d like to see an end to Arizona’s tsunami of hate. This, over the defeat of five anti-immigrant bills on the state Senate floor yesterday, including Senate President Russell Pearce’s “immigration omnibus” Senate Bill 1611, and the…
Border extremist Glenn Spencer was a no-show today at the state Senate Border Security Committee hearing where he was to give a presentation on immigration. Before the hearing started, Democratic Senator Steve Gallardo told me that he was informed last night that Spencer had been “uninvited.”Gallardo and others, including the…
The Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office busted two guys — one of whom was an elementary school music teacher — last month who allegedly used Craigslist to try and have sex with a dog, and the sheriff seems to think it’s becoming a trend — despite it only happening once.Sheriff Joe…
Bunny boiler. Sorry, all I could think of as I read through Maricopa County Hearing Officer Harold Merkow’s report on former Deputy County Attorney Lisa Aubuchon and her ongoing appeal of her dismissal, was Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction. What will it take, I wonder, for the county to be…
A group of Valley freethinkers want Arizona Governor Jan Brewer to stop calling on Arizona residents to pray about the budget or anything else. Two attorneys and several area residents, all members of the national Freedom From Religion Foundation, filed a lawsuit in federal court this week in hopes of ending proclamations for state prayer…
Vanity, vanity, saith the preacher, all is vanity.And what more can it be than vanity that Phoenix’s Arizona Christian University is feting former President George W. Bush at a $500 a plate dinner so the Torturer-in-Chief can blather on about his “faith-based presidency”?I reckon there’s also hypocrisy and greed, both…
An all-access pass. That’s what aging action film stud Steven Seagal, star of the cheesy A&E series Steven Seagal: Lawman gets in his contract with Sheriff Joe Arpaio. In fact, Seagal may have better access than the U.S. Department of Justice, which is still investigating the MCSO for alleged civil…
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio won’t admit any wrongdoing in his campaign mailer attacks on former Maricopa County Attorney Rick Romley during last year’s special election for county attorney, but he will pay $76,000 to make the problem go away.The $76,000 is a nice chunk of change — even for…
So here’s a little round-up of news related to everyone’s favorite neo-Nazi hugger, state Senate President Russell Pearce.First, regarding the dueling recalls of Pearce underway in Legislative District 18: DeeDee Blase of the Libertarian/Somos Republicans effort Arizonans for a Better Government recently issued a statement regarding the rival recall group…
You would think that an old, Mexican-bashing coot like Glenn Spencer, the head of the nativist “organization” American Border Patrol, would be radioactive to any politician with a lick of sense, after all of the dumb, bigoted statements he’s made over the years. Not to mention that he was once…
As we noted last week, Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio was more pissed off at New Times than usual after we prematurely published information about Friday’s Tent City jail shakedown (billed to be starring Under Seige II star Steven Seagal) after his office had asked the media to wait until…
Straight from Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio: calling a press conference about a jail shakedown — when Hard to Kill star Steven Seagal just happens to be in town filming his new cop-u-drama Steven Seagal: Lawman at Joe’s infamous Tent City — was not a publicity stunt.Only it was.While we…
As Sheriff Joe Arpaio tosses cots in Tent City with Steven Seagal, a woman in Guadalupe, Arizona is looking forward to a check cut by the county for $30,000. This, due to her false arrest and imprisonment at the hands of Sheriff Joe’s boys in beige.You may recall the name…
So it’s Friday –traditionally a slow news day — which means time for another Sheriff Joe Arpaio media stunt, this one to help his buddy Steven Seagal’s A&E reality series Steven Seagal: Lawman. (Please see updates below.)Although the media has been told to “embargo” this one for “jail security” till…
The Maricopa County Attorney’s Office’s investigation of the Phoenix Law Enforcement Association and its president Mark Spencer, the subject of this week’s Bird column, produced a nice doorstop pile of documents for me to dig through.I have limited time to scan the ginormous file that I obtained from the MCAO…
What would you call law enforcement union leaders who claim to battle for their members’ public benefits during tough economic times, while handing out endorsements to lawmakers hell-bent on wiping out those benefits for good?Hypocrites? Backstabbers? Secret scabs? Something worse?Whatever it is, it applies to Mark Spencer, president of the…
Image: Arizona DPS Arizona Department of Public Safety Director Robert Halliday has won a lawsuit filed against him by a former officer who once dated his daughter. Robert Halliday, director of the Arizona Department of Public Safety, has won a federal lawsuit filed against him by a former DPS officer…
Despite all this blather about immigration-related bills being “held” by state Senate President Russell Pearce until there’s a budget, Senate Bill 1495, which would give the governor the power to call up a presumably nativist “state guard” anytime she wants, passed the Senate yesterday, 21-9.All nine Democrats voted against the…
