MiamiHerald.com: Fred Grimm

Fred Grimm: Rush to privatize is all about bucks

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 18:42 EDT

Our governor was deeply offended by a burst of unkind aspersions after an insurance company that didn’t exist 11 months ago finagled a $52 million deal out of the state-run Citizens Property Insurance Company.

Fred Grimm: Florida’s corruption knows no ethnicity

Sat, 08 Jun 2013 20:18 EDT

After Miami Herald stories exposing corruption in Miami-Dade County, a familiar disparagement has become inevitable in the e-mail reaction and readers’ comments. “Nothing but a damn banana republic,” they complain, implying an ethnic superiority, as if local government was a pristine enterprise before an influx of Cuban exiles ruined South Florida’s fine Anglo ethic.

Fred Grimm: Surprise! Both parties cheated in Joe Garcia’s district

Mon, 03 Jun 2013 19:53 EDT

We’re calling the game off down in District 26. Suspending the democratic process. Citizens of District 26 will have to get by without a voice in the U.S. House of Representatives until they can come up with congressional candidates not inclined to subvert elections.

Fred Grimm: Maybe Margaritaville beats Hollywood ‘Curse’

Sat, 01 Jun 2013 20:45 EDT

Not to descend too deeply into hoodoo, black magic, sorcery, the dark arts, but after 87 years of unholy debacles, “cursed” has come to seem a plausible explanation for a certain five-acre tract on the Hollywood shore.

Fred Grimm: Dead Dozier kids finally matter

Wed, 29 May 2013 18:55 EDT

No one much cared before. Not when these children were brutalized by the guards at the Dozier School for Boys. Not when their bodies were discarded into unmarked graves.

Fred Grimm: It’s sink or swim time for hall of fame

Sun, 26 May 2013 00:46 EDT

Only me. Only visitor in sight. Couldn’t even find someone to take my $8 admission fee before setting off among the yellowing wax effigies of Johnny Weissmuller, Duke Kahanamoku, Mark Spitz, past the black swim trunks of Greg Louganis, onto an exhibit of exceedingly modest swim wear once forced on American women. The 1915 Sports Illustrated swim suit issue would not have been so very titillating.

Fred Grimm: Broward may be Koch brothers’ own ‘deal from hell’

Wed, 22 May 2013 20:51 EDT

As puns go, the caption was pretty vapid. “Sun Sentinel doesn’t need a Koch problem.” (Pronounced, by the way, “coke.”)

Fred Grimm: On Robaina, Miami-Dade voters got it right

Mon, 20 May 2013 18:55 EDT

Credit the wisdom of Miami-Dade voters. They saw through Julio Robaina.

Fred Grimm: Bail bondsmen unfettered by civil niceties

Sun, 19 May 2013 00:00 EDT

So you’ve just finished your workout at a very nice Miami Beach gym. You’re in the shower. The curtain is drawn. It’s a setting that comes with certain expectations.

Fred Grimm: Scoreboard: Panthers $4.2 million, taxpayers zip

Wed, 15 May 2013 18:11 EDT

The Florida Panthers picked up a $4.2 million bauble this week, a new digital scoreboard, courtesy of the taxpayers. Not that taxpayers had any say in the deal.

Fred Grimm: Boondoggle? Hey, it’s for the kids

Mon, 13 May 2013 19:12 EDT

Tallahassee has long resonated with talk about our precious, precious school children. Except lately the allusion has become quite literal.

Fred Grimm: A crabby savoir for the parimutuels

Sat, 11 May 2013 22:47 EDT

Old (slightly crabby) Jim Morgan, who races more animals on a weekend than most trainers run over a lifetime, could be the last, best hope for Florida’s faltering parimutuel industry.

Fred Grimm: Florida oxy pills have long, deadly reach

Wed, 08 May 2013 19:13 EDT

Oceana is a misnomer, a small town at the confluence of the Clear Fork and Laurel Fork rivers in the mountains of southern West Virginia, some 400 miles from the nearest ocean. Lately, locals have given it a more accurate appellation. They call it Oxyana.

Fred Grimm: As other states ban executions, Florida says kill ’em faster

Sun, 05 May 2013 00:36 EDT

On Thursday, Maryland became the sixth state in the past six years to abolish capital punishment. Eighteen states have now done away with the death penalty. Florida, of course, is not among them.

Fred Grimm: Tallahassee sticks it to the locals

Wed, 01 May 2013 19:44 EDT

Our good ol’ boys in Tallahassee surely do resent those meddlers from Washington sticking their big government noses in Florida’s business. “We know what’s best for Florida,” they’re fond of saying.

Fred Grimm: Journalism’s bright side: few rattlesnakes

Mon, 29 Apr 2013 17:53 EDT

So a soldier, a lumberjack and a newspaper guy walked into a bar. Which might have had the makings of a joke, except they couldn’t afford a punch line.

Fred Grimm: Pro teams get sweet deal for spring training stadiums

Sat, 27 Apr 2013 23:15 EDT

It’s as if when they sold naming rights to South Florida’s sports stadiums, the winning bid went to “controversial.”

Fred Grimm: Boston bombing has FAU’s nutball prof blathering again

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 22:05 EDT

The likes of James Tracy wouldn’t have thrived before the digital age.

Fred Grimm: The error was small, the damage immense

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 19:25 EDT

Andrew Flaherty, new to Florida, could not escape the feeling he had moved to a unwelcoming place. He was often treated with a dismissive brusqueness, particularly at businesses where he was asked to produce an ID.

Fred Grimm: These days, the news comes fast and furious in our pockets

Sun, 21 Apr 2013 00:23 EDT

“Ping!” goes my pocket. And Pavlov’s neurotic dog goes for the cellphone like Wild Bill Hickok going for his holstered Colt. Like it was urgent. Like I was expecting Lebron to phone. Or the president. As if Eva Mendes was finally returning my call.