Unlike Alabama, Florida still flies its Confederate flag. Political sensitivity isn't much of a priority, either. Every year legislators ritually complain about the James Rosenquist mural on the ground floor of the capitol: Why the giant orange peels? And a rock stuck to a rope? And a crab wearing a cowman's hat? Aesthetics has never been much of a priority around here. I guess the governor and the legislature have bigger mullet to fry. But beneath my feet, down through the concrete, down below the blanket of red clay on the hill, underground rivers course through limestone passages: you wouldn't have to dig far to hit water. The State of Florida is too cheap to fix it. I pick my way over black TV cables, thick as a convention of king snakes, behind the New Capitol, reaching past the fountain that should have water splashing over white stone except it's been broken and dry since the 1980s. The judges have disappeared behind the silver doors of the Florida Supreme Court, pondering their next Delphic pronouncement. The lawyers are holed up in their offices navigating stacks of statutes, Lexis printouts, briefs, and mostly empty Pizza Hut boxes. The "Sore Loserman" sign-toting rent-a-rabble have decamped to the high ground of the Holiday Inn. I'm walking around downtown, acting like a tourist in the place I was born, hoping maybe I'll run into Jesse Jackson or Warren Christopher or Tipper Gore (incognito in Audrey Hepburn sunglasses) or just somebody who feels like sucking down a couple of cosmos at Chez Pierre. Florida is still the center of the universe. Home Depot is still sold out of extension cords. Walgreens is still sold out of collapsible umbrellas. Television trucks, their satellite dishes pointed at the cold heaven, still clog Duval Street. News anchors still drink Bombay Sapphire martinis in the Doubletree, bugging the bartenders: "Could I have extra olives? A bowl would be good." Ex-secretaries of state still eat shrimp and grits at the Cypress Restaurant. The votes - chads dimpled, dangling, hinged, hanging, or pregnant - still sit in boxes. It's November 17, 2000, ten days after the not-election. May be incomplete or contain other coding. Sample text for Library of Congress control number 2004056276 Sample text for Dream state : eight generations of swamp lawyers, conquistadors, Confederate daughters, banana Republicans, and other Florida wildlife / Diane Roberts.īibliographic record and links to related information available from the Library of Congress catalogĬopyrighted sample text provided by the publisher and used with permission.
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