Ros-Lehtinen will doubtless be unaffected by the scandal concerning her attorney husband as she is a senior member of the Republican caucus in Congress but it was disappointing to hear it anyway.
Somehow, heaven knows how, the estimable representative's husband got the contract to be the legal advisor to the Miccosukee tribe of Indians. By all accounts he was a strong advocate for environmental protection of the Everglades, traditional home of the tribe.
The Miccosukee are a secretive lot, living well thanks to their gambling palace on Krome Avenue at Tamiami Trail, but their government is a closed book to outsiders. In 2011 a new tribal leader saw mass firings in the tribal police department when half the department protested a hostile work environment and were fired, as though to prove the point.
The IRS have been investigating the tribe which recently fired it's counsel saying Dexter Lehtinen gave them bad tax advice. The story is as weird as a pair of lost panties in a Key West street. The tribe according to the WLRN story, have fessed up to a cool 26 million dollar oversight in their tax bill from the turn of the century as uncovered by Federal investigators.
The confession is, it seems a legal maneuver the tribe felt obliged to take to devolve the blame onto their attorney of record for his faulty tax advice. The only way the tribe could nail Dexter Lehtinen was by accepting that they had screwed the pooch on their tax returns.
The tribe claims that their attorney advised them, erroneously, not to file individual tax returns for the tribe's 600 members and thus they now find themselves with a rather large bill to pay.
Lehtinen's attorney says the tribe is nuts under the new leader elected in 2010 who has abandoned Lehtinen's pro-environment position in favor of focusing on gambling revenues.
Either way it seems like the Miccosukee are not going to be doing the Lehtinens any favors this election year. Se has been a good representative for the Keys, paying attention to the needs of this tiny portion of her South Florida constituency. Even though her support for the embargo is the price she pays for easy re-election by her Cuban base.
Locally the newspaper reported recently that the widow of a power boat racer who died in last year's race is going to sue the medical staff and organizer of the race. As a friend of mine remarked: "Put two people in a fiberglass shell powered by a jet engine and send them across the author as fast as they can go and what do you think is going to happen?"
It used to be people took up dangerous sports for then thrill and relied on themselves to get into and out of scrapes. This suit strikes me as being a perfect example of the inability of anyone to take responsibility for their own stupidity. I hope someone in the legal system shows them the door at their expense.
Meanwhile Key West continues on accommodating thousands of visitors and hundreds of negative comments in the paper bitching about parking and cruise ships and noise and bums and bad manners.
It makes you wonder why anyone bothers t move here, or live here in winter.
I like looking around and taking pictures and reminding myself what a great place this can be.
Winter sunshine, quiet early morning streets and not a complaint to be heard.
Besides I'm not a famous attorney so no one is suing me for untold millions so this must be my lucky day.
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...a small town crowd and a small town parade blocking all traffic... 
...except those turning a sharp right back onto the Overseas Highway, with no other traffic to share the northbound lanes on the 18 Mile Stretch:
It is a weird mixture of the mundane and agricultural and the whimsical and picturesque.
The weekends are a good time to drive out from the city, park at the edge of the highway and fish. That's a great program for a lot of people apparently.
Indian Villages line the highway in small fenced compounds.
The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians lives alongside Highway 41 across South Florida, and these days they live well in peaceful rural isolation, alongside the River of Grass which looks a bit like this:
The Everglades is a huge area of marsh bisected further north by the Interstate I-75, known as Alligator Alley. Down south the old two lane Highway 41 known as Tamiami (Tampa-Miami) Trail still runs east and west to and from Dade and Collier Counties and looks like this in the Miccosukee reservation:
In the old days the Indians sat by the side of the road in sheds and sold plastic alligators to passers-by. Nowadays they operate a huge casino at Krome Avenue and Tamiami Trail and "gaming" has changed the standard of living for the tribe. They live in rather nice suburban homes, in the modern ranch style shown below, and they have extensive administrative buildings barely visible from the highway:
On Tamiami Trail their villages are set back from the Highway hidden by privacy fences with roofs covered by fronds:
The Miccosukee like their privacy and their homes aren't open for public tours so contact with the tribe is through the casino (which I've never visited), or on the Highway itself which is less desirable obviously:
Or at their restaurant on Tamiami Trail, in the western reaches of Dade County, which in my opinion is the best of all options: 
The restaurant is apparently operated by Spanish speaking workers, as it's quite likely the Indians find working at the casino or at the magnificent Tribal Administration building more to their liking. For Bruce and myself a quick bite at the restaurant provided the pause that refreshes in the middle of a motorcycling exploration of the Everglades:
Just in case you have any doubt about the area of which I write the Miccosukee provide a handy place mat map:
The place mat also offers views of Indian life, where I captured images of an air boat and an alligator wrestler 
It was a brisk winter day so European tourists felt at home enjoying the great outdoors with their luncheon: 
Bruce and I were happy to snuggle indoors:
I ordered a heavy mug of sweet Miccosukee coffee:
The tribal colors are proudly carried on the mugs just like that on the flags flying out front: 
Those colors are also flown on the door of a tribal truck:
We ordered steak sandwiches which came wedged between slices of flat bread. The meat had some fat attached but they filled the spot in an undistinguished kind of way, not particularly Indian. On the other hand I wasn't about to experiment with gator chunks or frog legs so I decided to take a bite out of Indian eats by ordering fry bread with blueberry filling. Bruce lives in Santa Fe and his idea of fry bread is all New Mexican, a puffy piece of pastry frequently sprinkled with powdered sugar. I photographed some at Taos Pueblo for an essay I wrote last year.
This Miccosukee version of fry bread was rather greasy and looked in his estimation more like an apple fritter. It was substantial enough to have qualified for lunch all on it's own:
We saddled up and rode out, warmed by our Indian encounter, after a fashion. I quite enjoyed riding with Bruce, I hope we do it again one day.