Buzz

Run, Jesse, run?
If things have been a bit too quiet lately on Dallas' racial front, here's a piece of news that promises to warm things up: Jesse Diaz is planning to run against County Commissioner John Wiley Price.

Diaz, an activist with the League of United Latin American Citizens, last year lost to Don Venable in a race for DISD school trustee. He's a longtime Price opponent and once got into a scuffle with members of the New Black Panther Party at a school board meeting.

Diaz says he thinks that the changing demographics in Price's district make the longtime African-American commissioner vulnerable.

In other words, don't expect Diaz to pour oil on Dallas' troubled racial waters--at least not without following it up with a lit match.

"I think if a Hispanic like myself should run, I think I could pick up a lot of the Anglo and Hispanic vote," Diaz tells Buzz. "I'm tired of John Wiley Price. He thinks he's untouchable."

Ah, yes, the old Hispanic-Anglo axis--it did such wonders for DISD.
Buzz isn't naive enough to expect a candidate in Dallas to keep from playing the race card, but we hope that sometime between now and the election--in 2000--Diaz comes up with a few more planks in his platform.

Windle, Windly he's our man
Dallas personal injury lawyer Windle Turley isn't afraid to acknowledge what some would rather deny--size counts.

Turley, who represented eight of the 11 victims of former priest Rudy Kos in their sexual abuse suit against the Dallas Catholic Diocese, recently issued a news release bragging that the $119 million verdict was the eighth-largest trial judgment in 1997, according to The National Law Journal. Turley's role in the case also is detailed extensively on his Web site.

This is the second time in four years Turley made the list, his office says. He placed in 1993 with a $42 million verdict involving an injury to a driver in a construction zone. The message? When you want to make 'em pay, see Turley & Co.

"While most law suits are settled without the necessity of trial, I am proud for the nation to recognize that when lawsuits must be tried, the citizens of Dallas, Texas, can render a full measure of justice," the release quoted Turley.

Ever since we received the release, Buzz has been trying to figure out exactly what about it gives us the creeps. After all, at least the guy isn't driving a tank in a late-night TV ad like lawyer Brian Loncar once did. Still, there's something distasteful in Turley's crowing as though his firm was just seeded in a basketball tournament. Consider this: Maybe the size of the verdict had something to do with the jurors' horror that a priest molested 11 boys. Maybe nobody should be claiming bragging rights.

Good work, Windle. Now be still.

Look out below
On the third floor of the dilapidated Dallas Police Department headquarters downtown, where the homicide detectives are housed, the rallying cry is "Duck and Cover." They don't fear the badasses they've put away coming to get them after they're sprung from prison. At the DPD, it's the enemy within that's the problem. More precisely, it's falling acoustical ceiling tiles. And they have reason to worry. About a third of the grungy gray tiles have already fallen out, leaving exposed dried glue. The police department has battled for years to get a new building from the stingy city, but frankly, the cops have found it easier to get the bad guys to cooperate with them than the city manager.

Dancing fools
We're usually pretty staunch in our defense of the First Amendment, but we're going to have to side with Dallas City Council in its effort to change the rules for "dance-hall" clubs. U.S. District Judge Jerry Buchmeyer has questioned whether the city can legally require dancers at some clubs to wear bikini tops.

"It's likely that the city's main goal in enacting the ordinance was to restrict the essential expressive nature of the business," Buchmeyer wrote.

Damn straight, we say. Not that Buzz is offended by bare breasts. From our trips to discos, however, we believe that some "expressive natures" need to be kept from dancing at all costs. The city should forget about the pasties/bikini debate and ban the pitiful flailing of rhythm-impaired, white, male professionals over age 40; Grateful Dead fans; and any member of the City Council.

--Compiled from staff reports by Patrick Williams

Send Buzz your e-mail, and we promise not to come to your house and dance: patrick_williams@dallasobserver.com.