Email Author Brantley Hargrove

2012 Stories by Brantley Hargrove

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  FEATURED STORY

  Has the "God Particle" Been Foundr Let's Ask the SMU Prof Who's Been Looking.

  published Jul 03, 2012

  In the early morning hours Wednesday, physicists in Switzerland may announce that they've discovered the elusive "God Particle," aka the Higgs boson. For more than half a century, the Higgs has been ... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Man Sues Dallas Doc, McKinney Hospital After Losing Testicle, Length of Colon Due to Allegedly Botched Hernia Surgery

  published Jul 03, 2012

  Pedro Hermenegildo didn't have insurance, so he paid Dr. Ricardo Rocha in cash to repair a hernia, a fairly routine, outpatient procedure. But according to a lawsuit filed against Rocha in a Dallas Co... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Domingo Garcia and Marc Veasey Trade Barbs At Pissy Primary Debate For District 33

  published Jun 29, 2012

  Friday's Democratic primary run-off debate between Domingo Garcia and Marc Veasey for the 33rd wasn't quite as bitchy as we had hoped, in that Garcia didn't refer to his opponent, a grown-ass black ma... More >>

• In August, the Price Cap on Electricity in Texas Will Jump 50 Percent

  published Jun 28, 2012

  Texas electricity regulators voted today to raise the price cap on wholesale electricity from $3,000 to $4,500 per megawatt hour -- the equivalent of powering roughly 330 homes for one hour -- by Aug... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  ExxonMobil CEO: Burning Fossil Fuels Causes Climate Change, But Energy Independence Is Still Complete Bullshit

  published Jun 28, 2012

  We at Unfair Park will never, ever tire of hearing Rex Tillerson, the CEO of Irving-based ExxonMobil, the largest private oil and gas company in the world, admit that the product he peddles has in fa... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Texas Senators Demand EPA Review of Fracking Endangerment Order in Parker County

  published Jun 26, 2012

  Six Republican members of the U.S. Senate -- including Texas' Kay Bailey Hutchison and John Cornyn -- have requested an investigation of the EPA's decision to accuse a natural gas producer of contamin... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  What the Supreme Court's Ruling On Arizona's Immigration Law Means for Farmers Branch

  published Jun 25, 2012

  The U.S. Supreme Court struck down much of Arizona's illegal immigration law Monday morning, leaving its most controversial, show-me-your-papers provision standing, and that only provisionally. Expert... More >>

• Rais Bhuiyan: The Forgiver

  published Jun 22, 2012

  In this week's Dallas Observer we profile 30 of the metro area's most interesting characters, with new portraits of each from local photographer Mark Graham. See the entire Dallas Observer People Issu... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Former Dallas Deputy Chief of Police Who Resigned Amid Controversy Accused of Sexual Harassment As Fairview Chief

  published Jun 22, 2012

  Trouble seems to follow Fairview Police Chief Granver Tolliver wherever he goes. Back when he was a Dallas cop, soaring through the ranks to deputy chief, he became mired in an internal controversy ov... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Rockwall's Rep. Ralph Hall Is So Sick of Watching Obama "Bow," "Scrape" and Treat "Enemy" Chinese With Anything But Contempt

  published Jun 21, 2012

  At a hearing Wednesday, Chairman Ralph Hall and his Republican colleagues put their powerful U.S. House Committee on Science, Space and Technology to its highest, most noble use: Namely, bringing the ... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Politics of Misdirection: Dallas-based Luminant and Coalition of Utilities Blame the EPA for Coal's Creeping Demise

  published Jun 20, 2012

  Dallas-based Luminant, the electricity generation arm of Energy Future Holdings, and a number of other utilities that own coal-fired fleets are attempting to head off an EPA rule that would curb the a... More >>

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  COVER STORY

  Farmers Branch Has Spent Five Years and Millions of Dollars Trying to Keep Out Mexicans. Is It Time for a Truce?

  published June 21, 2012

  Until five years ago, Farmers Branch (pop. 28,000) had about as much renown as "a speck on a flea," the town's former mayor once... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  A Guide to How Obama's New Immigration Policy Will Work, And a Word of Caution

  published Jun 18, 2012

  President Barack Obama announced Friday afternoon that the Department of Homeland Security will no longer attempt to deport young undocumented immigrants brought here as children, signaling a compassi... More >>

• Republicans Have a Hispanic Problem, But Texas GOP Thinks It Has the Solution [Updated]

  published Jun 15, 2012

  Five months to go and Republicans are waking up to the awful realization that over the course of the primary season -- the last five or six years, really -- they've done their level-best to alienate t... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  EPA-Bashing Judge in Fracking Case Recuses Himself, Predictably Blames the Media

  published Jun 13, 2012

  It must be codified somewhere in the Conservative's Guide to Crisis Management: Ensnared in scandalr Come across like an uninformed buffoonr Or are you a judge whose campaign fliers dispelled any appe... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Al Armendariz, Ousted EPA Chief, Stood Up Congress Yesterday, But the Show Went On

  published Jun 07, 2012

  Former EPA Regional Administrator Al Armendariz was the designated whipping boy at a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee hearing this week, though it proceeded in absentia. Armendariz totally blew ... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  UT Southwestern Researchers Identify Receptor Compound That May Yield New Leukemia Treatment

  published Jun 04, 2012

  The ability of a leukemic cell to remain in an immature state, capable of relentlessly propagating, has remained one of the vexing obstacles to the effective treatment of leukemia, particularly acute ... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  EPA Nut-Kicking Braggadocio Doesn't Save Judge in High-Profile Fracking Case From Republican Primary Opponent

  published Jun 01, 2012

  Voters up in Parker County must not have thought much of district Judge Trey Loftin's campaign mailers bragging about how his "decision regarding deceptive actions by environmental extremists made the... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Rep. Ralph Hall of Rockwall Defeats Super PAC, Tea Party, Old Age and the Sky

  published May 30, 2012

  All you need to know about U.S. Representative Ralph Hall's decisive win in the 4th Congressional District Tuesday night is that he went skydiving on Memorial Day. He wore a jumpsuit printed with undu... More >>

• Super PAC Makes Big Media Buys To Soften Up Rep. Ralph Hall For Primary Day

  published May 29, 2012

  Today, the unalloyed, wedge issue-driven, throbbing heart of the Grand Ol' Party will cast their ballots so that the candidates can stop chest-thumping about who's the real conservative and start runn... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Arrests Made in the Case of a Man Whose Burned Body Was Found in a Field, Identified Only By His Tattoos

  published May 25, 2012

  On May 5, the badly burned body of a man was found in a vacant field in far southeast Dallas, not far from the railroad tracks. Pieces of him were missing. The body's condition made identification dif... More >>

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  Trey Loftin, the Judge in a High-Profile Fracking Case, is Bragging in Campaign Mailers About His EPA Nut-Kicking

  published May 24, 2012

  Politics is politics, and incumbents running for re-election in conservative Parker County, Texas, where the local economy is fueled entirely by shale-gas production, want to look like champions of th... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  In Fight Over Flammable Parker County Water Well, Judge Decides Who Is, Isn't A Journalist

  published May 24, 2012

  Tricky work deciding who gets the protections of a journalist in court. In the case of a natural gas production company suing a Parker County man who blames it for contaminating his water well, state ... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  With Billy Allen's Compensation, Relief Begins for Exonerees Without the DNA Silver Bullet

  published May 22, 2012

  Billy Frederick Allen served 26 years in prison for two drug-related murders in University Park. In February 2009, the Court of Criminal Appeals in Austin freed him, citing ineffective lawyering and "... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Have Babies and Young Children, Dallasr You Might Want to Get Vaccinated Against Whooping Cough

  published May 21, 2012

  Cases of pertussis, widely known as whooping cough, are on a "modest" uptick in Dallas County, county health officials say. So far this year, the number of cases is higher than in 2010 and 2011. And w... More >>