The New York Times Company

Lessons of the West Explosion: Government Regulation Bad; Government Money Good

All I want is to connect the dots. You help me. Mayor Tommy Muska, whose town of West just suffered what has been called the worst industrial accident in the 15-year history of the U.S. Chemical Safety Board, is on the front page of The New York Times today agreeing with Governor Oops that governme ... More >>

Ronald Johnson Gambled and Lost at JCP, but that Doesn't Mean He Made a Bad Bet

What to make of the big boot at J.C. Penney? CEO Ronald B. Johnson came tumbling out that door grabbing for his hat like a riverboat gambler evicted from First Baptist. Sometimes it's hard to look cool. But what's the big picture in this picture? Is there ever a big picture in bed sheets and towels ... More >>

Best Places for King Cake in Dallas for Mardi Gras

Recently Scott Reitz forwarded me an amazing New York Times story on king cakes. We're both surprised at the creativity and options for king cakes in NYC, and yet the lack of them here -- based on proximity of king cake motherland, New Orleans, if nothing else. See, according to tradition we're al ... More >>

Dallas Hair Weave Thefts Have Reached Epidemic Proportions

When employees of USA Beauty Supply arrived at work on the morning of December 26 after taking Christmas off, they were surprised to find that the Red Bird store was already open. The doors were still locked, but the gaping hole in the brick wall provided easy access inside. That's evidently what t ... More >>

Cantor and Co. Wimped Out at the Cliff's Edge, but There's More Scary Terrain Ahead

New Year's Day was great -- saw The Hobbit with son and girlfriend, came home to prime rib, what could be better? -- but I also spent a hell of a lot of time on the iPad trying to find out if I had fallen off a cliff yet. I'm not sure which was more death-defying -- the movie or real life. The real ... More >>

Chicago's Teacher Quality Debate? Texas Republicans Built That. Thank God.

The New York Times this morning has a piece arguing that the Chicago teachers strike is a window on the nation's heart over the last few years, where education is concerned. I would say it's been 15 years at least, and in a weird way a lot of it started right here in Dallas. In the mid-'90s Dallas ... More >>

Oak Cliff Film Festival at the Texas Theatre

Thursday, June 14-Sunday, June 17

The Oak Cliff Film Festival Puts Its Spotlight on Music Video

See also: Who's that girl in the Sarah Jaffe video? See also: It's Friday the 13th, watch this Angelus video See also: The premiere of Mind Spiders' "Wait For Us" I came across this video last night, for Beck's "Pay No Mind," which I hadn't seen in about 18 years. I remember watching it one bore ... More >>

The Walking Taco May Have Walked Across the Border

John T. Edge wrote about Tostilocos in Wednesday's New York Times and describes the Mexican street food as Tostitos corn chips topped with shaved jicama, pickled pig skins and stumpy tamarind candies in one instance. Sounds a little like the Frito Pie we wrote about a few weeks ago, right? Could our ... More >>

Tto Tto Wa Bistro and the Arrival of Korean Fried Chicken

While researching Tto Tto Wa Bistro, the subject of this week's review, I read everything I could on an Asian delicacy that's become a personal obsession: Korean fried chicken. The earliest reference I could find to the stuff served in the States was in John T. Edge's book Fried Chicken, published ... More >>

Who Will Build Dallas' Best Meatball Hoagie?

Flickr​This week in The New York Times, Pete Wells reviews someplace called Parm. His intro points out the lack of coverage food snobs give Italian-American cooking -- red-sauce pasta on red-checkered table cloths -- despite that it's a prominent comfort food for millions of Americans. That's ... More >>

On Flood Control, Dallas Better Think Nationally or Be Ready to Drown Locally

Man, talk about whistling past the graveyard. At yesterday's Dallas City Council meeting, council members Tennell Atkins and Delia Jasso asked good questions about the city's flood control plans, and City Manager Mary Suhm and her assistant, Jill Jordan, gave good answers. But it was all deck chairs ... More >>

We'd Love to Buy a Vowell

Mark Cuban Wants to Adios the NBA's Salary Cap? Apparently. Quite the "Game Changer."

Photo by Sam Merten​This morning's New York Times looks at the NBA lockout and wonders whether all the owners -- those from small markets, those with big payrolls, those losing money, those winning titles -- are on the same page when it comes to demanding givebacks from their players. Long story s ... More >>

See, Strips Clubs Are Good For the Economy

Patrick Michels​Dunno why Mayor Mike Moncrief and the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport board are so stimulated to keep that new Rick's Cabaret from getting its TABC on; don't they know that girls, girls, girls getting that cherry pie hot in herre all night long is good for the coffers? Says ... More >>

This Morning, In a New York State of Mind

​Writes Mike Lupica in this morning's New York Daily News: "So now, after all the winning during the regular season that Joe Girardi talked about in a testy postgame interview session, after starting the postseason with four straight wins and maybe thinking the Rangers were going to be the kind o ... More >>

A Vintage Clip of Bobbie Wygant Interviewing Harrison Ford in '77 Is Making Rounds Today

Bobbie Wygant Interviews Harrison Ford for Star Wars 1977 from Atombomb.tv on Vimeo.First it appeared on The New York Times's Web site this morning, courtesy fellow nostalgist Dave Itzkoff (who actually stumbled across it on The Daily Wh.at); then, MTV's. This six-minute clip of Channel 5's Bobbie W ... More >>

Killer Salsa: Why is the CDC Picking on Our Favorite Dips?

Ohmigod, that salsa killed Kenny!​The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention this week did its best to dampen summer fun by linking salsa to food poisoning. According to the much-quoted press release, one out of every 25 cases of foodborne illnesses picked up at restaurants originates ... More >>

Eating Fast Food Might Make You Fat, but not Necessarily a Slob

You do know that this guy was really an Italian, right?​In a bit of tangentially related-to-food news, the Texas Department of Transportation is reporting that the state's motorists are doing much better at keeping food-related trash off Texas roadways. Smokers, however, are pigs. TxDOT reported ... More >>

The Humane Society and big agriculture slug it out over animal rights

Nobody Gets Out Alive: Dallas Police Chief David Kunkle Explains Why He's Retiring

Dallas Police Chief David Kunkle​Tomorrow morning, at around 10, Dallas Police Chief David Kunkle will hold a press conference during which he will announce that, effective April 30, 2010, he will no longer be Dallas Police Chief. He has known this day was coming for a while. He told Dallas City M ... More >>

NY Times Takes on DPD's "Noxious Practice" of Ticketing Non-English Speaking Drivers

​This morning, The New York Times' editorial page insists the tale of Ernestina Mondragon, the first of 39 drivers ticketed by Dallas police for not speaking English to speak up, is merely a symptom of a larger issue: "how local police departments should deal with recent immigrants." (And, no, the ... More >>

NY Times on Why Dallas Treats Under-Age Prostitutes as Victims, Not Criminals

Brandon ThibodeauxAs we wrote last year, Dallas's Letot Center beds offer sanctuaries to minors fleeing pimps.​Speaking of The New York Times ...On this morning's front page is a lengthy piece about the rise in runaways turning to prostitution, and how most law enforcement officials treat these ch ... More >>

On The Range: Huaraches

Ooops...wrong image.​On The Range is a weekly exploration of the history and lore of Texas menu items."If everybody had an ocean/Across the U.S.A/Then everybody'd be surfin'/Like Californ-I-a/You'd see 'em wearing their baggies/Huarache sandals too..." Despite the popularity brought to them by ... More >>

Of Rusty Wrecks and Fake Insurance Cards: Local Dealers Say Adios to Cash for Clunkers.

Posteritati​According to the U.S. Department of Transportation, via this New York Times story about today's cash-for-clunkers deadline, I'm the proud owner of one of the most popular trade-ins: a Jeep Cherokee, which is starting to drive like today's its expiration date as well. So, how'd it go fo ... More >>

Cowboys Stadium, Also a Fine Art Gallery

Courtesy the Dallas Cowboys​So reports this morning's New York Times, which takes a tour of the Dallas Cowboys' new home with Gene Jones and finds the walls adorned with works by the Whitney-feted Lawrence Weiner, Franz Ackermann (who's collected at the Museum of Modern Art), conceptualists Mel Bo ... More >>

There is No Joystick in Mudville

The headline in this morning's New York Times reads like something out of The Onion: "Virtual Leagues Fold, Forcing Gamers to Find Actual Jobs." Alas, 'tis true -- and the man at the center of the story is Dallas's own Emmanuel Rodriguez, a 23-year-old professional video-game player and world champ ... More >>

Where's My Money? Just Remember, "A Very Simple Old Scam Can Still Fool Smart People."

Bernie Madoff's in jail after pleading guilty to all charges. Closer to home, Allen Stanford's pleading the Fifth. So better now than never, seemed like a good time to catch up with Randy Johnston, a Dallas financial malpractice lawyer and the author of Robbed at Pen Point -- and a guy who predicts ... More >>

Mother's Play

In Dallas, Too Much Office Space

Malls are lacking tenants; so too are offices. And, says this morning's New York Times, it's going to get worse -- even in a market like Dallas, "which had been shielded from the economic downturn until recently by skyrocketing oil prices and expanding energy businesses." One real-estater quoted in ... More >>

Zagat's Great News for Fearing

Dean Fearing, who clearly needs to work on his knife skills Dean Fearing's eatery in the Ritz-Carlton has been the recipient of myriad kudos from the likes of Frank Bruni in The New York Times (who called it "overwhelming," but in a good way) to Esquire, which, couple years back, hailed it as its ... More >>

All Shale Tracy Rowlett!

Salvia Is Not Your Bud

Oscar Nominee's Big Rig Infomercial to Premiere Next Friday at Angelika

Ross for Boss! And He's Got Charts!

This Doesn't Raise Any Questions At All

Writer on the Storm

Kristof speaks his mind

Rapper's Caviar Dreams

Are the latest boastful rappers billionaires or boobs?

Setting Sunstein

Dirty Old Men

Cuban: Newspapers Do "Dumb-Ass Shit"

The Smell of...Victory?

Art You Say?

Film will be the judge of that

Still, It Moves

Science at a science museum? Huh?

Farewell to the Flame

See the Idiots before they return to their villages

9/11/02

One year later, local media struggle to make sense of the terrorist attacks--and their own coverage

Book 'Em

Arts and Letters Live is Texas Bound with Daryl Johnston

Banter

Making a "theater town"

Banter

Stonewall Jackson's House would be politically incorrect, but Jimmy hates that term

Joe Bob Briggs

Drive-In Movie Critic of Grapevine, TX