Ron Kirk insists he is neither optimist nor pessimist, cynic nor Pollyanna. “I’m a realist,” he explains during a quiet break from campaigning in deep East Texas. “I’ve had to deal with life as it is.” Because he’s a realist, he recognizes some harsh truths. Kirk knows, for example, that…
The thin, attractive blonde stood up before a room of Rent-A-Center’s top execs–the only woman in a sea of white shirts, dark suits and ties–and began delivering her report on the company’s tax situation. She didn’t get far. Before Leigh had completed two sentences, Ernie Talley, crimson-faced and ready to…
Lucano Transports, the Oak Cliff bus company that stirred up such a fuss for Mayor Laura Miller last summer, is gone. Neighborhood homeowners, whose complaints about congestion and the stink of bus fumes prompted then-City Councilwoman Miller to try to shut down the Davis Street bus depot, should be happy…
Feeling SmallCity Hall is normal: In regard to the story by Jim Schutze titled “Laura and the Little People” (February 28): Oh, Jim, I think you are getting a little too paranoid. The way things work at City Hall is normal; Laura Miller does argue about a lot of issues,…
Charlotte Scott remembers being in the kitchen preparing for a barbecue when her husband’s stepfather, Kerry Quinney, walked in and scooped up her 3-year-old son Matthew for a visit to the tigers. “Kerry said, ‘OK, let’s go.’ I said, ‘What are you doing?'” Scott recalls. His adult daughter Nikki, who…
Royce Ring attributes much of his success to DNA. Not the genetic material he inherited from his parents, but a kind of sloganeering process he applies to all his restaurant projects. Ring says DNA (a strained acronym derived from “differentiators, nuances and attitudes”) is a process of reducing a restaurant…
Note to self: Federal appeals court decision in D.C. last week now allows for huge media companies like AOL Time Warner or Viacom or Knight Ridder to buy more media companies. Consider column on one of these companies buying Belo. Do research. Consider hiring research assistant. “Many of the most…
It’s time for another Buzz pop quiz. The topic this week is citizenship. Suppose some shady character offers to sell you a brand-new 40-inch television for 100 bucks as long as you aren’t too particular about where it came from. Do you: A) Ask him if he’ll take a check;…
BoomNew London tragedy: Carlton Stowers’ article about the New London school explosion (“‘Today, a Generation Died,'” February 21) that killed 294 people in that small East Texas town in 1937 was very moving. Like many Texans, I had forgotten about that terrible incident from our history. Thank you, Carlton, for…
Lonnie Barber, janitor-driver for the New London School, watched as young children climbed aboard his bus, laughing and horseplaying. The elementary school students–released 10 minutes earlier than their junior high and high school classmates–were in particularly high spirits that springlike Thursday afternoon of March 18, 1937. The next day had…
Political insiders always suspected that ballots mailed to certain parts of Southern Dallas were for sale. They knew the blind, the elderly and the infirm–mostly black–were told how to vote by friendly and helpful campaign workers. And they knew the ballots were sent to and collected from at-home voters by…
Now that Laura Miller has climbed to the top of Dallas’ greasy political pole, what, Buzz wonders, will happen to some of the little people who helped hoist her up there? Specifically, what will become of Web masters such as Sharon Boyd (www.dallasarena.com) and Avi Adelman (www.barkingdogs.org), who turned their…
Like Father, Like SonThe greatest newsmen: I worked with Bert Shipp for years and agree he was one of the greatest newsmen who has worked in this market. The first time I saw his son Brett (“Sail On,” February 14) on the air, I called his dad and told him…
They are known by many names, some of which are endearing, silly or downright demeaning, none of which adequately describes our cultural obsession with them. We call them boobs (too whimsical), mammaries (too medical), teats (too Shakespearean), honkers (too Man Show), jugs (too Pamela Anderson), melons (too horticultural), ta tas…
The Shipp boys were, arguably, the coolest kids in elementary school who didn’t have access to a stack of Playboys. Their dad, Bert Shipp, was a local newscast legend, having worked as a reporter and news director at Channel 5 and, beginning in 1961, at Channel 8. The other kids…
Until now, Dallas residents haven’t had to think about how to get electricity. It always came from TXU, a stodgy monopoly that was regulated by the state. All that changed on January 1, when new state laws took effect and opened up the retail energy market to other companies. Those…
They’re the Gentle Musers–said so right on Laura Miller’s T-shirt. But on Tuesday morning, George Dunham and Craig Miller, the morning-show hosts on sports-talk station KTCK-AM (1310), played gatekeepers of local politics. The highly rated Dunham and Miller show gave way to the–oh, dear God, no–“Dunning and Miller Show” as…
Vote for Dad Cookie-cutter pol: Thank you, Mr. Schutze! Thank you for reminding me why I vote (“The Envelope, Please,” February 7). I am in my mid-30s and am ashamed to say I just started voting with Clinton’s last presidential race. Now, however, I make sure that my voice is…
Late in the afternoon of July 31, 2000, a who’s who of Republicans–Texans as well as national party officials–jammed into elevators of a downtown Philadelphia office building, a few blocks from the GOP National Convention. When the doors slid open on the 50th floor, they spilled into the Top of…
At first, “The Freedman’s Memorial” 10-page workbook and teacher’s supplement looks harmless enough. A kid is depicted on the cover with his hand on his chin, head cocked, looking up thoughtfully. Inside, the books have drawings of old Dallas and a description of the long-vanished black community known as Freedman’s…
Buzz has always prided itself on being able to laugh at pretty much anything. So we expected to guffaw ourselves into incontinence when we heard that Tom Dunning’s mayoral campaign was going “urban” and had produced a rap ad being aired on KKDA-FM. Then we heard the ad. We didn’t…
Pants on Fire Something smells: I never expected to become a Laura Miller supporter in the race for Dallas’ next mayor, but something smells in Dallas, and I believe it’s Domingo “The Liar” Garcia (“Someone’s Lying,” January 31). Clearly he doesn’t expect that we (the voters) are all so shallow…
