Molly Ivins: 1944-2007

The Texas Observer’s home page confirms what we found out but a short while ago: Molly Ivins has died. We will have more tomorrow from her old friend and Dallas Times Herald colleague (by which I mean “drinking buddy”) Jim Schutze. –Robert Wilonsky…

Uncle Barky Punches Daybreak Belo the Belt

Ed Bark thinks Justin Farmer’s a real mimbo. Gee, what gave it away? File this under Things The Great Ed Bark Never Coulda Said About WFAA When He Worked At The Dallas Morning News: “Justin Farmer and Jackie Hyland seemed happily under glass, bantering with almost shocking ineptitude on a…

People, People Who Read People

When she’s not running the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, Nancy Brinker’s reading People magazine. How do we know this? Because she has a letter in the new issue (the one with Tyra Banks on the cover) — specifically, a response to a story the magazine recently did on…

Victory is Ours! Well, Belo’s, Anyway.

“Schutzesque.” I’ve yet to find a precise meaning in the dictionary — Jim says it means “ruggedly handsome in tweed” — but the word has officially entered the lexicon at Bold Types, The Dallas Morning News’ Metro blog that has becoming infinitely more interesting with the recent additions of education…

A Cunning Plan Foiled

This is not young Jim Schutze… OK, this is navel-gazing of the worst kind, but I thought you might like to know about it anyway: That picture (at right) on the cover of this week’s Dallas Observer, accompanying Jim Schutze’s story about the de-hippy-fication of East Dallas, is not Schutze…

The Day the McKinney Courier-Gazette Got Bought By Some Yankees

Who says the newspaper business is dead (well, besides, like, everybody)? Don’t tell that to the folks over at American Community Newspapers, the Minnesota-based publisher of 16 papers in the North Texas area — including the Plano Star Courier, McKinney Courier-Gazette, Frisco Enterprise and Mesquite News. (The North Texas papers…

Bring It On

Hey, Superintendent Michael Hinojosa, that’s quite a spokesman you got there. Celso Martinez works as the spokesperson for DISD, where his job is to explain to the public how the school district goes about educating its students. Lately, my job has been to write about DISD, particularly how it goes…

Hi, Craig

Craig Miller of KTCK-AM (1310, The Ticket) sends this brief missive concerning his phrase “sardine theory” becoming a part of the Dallas Police Department lexicon: “I am honored that my sardine theory has gone mainstream. In 100 years, I believe most will point to this moment as the springboard to…

Radio Experiment = Failed

Well, that didn’t take long. I started last week’s announcement of a new all-sports radio station by cautiously warning that the Sports Fan 990 experiment was either “hopelessly pitching pebbles at the castle walls…or perhaps the latest, greatest idea in local sports radio.” Three days into its first week, we…

Don’t Worry, Jim. You’ll Be A Lot Warmer Soon Enough.

WFAA’s Pete Delkus unveils the station’s latest weather forecasting tool, Doppler GODar. O.K., now I feel guilty about my Pete Delkus rant yesterday. I have reconsidered my feelings about yesterday’s weather, and I see now that my issues are not really with Delkus but with God. That’s an old beef…

DMN Gets Religion, Then Gets Rid of It

Earlier this week we had Dallas Morning News editor Bob Mong telling Unfair Park that the paper was Rapturing the Religion section into the rest of the paper. Now, per the paper’s Religion blog, comes the adios announcement that will appear in tomorrow’s edition. The farewell, found after the jump,…

The Good Ol’ Days at Channel 8

John Criswell may not be on TV anymore, but he’s still lookin’ good. The other day, BlogMaverick hisself Mark Cuban was bemoaning the lack of actual user-generated content on YouTube. Seems all you’re getting on the site these days are repeated postings of “Dick in a Box” and and movie…

Newspapers are Worthless. Wait, That’s News?

Belo Corp.’s stock has suffered significant declines in the last two years. Seems the public doesn’t wanna hold that stock. Yesterday, newspaperman-turned-Interweb entrepreneur Alan Mutter posted to his blog Reflections of a Newsosaur this item about the beatings publicly held publishing companies are taking on the stock markets. In short,…

Plano: Heaven or Hell? You Decide.

A Friend of Unfair Park writes: Not sure if you’ve followed this “story” on Slate, but apparently Mickey Kaus, Virginia Postrel, and Andrew Sullivan have been engaging in debate (loosely centered around the success of Brokeback Mountain in Plano) regarding whether Plano is a prime example, if not ground zero,…

Richie Says You Suck, Channel 11. Merry Christmas, Everyone!

This is Chrissy Haley with her kids. She talked to us before Channel 11. Just don’t tell Channel 11 that. They’ve got the “exclusive.” Yeah, right. Fine. OK. Whatever. Call me The Grinch if you must, but after watching the news last night I’m compelled to spread some Christmas jeer…

Letterman Calls DMN “Small Town News”-paper

Did you happen to notice that The Dallas Morning News got a shout-out on the Late Show with David Letterman last night? Not the good kind, either; nothing like when a big-city daily winds up in the “Small Town News” segment. Seems Dallas’ Only Daily recently reprinted a quote from…