Oh, Mother Hubbard!

A couple months back, Elaine Liner found herself with some free time and decided to document for Unfair Park the protest staged outside the Church of Scientology Celebrity Centre on Buckner Boulevard — looks like fun, no? Turns out there’s another protest scheduled for April 12, again staged by the…

AFI Dallas: The Filmmakers Talk

Amy Redford, like her father, is ready for her close-up. Several of filmmakers in town for the AFI Dallas International Film Fest, which wraps this weekend, are doing on-camera interviews for the festival — only, they’re kind of difficult to find. The fest’s Web site is only hosting daily montage…

Laura Miller Talks Mayoral Posse

Hadn’t heard from former Dallas mayor Laura Miller in a while — then, twice yesterday. And she shows up again today, this time in a Detroit Free Press column about Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s ever-expanding security detail. At first it looked like Miller was just recounting an anecdote about Kilpatrick…

And the Hits Just Keep on Coming at KTVT-Channel 11

Robert Riggs, among those laid off at KTVT-Channel 11 In recent days Ed Bark has brought plenty of news concerning layoffs and cutbacks at KTVT-Channel 11 — including Robert Riggs, the ace investigator; anchor and reporter Maria Arita; sports reporter Chuck Fisher; producer John Sparks and reporter Kaushal Patel, among…

Mock the Vote: Or, Looking Into Voter Suppression in Dallas.

How we missed this Huffington Post piece yesterday … well, no idea. Anyway, any story that begins … … at recent hearings before a House Judiciary subcommittee, new revelations emerged about how the Justice Department failed to investigate illegal mailers sent to African-Americans in Dallas threatening criminal punishment if they…

The Texas Rangers Are Pleased to Meat You, Nolan Ryan

Now we know why Nolan Ryan’s the president of Your Texas Rangers: to move his meat. The headline of the release says it all, in capital letters: “TEXAS RANGERS ANNOUNCE PARTNERSHIP WITH NOLAN RYAN BEEF.” As in, “The Texas Rangers announced today that all concession stands, suites and fine dining…

Dallas-Based Pizza Hut Don’t Want No Pistols With the Pepperoni

Brad Zaun, a Republican State Sen. from Urbandale, Iowa, says he’s “going to be watching Pizza Hut,” and not in a good way either. And, no, he’s not referring to the Dallas-based chain’s ridiculous April Fool’s joke involving a name change. Nope, what he’s referring to is Pizza Hut’s policy…

More Wright Than Wrong, But …

Thanks to a few incendiary soundbites, recordings of the Reverend Jeremiah Wright’s sermons are circulating among church people, making their way from hand to hand and e-mail to iPod. A politically active young man in my church gave my husband a copy of the full message from which the infamous…

Sleeping in the Blogspot

So you’re saying wearing one of these will not get you into the Mavericks’ locker room, then? Damn it. I’ll have much more on Bloggergate in this week’s paper version of Unfair Park. (Wait till you get a load of how the thing really started.) But this morn’ I get…

Dropping Out in Dallas

The nonprofit America’s Promise Alliance of which Colin Powell is the founding chair, this morning released a report titled Cities in Crisis: A Special Analytic Report on High School Graduation, which disputes the notion that 85 percent of all high school students get their diplomas. Says the study, it’s more…

How Much Is Innocence Worth?

Beginning on page 138 of today’s agenda for the Dallas County Commissioner’s Court meeting you’ll find Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins’ request for some $823,000 with which he’ll keep funding the county’s efforts to use DNA evidence to free the wrongly convicted. That figure is for two years’ worth…

Back in the Day, He Was Da Nu Man

Someone’s actually selling this bit of Dallas music history here, as well as many other local rock-show handbills from the 1980s. In The Los Angeles Times today, there appears a brief paid obituary without any further explanation; all it says is the name of the deceased, William David Bindler, along…

You Can Have the Shirt Off His Back, But Not Without a Lawsuit First

In October, Waxahachie High School sophomore Paul “Pete” Palmer was given the heave-ho from his classes because he was acting up. By which we mean the troublemaker was wearing a T-shirt that read, very simply, “John Edwards 08.” The outrage! Anarchy, anarchy, anarchy! District administrators said, sorry, but the shirt…

Laura Miller Ain’t No One’s Publicist

For someone not doing PR, as she claims in a missive Unfair Park and FrontBurner received this a.m., former Dallas mayor Laura Miller is doing a pretty good job of, ya know, PR. But, no, insists the anti-coal Miller — she ain’t handling public relations for Washington State-based Summit Energy,…

At Least Deep Ellum’ll Look Pretty

Hal Samples The winning entry in the first Re*Cov*Er mural competition back in October, from Reel FX’s Ronnie Bates Back in October, we spent a lovely Saturday strolling the streets of Deep Ellum whilst perusing and parsing the entries in the first Re*Cov*Er mural series contest, wherein 16 contestants decorated…

Jerryworld: The Worst Timeshare Ever?

Speaking of Jerryworld, as we were below, a Friend of Unfair Park sent his missus to a meet-and-greet with the Dallas Cowboys’ owner last week. During that chat — with “prominent citizens,” says our Friend — Jerry Jones offered this novel approach to dealing with the exorbitant prices being charged…

Central Dallas Ministries’ “Destination Home” for the Homeless

On March 13, Central Dallas Ministries hosted its 13th Annual Urban Ministries Prayer Breakfast, with Mayor Tom as the keynote speaker. At that time, Larry James’ organization debuted the video below, titled “Destination Home,” Central Dallas Ministries’ latest short among several spotlighting the city’s homeless and focusing on how they…

Honoring What’s Left of Dallas’ Past

The Gulf States Building downtown, built in 1927 and now part of the Third Rail Lofts Preservation Dallas today announced the recipients of its ninth annual Preservation Achievement Awards, and it’s a varied list. There are, essentially, three categories: residential projects, commercial projects and “important institutional sites.” And the residences…