Mark Graham As we mentioned in 2001, Santos Rodriguez is buried at Oakland Cemetery amongst Dallas’s elite. This is the kind of morning I dread. I wake up. I pour coffee. I turn to The Dallas Morning News editorial page. I read things there that make sense. I hate this…
Dear Mexican: Where I recently started working, Latinos make up about 95 percent of the workforce. We are, however, prohibited from speaking Spanish. Our supervisor tells us that if we can so much as speak one word of English, that we cannot speak in Spanish. We are constantly being threatened…
By any chance, were you ever one of those people from a church or synagogue or mosque or some other outfit that used to come downtown in a van and feed the homeless? I say, “used to,” because, as you know, feeding the homeless is all taken care of now…
Pauline Medrano The real joke in the Ross Avenue name-change controversy is the Three Stooges double head-slap the three Latinos on the city council’s Trinity River Corridor Project committee are taking from Mayor Tom Leppert on this. In the first place, Mayor Pro Tem Elba Garcia talked Steve Salazar and…
Turn to Page 25 of your document, where you will find that a “shade structure take[s] the place of tree vegetation in this plaza preserving views of the downtown skyline and promenade.” Also: a solar-powered water taxi. And: jet packs for everyone! This morning, while the Dallas city council’s Trinity…
Joyce Foreman On her blog yesterday, former Dallas Area Rapid Transit board member and political activist Joyce Foreman posted an item in which she called Dallas city council member Dwaine Caraway “[Mayor] Leppert’s head Negro watcher at Dallas city hall.” There has been some tittering about it already today over…
One of the names nominated for the renaming of Industrial Boulevard recently was Stanley Marcus Boulevard. Walk a quarter-mile in my shoes on this, will you? Marcus’ name was one of several put forward by the public in a recent competition run by City Hall to find a new name…
Dear Mexican: What’s with calling yourselves “La Raza”? Being Mexicans, Chicanos or whatever isn’t enough—now you’re THE race? Sounds pretty racist to me. —The Race Is On Dear Gabacho: Few things annoy the Mexican more than the Know Nothing Nation’s deliberate ignorance with this most nebulous of Mexican idioms. Despite…
Maybe it’s Obama. Something is going on, something bubbling up. I feel it all around me. Don’t you? Not just nationally but locally. Some kind of touchiness. Not touchy-feely. Touch-pokey. Things are complicated all of a sudden. When Russell Fish and I had lunch last week, the first thing we…
Dear Readers: Gracias, merci, obrigado for the many submissions in our contest asking readers to argue in 25 words why corn tortillas are superior to flour, or vice versa. Below are the winners for some of the cities that carry the Mexican; see the full list at dallasobserver.com. Don’t see…
I actually don’t want to talk about the elephant in the room. I want to talk about Steve Blow, who is biting back at me over on The Dallas Morning News’ Metro blog for criticisms I made of him Monday here on Unfair Park. And sorry if this is just…
Now where I’d put my barrel? Yeah, I know, feels like I just got back from vacation. But you know what they say in the corporate media world, “use ‘em or lose ‘em”. They do say that, right? While I’m gone you might wanna check out our Dallas Observer Music…
Sometimes people look at the wrong thing when they look at Dallas. They want to find what makes Dallas unique, so they look for something unique. But the thing that makes this region unique is its perfect, flawless, seamless lack of uniqueness. OK, I know, it needs a little explaining…
Dear Mexican: Why are there Mexicans in the Border Patrol? What a hypocritical thing to do to our people. —Carne Asada Carlos Dear Wab: Not only are Mexicans in the Border Patrol, but la migra’s own figures show that Latinos make up about 52 percent of its force, comfortably outnumbering…
Florence Shapiro’s much more attractive than her younger lefty brother. Over on FrontBurner, D publisher Wick Allison wrote about State Senator Florence Shapiro announcing plans to run for Kay Bailey Hutchison’s U.S. Senate seat. “Question is,” Allison asks, “does she have $10 million in ready cash? For a Jewish woman…
Last December at the annual meeting of the Dallas Citizens Council — a private, sometimes secretive body long powerful in local affairs — outgoing president John Scovell said, “We’re changing back to the good old days.” He was talking about Tom Leppert getting elected mayor, among other things. But the…
You can’t call us losers anymore. At least to our faces. A wise man – no, come to think of it, it was this a-hole – once said that “those who can’t play, write.” At your friendly lil’ Dallas Observer, thank you very much, we can do both. After years…
Dear Mexican: What’s the fascination Mexicans have with Elvis? —Good Roceando Tonight Dear Gabacho: Your question is spot-on, but it’s taken a while for Elvis to achieve icon status amongst Mexicans. As recounted in Eric Zolov’s 1999 book, Refried Elvis: The Rise of the Mexican Counterculture, the King largely sparked…
Dear Mexican: Whenever I have an immigration debate with my Chicano hermanos who support open borders and get angry at any type of immigration control, they don’t seem to understand the basic laws of economics, such as the fact that migrant workers who pick fruit, work in construction and do…
Dart boards rejoice. Been meaning to get around to this and, with Wimbledon in a rain delay, seems like a good time. (Sports prologue: The Rangers stole another win in New York and the Mavs will sign Gerald Green. There.) Couple of you have emailed asking for some personal background…
Sorry, but every once in a while I feel a need to clear the air on blog comments. I recently wrote about a major Dallas Area Rapid Transit screw-up in which alert citizens caught one of the agency’s major contractors tearing up $600,000 worth of new improperly installed train track…
Dear Mexican: What do you think would happen if U.S. citizens could as easily buy land and set up businesses in Mexico as Mexicans can do in the United States? Might that be a big boost to the Mexican economy? I know there are provisions in the Mexican Constitution that…
