Opinion & Commentary

Let’s say the kids do come. What does that look like on Day 1? Crazy? Or not? It’s all about anger management. Dallas County Commissioners Court Judge Clay Jenkins, with backing from all but one of his fellow commissioners, has vowed Dallas will take responsibility for as many as 2,000…

Seeing that the legendary Willie Nelson is performing at his annual 4th of July picnic this Friday, we at DC9 thought it time to do some wishful thinking about dear Willie. The guy has always loved doing duets. He’s performed songs with (among others) Snoop Dog, Steven Colbert, Julio Iglesias,…

Something recent and specific must be driving the surge of unaccompanied immigrant children across the Texas border with Mexico. It’s reasonable and prudent for government to try to figure out what’s behind it in order to stem the tide. But that’s one thing. The other thing is this: The offer…

One way or another, the Robert Groden situation in Dealey Plaza will fester and erupt again in months ahead. You know who I mean. Groden is the Kennedy assassination expert who sells books and videos there on weekends. The city has been trying to get rid of him forever. Funny…

The big show-and-tell meeting between the U.S. Attorney’s Office and Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price, scheduled for today, has been postponed, according to reliable sources. We have a call in to Price’s attorney, Billy Ravkind, for word on why. Ravkind had predicted previously that the feds would show Price…

Culture is the most confusing thing. In today’s Dallas Morning News, a state representative from a northern suburb is quoted objecting to a proposal for tolled lanes on U.S. Highway 75, the main road north from the city, saying, “We’ll basically be a gated community.” Wait. I thought that was…

When I heard that Kim Kardashian had a new baby collection coming out, I assumed it was a formal announcement that she was about to birth multiples. As it turns out, she is not going to birth a collection of babies, but has in actuality created a line of baby…

Always fun for me to read The Dallas Morning News on Sunday, or, as I call it, Pravda Day. That’s when the big think-pieces come out in the special “Pointy Section” of the paper … oh, ‘scuse me, it’s really called the “Points Section,” but you get my point. It’s…

Courtesy of the label Mainstream country music gets an unfair rap as being universally over-polished and formulaic, a notion that artists like Kacey Musgraves and Eric Church obliterate every time they strap on their guitars. But there’s a granule of truth to the stereotype, and a particularly damaging sub-genre — known as “bro-country” — is…

Kathy Colvin at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Texas would not confirm or deny the veracity of Kevin Krause’s post up now on the Morning News saying the feds have invited Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price in for “a meeting” next week. Price, whose offices…

The time escapes me. At least 20 years ago. I am seated outside the office of a prominent African-American clergyman in South Dallas waiting for an appointment that was to begin 45 minutes ago. The waiting is the South Dallas white man’s tax. I knew all that before I showed…

Dearest Lice, Fuck you very much. Fuck you for jumping onto some kid’s head, and then onto my kid’s head. Fuck you additionally and this time more aggressively and angrily for then jumping onto my head. I will end you. I know that you were sent to earth to remind…

Mark Lamster, architecture critic for The Dallas Morning News, is still new in the job, but he’s got a sharp analytical eye. Over the years I have developed my own mental gauge for how long it takes newcomers to figure out Dallas, and I have to say this guy’s sort…

In this week’s Dallas Observer we profile 20 of the metro area’s most interesting characters, with new portraits of each from local photographer Can Turkyilmaz. See the entire Dallas Observer People Issue here. Twelve years ago, Mariana Griggs was one of those people whose parachutes got messed up. Instead of…

In this week’s Dallas Observer we profile 20 of the metro area’s most interesting characters, with new portraits of each from local photographer Can Turkyilmaz. See the entire Dallas Observer People Issue here. Bonnie Jacobs studies plant fossils found in ancient rocks and deeply cored soil samples — bits of…

Dear Mexican: Why do some Mexicans expect us to learn Spanish instead of them learning English?  (NOTE: I did say SOME, not most or all!)  I’m offended whenever I am ASSAULTED by listening to anything in Spanish on phone menus or see it on forms that I have to fill…

It’s really sort of embarrassing — all this gushing from The Dallas Morning News and the mayor, not to mention Wick Allison at D Magazine, going on about their conversion therapy and how they now believe in the new walkable city. Especially when they’ve put hearts on their sleeves this…

Good piece yesterday by Matt Haag on The Dallas Morning News education blog reporting that fewer public school seniors received at least a 990 score — that’s the number that means a student is “college ready” — on the SAT exam, reflecting school Superintendent Mike Miles’ push to have more…

Scott Goldstein, who’s still new at covering City Hall for The Dallas Morning News, had a piece in the paper a week ago that expressed the longstanding Morning News strategy for new beat reporters, which is pretty much the opposite of the strategy at places where I have worked. He…

On the Opinion Blog of The Dallas Morning News today, editorial writer Rudy Bush identifies one Dave Neumann as “a clearly unqualified former council member” in reference to Neumann’s recent brief engagement as a public relations consultant to the city’s police and fire pension fund. Unfair? Could be. The fund,…