Chesapeake CEO Sells Stock In Company, Blames Crisis

Not to end your week on another downer, but Aubrey K. McClendon, the CEO of Chesapeake Energy Corp. and its largest individual shareholder, has been forced to sell “substantially all of his shares” of common stock in the company, in order to meet margin loan calls. The reason underlying the margin calls, according to McClendon: “the extraordinary circumstances of the worldwide financial crisis.” McClendon’s the guy you’ve been seeing on TV pitching Boone Pickens’ natural-gas plan, and Oklahoma City-based Chesapeake is a major player in the Barnett Shale.

Jim Burnham Named Trial Lawyer of the Year in Dallas

Jim Burnham is a criminal defense attorney who represented a certain Hawaiian-shirted, balding magazine editor in an unfortunate DWI case about 15 years ago. The Dallas Bar Association believes he’s good at his job. I’ll just have to take their word for it, I guess. (Full release after the jump.)

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OK, Another Company is Moving to Downtown Dallas…

Here’s the clue (in the form of an invitation):

DOWNTOWNDALLAS and Mayor Tom Leppert Welcome a Major Corporation to the Downtown Area

WHO: DOWNTOWNDALLAS and The City of Dallas

WHAT: The announcement of the relocation of a major corporation’s regional headquarters to downtown Dallas.

WHEN: Monday, October 13 at 9:30 a.m.

WHERE: On the ice rink at Plaza of the Americas, 600 N. Pearl Street, Dallas, Texas, 75201.  Complimentary valet parking at The Westin Hotel.

WHY: Join Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert and John F. Crawford, President and CEO of DOWNTOWNDALLAS, in welcoming this notable tenant moving to a signature Downtown Dallas property.  Additional speakers will include executive leadership from the new corporate tenant as well as building representatives.

Anyone out there care to venture a guess?

Friday Afternoon Random Question

Since I just reread Chuck Klosterman’s Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs, this week’s question is too unwieldy to fit in the headline. It’s a hypothetical.

You have a chance to make all of DISD’s financial problems go away instantly. Now, you have no real affinity for the district and, in fact, send your child to a private school. (Note: you are not rich, but you do okay, well enough to afford private school with some help from scholarships.) Also, no one will know you did this. The way you are able to accomplish this is: over the next year, you will be punched in the face on four separate occasions. The puncher will be an unarmed average-sized man with no formal boxing or martial arts training. You will not know when or where the punches will be deployed.

If you choose not to do this, you will be paid a one-time lump sum of $5,652. This income will be tax-free, but cannot be used on anything entertaining (movies, vacations, liquor, etc.), nor can it be applied to your child’s education. DISD’s financial situation will continue as it is.

Search your hearts. The comments await your decision.

Re: An Open Letter to Talmadge Heflin

I wrote that the Outback Steakhouse at Conrad High that Heflin decried actually sounded like a good idea to me. Turns out, Heflin was even more wrong than I imagined. The restaurant isn’t even there anymore. Amy S, a volunteer at the school, wrote something in the comments to that post that deserves above-the-fold treatment:

Casting the DISD Movie

When faced with bad news–or any news, really–I make jokes. I can’t help it. It’s my self-defense mechanism. So instead of dwelling on the situation at DISD (and, to be sure, I do take it very seriously), I’ve decided to turn it into a thus-far unscripted movie. (I’m seeing it as Crash meets Stand and Deliver meets Twelve Angry Men.) Your cast is after the jump. Not a joke, I guess. But not exactly hard-hitting either. Certainly not essential. If nothing else, to take everyone’s mind off it for a moment.

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An Open Letter to Talmadge Heflin

Dear Talmadge Heflin:

First of all, your name is clearly fictitious. I’ll thank you in advance for dropping the ruse and instead using whatever name your mother actually gave you.

Now, about that op-ed piece you wrote in the Dallas Morning News today, wherein you criticize DISD for not making good use of the money from the 2002 bond and for “spend[ing] lavishly on extravagant new projects.” One paragraph in particular caught my eye. It’s this one, about the recently constructed Emmett J. Conrad High School:

Conrad High cost nearly $50 million to build. At a colossal 325,000 square feet, the massive new complex is home to 670 students who enjoy almost 500 square feet each. Even more impressive is the interior of the schoolhouse. Featuring a state-of-the art computer room for graphic design, a media center, a technology room and an on-site steakhouse restaurant, the school boasts some of the best technology and amenities that taxpayer money can buy.

I just want to make sure I understand. We should not provide students with state-of-the-art computers and technology. Is that what you’re saying? We should hook them up with TRS-80s? Because I disagree with you there. I think to prepare kids for the job market or to get them ready for college, we need to give them the best technology taxpayer money can afford. Yes, that.

Now, I do have to admit that when I read my tax money had been used to install a “steakhouse restaurant” in the school, I got a little cheesed (no pun intended). Because good computers are one thing; a “steakhouse restaurant” is something else entirely. That sounds like lavish spending!

Except then I did a little googling and learned that the Outback Steakhouse at Conrad is a learning laboratory, part of the Texas Restaurant Association’s Education Foundation Entrepreneur 101 program, “which teaches kids how to cook, manage food service operations, and run their own businesses.” Once I read that, I said to myself, “Awesome.”

And then, “Talmadge Heflin,” I said something else to myself. I said, “That Talmadge Heflin is either lazy or he’s a liar. And given that he’s gone through all the trouble of concocting that fake name for himself, I think I know which one he is.”

In closing, watch yourself, mister. I don’t like the cut of your jib.

Sincerely,

Tim Rogers

Obama Continues to Dominate at 7-Eleven

As if Barack Obama’s trouncing of John McCain in the coffee-cup poll weren’t enough, check out more evidence of That One’s popularity among the 7-Eleven set. Honchos at the chain’s store on Abrams near Northwest Highway say Obama’s stuff sold out the first day this display went up. (And hey, we’re just reporting the news here. Contrary to misinformed commenters on other blogs, not every editor at the D company is backing the Dem. No big fan of McCain, I nonetheless tried to warn Wick that the combination of Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and the Saul Alinsky-loving European socialist would be disastrous for our country, but did he listen to me? Uh, no.)

NTTA Gets Hosed By Credit Markets

I don’t pretend to understand bond financing of toll roads. But when the toll road people say, “We’re going to find interim financing to refinance our interim financing,” that’s not a good thing.

Friday Fun: Whiteboard Tower Defense

Well there goes today’s productivity. My favorite Friday Fun game Desktop Tower Defense has a new version: Whiteboard Tower Defense. The game is the same: Strategically place different towers to do away with ghoulies before they make it from one side of the whiteboard to the other. Upgrade towers as the game goes on. Enjoy.

Leading Off (10/10/08)

1. Dallas school trustees will most likely approve a new ethics policy that will allow trustees to do business with DISD so long as they don’t have a “substantial interest” in the value of the work, which I think means if they look they other way, the school board will, too. I’m workshopping that joke. I’d like your help.

2. Even though the postal service says one stamp should do the trick, some Dallas folks are seeing their absentee ballots returned to them for insufficient postage. Use the Celeste Rule on this, people: the more important the package, the more stamps. Credit card bill, one stamp. Absentee ballot, two stamps. Hard copy application to be a contestant on next year’s episodes of The Amazing Race: 48 stamps.

3. Big weekend. Texas-OU. State Fair and King Tut. What do you have on tap? I’m turning comments on for this.