Articles for April 23rd, 2009
Why Traffic Jams Happen Even When There’s No Accident
Commuting FrontBurnervians will want to know about a phenonmenon known as “critical density,” which was only confirmed by physicists last year. To understand it, you need to read this.
Maybe They Were Winking When They Said It
Really, Texas Republicans couldn’t be this far removed from reality. Daily Kos — okay, not the most reliable source — released a Research 2000 poll today on Texas. Despite its leanings, Research 2000 is a respectable outfit. For how Texas Republicans answered on whether Texas would do better as an independent nation and whether Rick Perry was right to suggest secession, take the jump:
EDS Execs Say “Adios” To Hewlett-Packard
The NYTimes’ Ashlee Vance is reporting that four top executives of the old EDS are leaving the new Hewlett-Packard. She includes a boilerplate PR reaction to her scoop from HP, then adds:
There is, however, a school of thought that says H.P. is underestimating some of the nuances behind the services business. The services types spend years building relationships with customers. It’s part of a world with far more layers of back-scratching and schmoozing than moving PCs and servers. Perhaps making wholesale changes on this scale is short-term thinking?
D Magazine Hit With Power Outage
The power blows out about once a year, and then Oncor swears on a stack of Bibles that it has fixed the transformer out back in the alley. It has become a ritual of spring, which probably has something to do with the hour that everyone all at once turns on their airconditioning. This time, for some strange reason, the reception phone is working. At the moment, that is all that is working. (Meanwhile, I will continue posting from an undisclosed location.)
Fancy Begging on the Radio
If you turn on your radio right now, KERA is being overrun by Jeff Whittington and Rawlins Gilliland. I’m expecting a pants-off dance off tonight from 4 to 7. (Says Rawlins of the three-hour stint: It’s so long, at the end of it you can collect workers’ comp.) Listen live here.
Why Is Jeb Hensarling In My Pants?
I mean, he’s not technically in my britches. But the supposed Republican fiscal pit bull is trying to make sure I pay even more in credit card interest rates, and that takes money out of my debt-ridden pockets. Within a few hours today, I received two press releases on U.S. Congressman Jeb Hensarling (R-These Parts). One pointed out what a fiscal butt-kicker he is:
Congressman Jeb Hensarling, the second highest ranking member of the House Budget Committee and author of the Family Budget Protection Act, was selected today as one of five top negotiators from the House of Representatives to work out final details on the federal budget.
That’s sweet, no? So, maybe I like the guy.
The next e-mail, though, pointed out that J-Hen is carrying water for the credit card industry:
Congressman Hensarling tried to gut the Credit Card Holders’ Bill of Rights yesterday by fighting for changes that would allow credit card companies to retroactively increase the interest rate on existing balances. As a result, Americans who are struggling to pay off their credit card bill could suddenly be charged more for purchases they already made. Congressman Hensarling said, “maybe, unfortunately, the local plant shut down and you’ve been laid off. Well that’s a job for the federal government to provide an adequate safety net. It’s not necessarily a job for the credit card company.”
I thought maybe I was missing something. Because that’s bad, right? So I sent the full details to Wick, one of J-Hen’s biggest supporters. Before I knew it, Wick was standing behind me (I may or may not have been checking my Twitter profile via Twanalyst.com), shaking his head. The only thing he said: “Effing Jeb Hensarling.”
GM’s Arlington Plant To Close In May
As Wick suspected yesterday, the Arlington GM plant will be going on hiatus starting next month.
What You Should Do This Weekend If You Dig Midcentury Modern Architecture and/or Want to Make My Wife Happy
Perhaps you’ve heard of the White Rock Home Tour. Perhaps you know it’s the area’s only home tour featuring midcentury modern architecture. Perhaps you know proceeds go to Blue Ribbon-nominated Hexter Elementary. (Go, Hawks!) Perhaps you’re hot to meet Alan Hoffman, who has built the only homes in Dallas that are LEED Platinum certified, and, further, you know that one of those homes is on the tour this year. Perhaps you’d like tickets but don’t think you’re good enough at writing haiku to get the free ones. Well then, buy a ticket. Or seven. Because the tour, now in its fourth year, was my wife’s brainchild, and she wants you to attend. I’ve found it’s best to do what my wife wants. Things just go smoother that way.
Texas Capital Bank Goes From Strength To Strength
Shareholder equity grew 51% year over year, March 09 to March 08. Tangible common equity to total tangible assets stands at 7.8%. For the quarterly results, go here and scroll down. For yesterday’s webcast, go here and sign in. And, yes, it did take TARP money:
On a fully diluted basis, earnings per common share from continuing operations were $.17 for the three months ended March 31, 2009, compared to $.30 for the same quarter last year. The effect of the TARP preferred stock dividends net of income earned on the TARP proceeds reduced earnings per share by $.03 for the three months ended March 31, 2009. Shares for the first quarter of 2009 were affected by the issuance of 4 million shares in September 2008.
News Online Readership Way, Way Up, Ctd.
Wick, indeed the DMN’s online readership is way up. But a more important number is online revenue. It is not growing for the company, unfortunately. The official press release on the fourth quarter 2008 results does not separate out the DMN’s financial numbers, but it does say the following:
AHC’s Internet revenues accounted for 6.9 percent of total revenues in the quarter. Internet revenues were $11.1 million, 16 percent below the same period last year.
Last Night: My Bloody Valentine @ the Palladium
There aren’t many things in this life that not only live up to the hype, but exceed it. Even if you carefully manage your expectations, you are bound to be disappointed on some level. (Unless you’re a permanent cynic, in which case you don’t truly enjoy anything, except the occasional schadenfreude.) So I was prepared to leave the Palladium last night happy enough to finally check the box next to “My Bloody Valentine” but not much more than that — “Ah, that was great,” and then forget about it by the time my head cleared.
I was mistaken. If you think people make too much about the MBV live experience you 1) weren’t there and 2) probably don’t care much for them anyway. Because that, last night, was transcendent, a fusion of a melody and malady that was about the closest thing to climbing inside a song I’ve ever felt. And you definitely felt it: my clothes were shaking, my hair was vibrating, and, by the end, my legs felt like I’d been standing on this for about an hour. As for the set-closing noise symphony I mentioned previously, after the jump a few descriptions of same from FB Nation.
FreeDarko’s Bethlehem Shoals Has Deep Thoughts About Tonight’s Mavs/Spurs Game
And he was good enough to share them with us right here.
Stanley Korshak Turns to eBay to Move Merch
An energetic FrontBurnervian points us to this Wall Street Journal story about Stanley Korshak’s electronic outpost on eBay. Korshak’s owner, Crawford Brock, says, “[W]e’re not so sure we want people to know necessarily that this is Stanley Korshak.” That’ll be tough to hide now that the WSJ has outed them. Here are the items up for sale on eBay now.
Did Last Summer’s Oil Spike Cause The Recession?
That’s the startling conclusion of a new paper by economist James Hamilton of the Brookings Institution. Derek Thompson of The Atlantic reviews it here (and in this case, the comments are worth reading). To Texas, oil increases are a double-edged sword. We benefit hugely from increases in oil prices, because our investor class is historically tied to oil and because higher prices spur new activity that increases employment. The other side, of course, is that we are consumers like other Americans, and higher prices at the pump mean less money for consumption on other goods and services. Hamilton’s thesis has its problems, but it also raises a lot of pertinent questions. Perhaps the federal government should turn its attention to why oil soared to $180 a barrel when oil investors were saying the “natural” price of oil should be $50 a barrel.
Was Perry’s Seccession Talk Smart Politics?
Aman Batheja over at the Star-Telegram presents the two opposing viewpoints. My take is that he was obviously making a play to the worst elements of the base, who are the most motivated primary voters. So to his campaign team it seemed like a smart play. But a year is forever in politics, and those comments on videotape – coupled with his rejection of federal unemployment funds for the increasing number of Texans who are finding themselves out of work — will not play well by the time the actual primary rolls around. This recession is far from over, and if gas and oil prices remain down, its worst effects might be felt in Texas while the rest of the nation begins a recovery.
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