D

Rick Perry’s “Secret” Junket to Israel

CBS11 devoted more than 7 minutes last night to this Bennett Cunningham report on Rick Perry’s family excursion to Jerusalem, paid for by Israeli oil interests who have scored big in Texas.  The trip took place while Perry was announcing a reduction in travel by state employees and carried a taxpayer price tag of $70,000 — plus overtime — for Perry’s security detail (the Israelis don’t provide security?). The purpose of the trip was so that Perry could receive a “Defender of Jerusalem” award.

As for how secret the trip was, the News’s Christy Hoppe reported on it in August, so maybe it was only a secret to CBS11.  Hoppe further noted that Perry is an unusual recepient of such an award, since in 2006 he said he agreed that Jews and non-believers will be condemned to eternal damnation.

How Not To Buy Tickets to the Dallas Theater Center’s Midsummer’s Night Dream, Ctd.

Mark Hadley, the overworked and by-now-has-to-be-exhausted general manager of the Theater Center, responds:

Let me first apologize for the colossal runaround we put you through.  We have a number of fronts that we’re battling as we open this new building.  We’re trying to maintain an excellent level of customer service — and this includes the website and the ticketing operations, along with the onsite experiences related to parking, house management, concessions, and so forth.  This has, admittedly, been challenging during the transition.

 We revamped our website just this week to provide improved information about our productions and to make the ticket-buying process more effecient.  I take your note about more specific seating maps on the site so that customers can know better what they are buying.  I am aware that the AT&T PAC is revamping their website as well.

 I hope you can understand the enormities of the challenges that arise when two organizations try to coordinate their efforts on customer service — and one is moving into a brand new home (DTC) and the other is transitioning from a fundraising organization to a presenting and building management organization (AT&T PAC).

 Still, we have to do better.  And we will.  Give us a little a time — I guarantee we’ll get this right.

And, with an attitude like that, I know they will.

Knives Come Out for Texas Trib Launch

I am a proud founding member of the new Texas Tribune, the online state news service that starts up on Tuesday. I know FrontBurner looks forward to stealing a lot of their material while the ink is still fresh on the server. But some are not so happy, as this Austin Chronicle appraisal makes plain. I was especially interested to see that Evan Smith enjoys a higher salary than I do.  But then again, he’s Evan Smith and I’m not.

Least Surprising Photo Ever? Tim Rogers Lectures the Staff About Word Usage

The topic: "blond" vs. "blonde." The book: Garner's Modern American Usage, a copy of which was recently purchased for the office for just such an occasion. The pedantic person reading from it, and thus extending the conversation for far too long: Tim Rogers.

A.H. Belo Again Posts Positive Numbers

I’ve already complained about how the financial press reports corporate results. Again, A.H. Belo showed a negative net income (-$5.8 million), which will be the headline, and a positive operating profit (+$14.4 million), which will  barely be mentioned.  The market, at least, knows how to read the data, driving the stock price up 21% so far today. This reflects a new confidence in management’s turnaround strategy, which entails cutting circulation and raising prices, a move that drove a 11.8% increase in circ revenue this quarter. Nobody is of the woods yet, but that’s a healthy number.

Gary Kelly’s Costume: Dorothy From Oz

The Nuts About Southwest blog today answers  my question from yesterday: CEO Gary Kelly is off to see the wizard, and then presumably Milwaukee, where the airline is launching flights this weekend.

InsideCorner, R.I.P.

It really was magic. When we launched InsideCorner at the beginning of the baseball season, it was an opportunistic move made possible by the Morning News‘ shortsightedness. They had on their staff the best baseball beat writer in Texas, Evan Grant, and they decided to make him cover football (a move forced by their content-sharing agreement with the Star-Telegram). So, with the support of some visionary advertisers (Dr Pepper, Pappas Bros., Texas Rangers), we were able to make a home for Evan in our humble digital outpost. You know what happened after that: the Rangers had one of their best seasons in club history as a direct result of Evan’s comprehensive, insightful coverage (along with the fine work of Mike Hindman and Jeff Miller, it should be noted). Then, at the end of the baseball season, the News got its shortsighted vision corrected by ESPN and hired Evan back.

Meantime, we’d brought along some other writers to round out the coverage on InsideCorner, most notably Bob Sturm, he of Ticket fame. Bob broke down the Cowboys for us in the way that only he can. And Gina Miller of TXA 21 has been pitching in on the Mavs front. Zac and Eric threw up a few posts, too, from beyond the arc.

Here’s what we struggled with: we had this great baseball blog run by a full-time employee whose job was to feed and care for the thing more or less around the clock. Then we had this parentless sports blog that was getting passed around from babysitter to babysitter, each of whom gave the thing good care when they had the time but each of whom also had a full-time job (in Zac’s case, keeping Twitter in business; in Eric’s case, breaking necks and cashing checks; in Bob’s case, mediating on-air fights between his broadcasting partner and his producer on BaD Radio; in Gina’s case, keeping Derek Harper’s six-button suits in check on Mavs broadcasts; in Mike Hindman’s case, lawyering; in Jeff Miller’s case, writing books). This is no way to raise a child. A kid needs stability. Rules. An engaged parent.

So. We’ve decided to give our baby to a better home. Or, more accurately, we’ve decided to put the baby down. And not just for nap.

On Monday, we’re pulling the plug on InsideCorner. Its content will still live on the interubes should you ever want to search for a bit of information you remember reading, but there won’t be any links to it on our site. Thank you to everyone who was a part of the magic while it lasted. Thank you especially for your forbearance as we’ve figured out the right course of action.

God bless us all.

Dallas-Fort Worth 5th Strongest Metro Area

Using rankings set by Brookings Institution, BusinessWeek presents the 40 strongest U.S. metropolitan economies. We rank No. 5, given props for being “sprawling, vibrant, and diverse.”

But we’re behind two other Texas cities: San Antonio (No. 1) and Austin (No. 2). And we’re behind two other areas in our region of the country: Oklahoma City (No. 3) and Little Rock (No. 4)

KERA Seeks CFO Who’s Fun to be With

Also at last night’s World Affairs Council event, I ran into Mary Anne Alhadeff, the CEO of North Texas Public Broadcasting. She said she and her team are super-excited about the launch of their new radio station, KXT (91.7 FM), on Nov. 9.

But she had some disappointing news to share. The company’s CFO, Jason Daisey — whom I had the privilege of meeting in the course of reporting a story in the latest D CEO — had just left to move back east. She tried to convince him that he should stay to see the new station launched. But he said that for him closing the financial transaction that allowed KERA to purchase the new frequency earlier this year was the exciting part, “like the Super Bowl.”

Be warned, potential chief financial officers: you’ve got some big shoes to fill. According to Alhadeff, it’s difficult to find a numbers guy who is as much fun as Daisey was.

World Affairs Council Honors Dr. Kenneth Cooper

Last night SweetCharity and DallasDirt and I represented the D Empire at at the World Affairs Council’s H. Neil Mallon Award Dinner at the Fairmont. This year’s award recipient was Dr. Kenneth Cooper of the Cooper Aerobics Center. Lots of big shots in the room. I spotted Ross Perot, Tom Leppert, and Roger Staubach without really trying.  Lots of nice things were said by and about Dr. Cooper. Congratulations to him.

In the spirit of the evening, our table was like its own little United Nations. (more…)

Note to Woodall Rodgers Park Blog: Get to Blogging!

This weekend Woodall Rodgers will again be closed to demolish another bridge. We can watch this activity from our 21st-floor windows, high atop St. Paul Place. It’s been interesting. So this morning I checked in on Common Ground, the blog for the Woodall Park, to see what was what. Maybe some pics. I don’t know. But something.

We’re all struggling to do more with less. It’s hard to keep blog populated with good content when there are other matters demanding your attention. But the last post on Common Ground, as of 9:54 this morning, was from October 25, announcing that Woodall Rodgers had just reopened. Let’s go, people. Ask Fingers of Fury to help out, if necessary. I’m sure he could throw you a few words.

What Was Your Most Memorable Halloween Costume? Ctd.

Yesterday Zac asked you dear, sweet FrontBurnervians to answer the above question. One of the responses so tickled me that I thought I bring it out of the comments section. It is from “I Am Spartacus”:

1977. I was 6. Star Wars (Episode IV: A New Hope) had come out that summer. Dad made an awesome R2D2 costume out of a paprika barrel (he worked for El Chico). It was spicy smelling but very cool, just hard to get up and down stairs.

How Not To Buy Tickets to the Dallas Theater Center’s Midsummer’s Night Dream

Based on a very strong recommendation from a certain 10-year-old, I decided to go to Midsummer Night’s Dream. So the easy thing to do — am I right? — was to go to the DTC website, pick my dates, pick my seats, and buy the tickets. On the seat selection page, there’s a neat little diagram that shows the different tiers (labelled as Area I, Area 2, etc.). This being my first time at the Wyly and having read how the layout changes from the production to production, I clicked on “best seats available.” Voila! Next page showed that I had tickets A104-A106. That was nice. Except that it didn’t tell me where A104-106 are. What does A represent?

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Leading Off (10/30/09)

1. The Highland Park Town Council doesn’t need any of your fancy studies, any of your new-fangled objective measures, or your pointy-headed cost-benefit analysis. They know the truth: Even looking at the possibility of maybe someday thinking about eventually enacting some sort of voluntary conservation ordinance to preserve houses in one of this area’s most historic neighborhoods, that alone will cause home values to plummet. Former Mayor Gifford Touchstone says so, and his word is good enough for them.

2. Dallas Police may need to review the finer points of the Lock, Take, Hide program after a SWAT supervisor’s vehicle was burgled. In related news, D CEO executive editor Glenn Hunter will no longer drive down North Fitzhugh Avenue.

3. Dallas attorney Ralph Janvey, the court-appointed receiver in the R. Allen Stanford case, is looking to recover $1.5 billion for defrauded investors. The lawyer for the investors says Janvey’s plan is “something of a fantasy.” Discussion topic: Is it more or less of a fantasy than seeing a fleet of electric cars on the roads of North Texas next year?