Dwaine Caraway Will Be Dallas’ Next Mayor. Interesting story about how some on the City Council tried to oust Caraway as mayor pro tem so that he won’t get the big office when Tom Leppert steps down early (which the smart money says he will). You can guess why the ouster failed. Yup. Racial politics. And accompanying the story is a sidebar of Caraway’s greatest missteps. I’m going from memory here, but I think Rudy Bush overlooked one. Didn’t Caraway get engaged to his current wife but neglect to tell her he was still married? I can’t wait for this guy to run a City Council meeting. We’re in for a treat.
Dallas County To Get Hosed by Redistricting. Preliminary Census figures suggest that we will lose two seats in the state House. Come on, people. This is unacceptable. I want everyone to go home tonight and redouble your copulative efforts. We need babies!
Sex Offender Gets Pwned. Michael Grogg walked into the North Richland Hills police department with his head bleeding. While it’s not entirely clear what happened, it sure seems like Grogg got what he had coming to him.
26 comments
Ellis County will get its own state representative in the new round of redistricting, according to Jim Pitts.
He’s even on video (The Ellis County Observer filmed the Ellis County Tea Party gathering when Pitts spoke) saying as such, so ha, what other county in Texas gets its very own state rep?
Race? Are you sure? The article did not even mention Davis at all.
The so-called racial tension in Dallas is no more. That card has been overplayed. Stop perpetuating it.
I will not subscribe!
@Enrique, here are quotes from the article:
“But the sensitivity of the issue, entangled in Dallas’ racial politics, has left many council members reluctant to discuss it.”
“there was a plan among several white and Hispanic council members to replace Caraway and to elevate Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Pauline Medrano to mayor pro tem.”
“But the plan quickly lost traction because of a disagreement over who would become acting mayor and whether that person should be black like Caraway.”
‘They said repeatedly, however, that the effort to replace Caraway broke down because council members Tennell Atkins and Vonciel Jones Hill, who are black, would not agree to the plan to elevate Medrano to mayor pro tem.”
“And, in large part because of the racial tension over who would replace Caraway, it appears that no five council members will step forward and sign a memo calling for a new vote.”
Sounds like race was a big issue!
Tim, please do us a favor and don’t link to DMN pay wall stories.
JS-
These two sentences do not follow:
“That would ensure Medrano would become the city’s acting mayor — and, as it happens, the city’s first Hispanic mayor — whenever Leppert resigns.
But the plan quickly lost traction because of a disagreement over who would become acting mayor and whether that person should be black like Caraway.”
@Justin: How do you propose we avoid doing that? To a large degree, Leading Off has always been a roundup of the best stories in the morning paper (though we link to other sources, too).
Let’s say the DMN publishes a story about Dwaine Carraway’s first day on the job as mayor, during which he gives a key to the city to would-be bomber Hosam Smadi. Let’s say the paper puts that story behind their paywall and that they are the only ones who have the scoop. That’s what everyone is going to be talking about that morning. We’d be doing you a disservice if we didn’t mention the story in Leading Off.
So again, I ask you: what are we to do? Ignore interesting stories because some people choose not to pay to read them?
Can anyone really be black like Carraway, though?
“To a large degree, Leading Off has always been a roundup of the best stories in the morning paper (though we link to other sources, too).”
If that were the case, you should have been calling it “Leading Off the DMN” every day. My perception of LO is interesting, relevant stories, but I’m less interested the more you post DMN links.
“So again, I ask you: what are we to do? Ignore interesting stories because some people choose not to pay to read them?”
Include a second, free source. Don’t have one? Don’t post it.
@Tim,
If this were an art blog instead of a news blog would it do you any good to say: “Hey guys, here’s some great painting by some old French dead guy” and then show a graphic of a big black square where the painting should be?
“So again, I ask you: what are we to do? Ignore interesting stories because some people choose not to pay to read them?”
I suppose a summary works, I just fail to see the point of making the actual link*. I bet if you made a Venn diagram of people that read blogs (generally young and tech savvy) vs people that pay for the DMN pay wall (generally old and still have a cue cat) you would find the overlap to EXTREMELY small (and most of those would probably be journalists such as yourself).
Tim, do you still have a cue cat?
I like Venn diagrams, and the logic described is solid.
Let me see if I understand this.
Every time FB links to a DMN story behind the pay wall, some people who subscribe can follow the link to the whole story, not just the tease, and the rest are stuck with just the tease.
Of those that subscribe, some have already read the story, so it’s not really new information although it could be a bonding moment: hey did you see that/yeah, wow/high fives and chest bumps/look, we just bonded over it.
Those that don’t subscribe are still stuck with just the tease. Not really a bonding moment, more like handing someone 2 quarters. Still, thanks.
So….every FB item linked to an item behind the DMN pay wall does have some residual value – informative for some, bonding for others, 4 bits for the rest – but never as much value for the readership as a whole as an item that will stand on its own without a DMN subscription.
But I’ll bet linking to the DMN is a bit easier, click, write a blurb, link.
How much $$ does FB get for each click thru to DMN?
Tim, I hate you. I just wanted to get that out there.
No more blockquoting from me.
@nopay: Zero. Come on. If we were getting a dime — literally, one dime — for every click-thru, every single one of our posts would have, roughly, 15 to 107 links to DMN content.
Obviously, you are not going to pay. Hence the name. A lot of people probably will not. And we may change our approach regarding links to the DMN once the paywall is up and running. I’m sure we will. Right now, it’s not up and running. You just have to register; it’s a trial period. Am I wrong? I may be. Anyway, is it a pain? YES. But we get it. I applaud your tenacity, but we get it.
Link to something we can read or do your own reporting.
@in vain: You’re asking for a lot. How much are you willing to pay for our reporting? Because the way our model is set up right now, newsstand buyers pay $4.99 a month for it.
I think I am falling in love with you Tim.
@nopay
I heard they get free mojitos sent over every Friday afternoon courtesy of the DMN. I think that was just a rumor though.
@Tim Rogers
Good point. I come to this site b/c it is fun, but also b/c I am cheap.
I think paying $.50 a day for access to DMN content via FB is a paltry sum.
However, only 4 posts today…do I smell a DMN model paywall coming for Dmag?
I thought these stories were old world crafted and freshly made to order……
@Brent D.: Our apologies. The magazine still pays the bills. We begin shipping our April issue to the printer tomorrow, and that task is taking up most of our time. We promise we’ll finish with our work as quickly as possible and return to goofing off here on the blog.
I’ve been thinking about how we deal with DMN links as well. Tonight was the first time I really had to make a decision because one of our writers linked to them. I’ve just kind of blocked the whole thing out right now because I’m to lazy to think about it. But I can say it does add a level of frustration to the user experience that may not be worth it.
Let me finish with the disclaimer that I think the work done by the DMN is very important and must be financially sustainable.