A Hypothetical For No Reason

Choice 1: You are best friends with John Wiley Price, but you’re not allowed to correct or confront him on ANYTHING. This is tough since you have an extremely noticeable physical deformity that he often pokes fun at, mainly in public meetings, which you are forced to attend. Making it even tougher: you are on the staff, in a prominent role, of JWP’s chief political opponent. If you DO correct/confront him, your 10 closest family members will either get cancer or go to prison for two years. If you make it five years without doing this, you will receive $2 million, tax-free, in a lump sum. But you are not allowed to tell anyone this.

Choice 2: You get $1 million, but it is distributed to you in $10,000 per month increments. To get your monthly installment, you have to go on every local newscast and say something either shockingly racist, sexist, or treasonous in nature, but you can’t pick the same kind of offensive speech twice in a row, and you must use all three. (In other words: you will be seen as shockingly racist, sexist, AND treasonous.) If you do this every month, you get an additional $1 million at the end — about eight years — but you can never tell anyone why you did any of it.

Leading Off (2/18/11)

Facebook Privacy Settings Are Your Friend. Dallas Police Senior Cpl. Cat Lafitte apparently has a history of questionable Facebook status updates, but the one that got her in hot water was one that bragged about an off-duty altercation with a Plano hospital worker. Note to Ms. Lafitte: It’s probably not wise to brag about bloodying someone, not having a current inspection sticker, or anything with racist overtones if you’re planning on leaving your Facebook page completely visible to anyone.

Rob Ryan Makes Reporters Sports Pants Tight. I gotta admit – when I saw Rob Ryan for the first time, I thought some guy from Ice Road Truckers somehow wandered onto the sidelines of a football game. But now he’s with the Cowboys, and apparently you can make the media love you if you drop an F-bomb.

Valdez Is Not a Fan of Immigration Bill. A bill before the Texas legislature would require law enforcement officials to ask for immigration status. Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez, Austin Police Chief Art Acevedo, and El Paso County Sheriff Richard Wiles are not fans, saying their departments are already strapped for cash, and can’t afford the additional training and manpower the bill would take.

If You Have City Business, It’ll Have To Wait. Want a library book? Need to go pay a ticket? Have grand plans of visiting a nearby rec center? You’ll have to wait. Way back when, the city decided on days workers would take mandatory leave, because of budgetary reasons. Today’s one of them. But don’t get too excited about Monday, either – that’s President’s Day, and almost everything will be closed then, too.

Friday, and a Beautiful Weekend To Boot. Remember how just last week we thought it would never get warm again? And then there’s this weekend, when I expect much of Dallas will be found enjoying a patio and a beverage somewhere? Yeah, that was crazy.

Groovy Time at D CEO’s Power Brokers Party

With white leather circular couches and disco-ball pillows, there was almost an Austin Powers vibe at D CEO’s annual Power Brokers bash last night, hosted by Peloton Commercial Real Estate and held on the 42nd floor of Bank of America Plaza. Along with the real estate pros who made our 2011 Power Brokers list, top execs from several firms joined the party, including Paul Whitman of Jones Lang LaSalle, Jack Eimer of Transwestern, and Moody Younger of Grubb & Ellis.

From left: Chris Herrmann of CB Richard Ellis, Sarah Hinkley of Peloton, and Michelle Donaldson and Harlan Davis of CBRE

Ranking the area’s top commercial pros isn’t easy. Calculating things based on deal terms can be dicey, as people often work in teams, and junior brokers sometimes take credit for deals transacted by senior brokers—or the other way around. So this year, D CEO went straight to the source and asked firm heads to tell us which brokers generated the most revenue for their companies in 2010.

There may be quite a few changes to next year’s Power Brokers list; commercial real estate execs say they expect the battle for both brokers and market share to heat up in 2011.

Grackles Are Good at Flash Mobs

Taken by a co-working FrontBurnervian yesterday in downtown. (h/t to Adam McGill for the headline)

Leading Off (2/17/11)

Meet a Seven-Year-Old Rocker. All you need to know about this story is this: Logan “Robot” Gladden is a rock star. And he’s seven. He’s even been mobbed after a kindergarten talent show. Now go watch the video.

Santa Does It Just Fine. Justin Cain tried to break into a vacant house by crawling through the chimney. Unfortunately, he got stuck. Firefighters had to use a crane to get him out. I think the homeowner and I could be friends. Anybody who can say “bless his heart” about a guy who just tried to break into her house is okay by me. However, I don’t see a future for me and Cain. If you’re going to be a burglar, at least be a good one.

More Controversy for Daystar. Two months ago, Daystar, a Christian TV network, came under fire for an affair Joni Lamb’s husband was having. (Joni and her husband started Daystar.) Now there’s a lawsuit against Bill Trammell, Lamb’s father. The suit alleges that there was inappropriate touching during what Trammell called “quiet time.”

And in Non-Story News. There’s nothing new to report about the cop award situation, but there’s a new story about it anyway. And also, someone decided to fly an Arizona flag in remembrance of the shooting victims last month. But some people were concerned the flag was being flown in support of Arizona’s immigration policy. It wasn’t. And Oklahoma inmates could be reading your license plates. Which could make some people mad, because inmates reading license plates is scary. Except that, it’s not.