Wacky Days of Winter

12/09/9 In is out - Up is down

After reading The Dallas Managed News and The Dallas Observer, you need to hold on to a wall or something to be sure you are upright.

DISD voters had 3 chances to change things on Ross Avenue. They re-elected one of the worst Hinojosa apologists in my district. That wasn't at all helpful. They replaced Leigh Ann Ellis with Bruce Parrott, which may be helpful. Ellis was too much of a pushover for Jack Lowe and Hinojosa, but Parrott could go too far in the other direction, which will make for interesting board meetings. They picked African-American Bernadette Nutall over White Linda Cain, but it wasn't about race, much --

The District 9 race was all about race. Ron Price rose to fame as a youth leader, and Nutall is a "a youth advocacy group executive director". Would someone tell me what that is? Who funds a "youth advocacy group"? What do they do? I've never met Linda Cain, but her husband, David Cain, was a State Rep for several years who represented East Dallas and Oak Lawn. He was very helpful when we fought to put mass transit under Central, rather than on the MKT line (now the Katy Trail). He was pretty moderate for a Democrat, and would probably be out of step with the new Democrats. I've no doubt Mrs. Cain would have been a bleeding heart on the Board, but I fear Nutall will be more in the tradition of Ron Price. Hope I'm wrong.

When Lois Parrott was on the School Board, I initially sided with her over Roxan Staff (then Board President). Parrott's conspiratorial rantings eventually wore me out. I met Bruce Parrott once at a wedding, and got the impression he pulled Lois' strings. He's a strong personality. My buddy, Allen Gwinn campaigned for Leigh Ann Ellis, but I'm not unhappy Parrott won the election. If Parrott does nothing more productive than run off Hinojosa, I will be satisfied. From the little I know about Bruce Parrott, he will make life difficult for Jack Lowe, Edwin Flores and Supt. Hinojosa -- and that will be a good thing.

With the exception of Bruce Parrott, the expensive November DISD election (caused by Flores, Lowe, Ellis, et al) was a bust. Flores is back, but he probably will not be the President now that Parrott is on the Board. Again, I hope I'm wrong, but Bernadette Nutall will likely be Ron Price-lite.

Switching to the County, any day now we are supposed to get a release of some of Danny Defenbaugh's findings in his investigation of the two tainted Constables, Derrick Evans and Jaime Cortes. Last week's temper tantrum by the Drama Queen on the Commissioner's Court was shocking public behavior by an elected official, but totally planned. Commissioner John Wiley Price never blows up without cameras running. Had Ch. 11 not had been there, he probably would not have escalated the drama to that level. Judge Jim Foster handled it well by ignoring the tirade as much as possible, like you treat a child who has been sent to time out and continues to scream for a few minutes. Others think Judge Foster should have had JWP escorted out by security officers. That would have played into JWP's hands, who was trying to divert attention away from the real issue of the Constables' wrongdoings.

It should not surprise you that JWP is endorsing and supporting a state representative for reelection, an official under Federal indictment and facing trial and certain prison time. See her endorsement list later in this commentary.

Liberal Jim Schutze is apparently worn out with Commissioner Price's shenanigans and bullying ways:

You know, I could go into a whole liberal guilt thing about how this isn't Price's fault, really. It's our fault. How can we expect him to do anything but break our ankles and throw water in our faces when we act like such gigantic, chicken-shit white pussies?

The poor kid. He's just reacting to the stimuli in his environment. It's our fault for failing to do a better job of mentoring him. Sure. I could say that.

But guess what? I just looked in my liberal guilt account, and that son of a bitch is empty! It's over-drawn in fact. It's got a penalty charge on it. If anything, I think Price owes me some guilt!

That statement has more information than you may at first read. Jim Schutze once told me "I'm so liberal, I can't even take my own side." If Jim Schutze can actually come out and criticize a Black Democrat, then the World axis may have turned dramatically or at least a little. Jim Schutze's villains are usually mean old White Republicans.

A particular gay guy sitting on a city board, abusing people with your official powers always got a pass by Schutze. Speaking of that particular gay guy, Lying Neil Emmons is already campaigning for Angela Hunt's District 14 council seat. Yesterday's council decision against his political base won't sit well with his plans. Lying Emmons has obviously been assisting/advising/organizing/directing the opposition from Love Field/North Park neighborhood to the expansion of Simon David's on Inwood. After leaving the P&Z, Lying Emmons continued to talk publicly about the zoning case that was pending before city council. If not an outright breach of the City's Ethics Code, his involvement certainly came close to the line. As a Plan Commissioner, he tried to keep developers from hiring Sarah Dodd as a consultant. Lying Emmons often is quoted as saying it is inappropriate for Police Chief's wife to be involved in zoning matters, that her relationship with Chief Kunkle intimidated people. Yesterday, a woman the council allowed to address them WITHOUT GIVING HER NAME OR ADDRESS almost quoted Lying Emmons mantra, verbatim:

Like Robert said, the Simon David zoning case is before the Dallas City Council now, and the Sarah Dodd issue has been outed after brewing behind the scenes for the last two years. She's the police chief's wife. She does zoning work for commercial clients. The speaker who just left the podium complained that Dodd's work represents an abuse of her relationship with the chief of police.

As you're no doubt well aware by now, Randalls wants to bust an existing planned development district to build a bigger Tom Thumby store on Inwood Road between Greenway Parks, a white neighborhood, and North Park Love Field, a black neighborhood. Randall's wants to demolish two homes in the black neighborhood and re-route a street.

Randall's lost at the City Plan Commission, because a majority of ballots returned from surrounding property owners were opposed to the zoning change. But since then, Dodd has been working the neighborhood. Now, apparently, the ballots are three-to-one in favor.

A speaker who was not asked to identify herself by the city secretary (normally they are) told the council that elderly citizens in the neighborhood had been told that, "Sarah Dodd and Safeway Stores Simon David misrepresented them." She said she had affidavits from some who had signed favorable ballots saying they are now opposed.

The speaker described Dodd as, "Someone who is willing to abuse his [Chief Kunkle's] power as his wife."

Only problem: I never heard any description of how she had abused his power. Dodd is a well-known former television journalist with her own name in the market. All I know is, if I told my wife she couldn't do her job because it might reflect on me, I think I know what she would decide to cut.

That unknown woman was obviously coached by Lying Emmons. Nothing to back up such an outrageous statement, and no one on the council called her out and demanded a specific incident. Why would they allow anyone to use the microphone and not identify themselves over a simple zoning case? That's what this was, a simple zoning case. Simon David people are going to remove two shacks from Love Field/North Park and slightly re-route Robin. Whether they got the zoning or not, they own the shacks.

The irony is Lying Emmons' position against Sarah is that her husband (and my friend), Chief David Kunkle is very liberal politically. Thank goodness, Sarah often cancels out his vote. I may differ with some of David's personnel decisions (I always take the street cop's side), but I never question his integrity. One of the reasons Sarah and David are such a great couple is that they both have so much integrity, even if they come at it from opposite political positions.

A Democrat friend with a high level of integrity sent me these links to Gromer Jeffers' column, Elected Officials Standing by Hodge (DallasNews.com, 12/8/9) and to Terri Hodge's fundraiser/endorsement list. Terri Hodge is under federal indictment for several things, including taking free rent while holding office from a developer needing legislative assistance in Austin. Her lawyer says she just has a 7th grade education and doesn't know better. Here's the list with some background info:

HOST COMMITTEE

Hon. Eddie Bernice Johnson - US Congresswoman
Hon. Royce West - State Rep trying to shake down developers in Southern Sector
Hon. Yvonne Davis - State Rep
Hon. Joe Deshotel
Hon. Garnett Coleman
Hon. Harold Dutton
Hon. Senfronia Thompson

Hon. Barbara Mallory-Caraway
Hon. Raphael Anchia - State Rep
Hon. Kirk England

Hon. John Wiley Price - Thug sitting on the Commissioners Court
Hon. Lupe Valdez - Sheriff
Hon. Gary Fitzsimmons
Hon. John Warren
Hon. Joe Wells

Hon. Carolyn Davis - Councilwoman
Hon. Angela Hunt - Councilwoman - certainly hurts her credibility
Hon. Pauline Medrano - Councilwoman
Hon. Tennell Atkins - Councilan

Hon. Dr. Harryette Ehrhardt
Dr. John Ehrhardt
Hon. Dianne Ragsdale -
Hon. Ricardo Medrano

Hon. Monica Alonzo
Hon. Shannon Bailey
Hon. Mark Baker
Hon. Jean Ball
Hon. Deborah Culberson
Hon. Pamela Curry
Hon. Neil Emmons- not elected to anything, so why "Hon."?
Hon. Kevin Felder
Hon. Leo Hollie
Hon. Michelle Luce
Hon. Janice Mattox
Hon. Lettie Searls
Rev. Zan Holmes
Hon. Amy Bradley
Hon. David Bradley
Jeff Dalton
Jim McCasland
Bernice J. Washington
Nancy Hall
Hon. Phil Fisher
Mary Malone
J. D. Williams
Rhonda Nail
Dallas AFL-CIO
James Holbrook
Kathy L. Nealy - political consultant
Kevin Buchanan
Hon. Ruth Wyrick
Hon. Gloria Hogg

Several of the people on the list with "Hon." titles have not held political office, unless you count precinct chair as an office. It is not surprising that JWP, Lupe Valdez and Lying Emmons are on the list. I was glad to see that Councilman Steve Salazar and Mayor Pro Tem Dwaine Caraway were not on the list. What does it really say about Councilwoman Hunt that she would put her name out in support of Hodge, when she knows what she's done?

The people on the list want to return a woman to the Legislature whose own lawyer says she's too dumb and uneducated to understand basic rules of conduct by an elected official.

DISD, City of Dallas and Dallas County are under such a cloud of political corruption. It is good to know that some liberals are finally breaking rank with the bad guys. Surely, Democrats will pick Erick Johnson over Terri Hodge in their primary, even if the big crooks in their party prefer corrupt politicians over a newcomer. Unfortunately, we have some really cold days ahead before the March primaries.