LeniAndJoeTV via Youtube

The National Socialist Movement, which is apparently still a thing, has selected the Aryan paradise of Rockwall for its November 8 rally against immigration and to protect the American way of life. An event notice posted on The White Resister informs Unfair Park that speakers include Commander Jeff Schoep, Captain Harry Hughes, Captain Brian Culpepper, and many more to be announced. Because if there's anything that can stem the tide of undocumented individuals seeking respite from crushing poverty and violence, it's a bunch of dress-up playing douches who've given themselves military titles.

After the rally, revelers can enjoy free barbecue and a swastika burning on private property. There is no word as to whether the barbecue will cooked over the burning swastika, but, these being classy Hitler fetishizers, Unfair Park expects nothing less.

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Centers for Disease Control

Clay Jenkins does not have Ebola.

This week, Highland Park school district's "Nurses's Corner" is an attempt to assuage parents' fears about the Ebola risk at HPISD schools. There is no risk, the letter says, despite Armstrong Elementary parent Clay Jenkins being in close contact with members of Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan's family.

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Trammell Crow

Not only is the new Sam's coming to Cityplace guaranteed to be ugly, it will also make you fat.

A study published earlier this month in the Journal of Transport and Health features some data that you might find disturbing if you enjoy many of the trappings of suburbia.

According to two engineers from the University of Connecticut and Colorado University, obesity -- and related conditions like diabetes and coronary diseases -- occur with significantly greater frequency in areas with broad, multi-laned streets, long distances between intersections and high numbers of big box stores. Sound familiar?

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WFAA via Twitter

"Soli deo gloria" is Latin for "Suck it, atheists."

Midlothian ISD Superintendent Jerome Stewart said Thursday that two overtly Christian plaques attached to elementary schools would remain uncovered for the time being. The plaques, which have adorned the schools for 17 without complaint, are the subject of a June 30 letter to the district from the Freedom from Religion Foundation, which wants them removed.

The district, advised by its attorneys that it would lose any lawsuit regarding the plaques, covered them with duct tape and prepared for their being replaced as the new school year began. Wednesday, the district posted a notice on its website that the plaques had been uncovered, but the district was "unsure who uncovered them" and had "no plans to recover them."

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Pujanak

Plano developers think solar panels like these aren't very pretty, and would prevent sales.

Darn those young vegan-organic-diet, yoga-loving hippies with their electric cars and their solar panels. They must all be moving up to Plano from Austin, and frankly the Plano home builders and developers won't stand for it.

In 2011, state legislation forbade Home Owners Associations from banning solar panels on homes. But a fine-print clause pushed by the Texas Homebuilders Association stipulates that if a neighborhood is still under development, neighborhood developers and the HOA have the right to stop homeowners from installing solar panels.

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Andreas Praefcke

Suburbia ain't all it's cracked up to be.

If you think more poor people are living in the DFW area in recent years, you could be spot-on. Heck, after the 2008 recession you could be one of them. According to a recent Brookings Institute study, DFW, land of the suburbs, is quickly turning into the land of the slums.

Elizabeth Kneebone authored the study. She says the general national increase in poverty levels is a result of the recession. "The overall poverty trend in the Dallas metro area is demonstrating the same trends we've been seeing nationally, but is even ahead of the curve in some ways," she said. "It's even faster than average."

Kneebone found that the population of poor people in DFW grew nearly 65 percent from 2000 to 2012, and that population is becoming concentrated in high-poverty neighborhoods. More than 56 percent of DFW residents below the poverty line live in neighborhoods with similarly high poverty rates, up from 40 percent in 2000. Perhaps most striking, impoverished neighborhoods are increasingly located in DFW suburbs.

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WBAP.com

Looks like an honest face, no?

Ben Ferguson is a conservative commentator who hosts a show on WBAP-AM 820 from 9 to 11 a.m. on weekdays. Until today, Unfair Park had no idea who he was, but we have to say, after his segment attacking D Magazine's "Best Dallas Suburbs" list, we're intrigued.

Ferguson took issue with Tim Rogers' characterization of Rockwall, the 16th-ranked city on the list. It was an innocuous item, although Rogers pointed out the "Walking Dead set" feel of a withering business development called The Harbor. Rogers also included a quote from one of the town's barbers, who said that many of Rockwall's new residents were "assholes," as was John Ratcliffe, the Tea Partier who knocked off Rockwall's 18-term congressman, Ralph Hall, in May's Republican primary.

"Is it not blatantly obvious this is a hit piece on a community?" Ferguson asked a caller. He also urged all of his listeners to cancel their subscriptions and stop advertising in the magazine.

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City of Rowlett

Mayor Todd Gottel is defending a Rowlett policy that says invocation leaders must be religious, but he may soon have to let Metroplex Atheists in on the fun.

Metroplex Atheists, with the legal aid of Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) delivered a letter last week to the Rowlett City Council requesting that they be added to the list of invocation leaders. It's not the first time the group has sought recognition with the City Council, but this latest move may be the closest they get to victory.

In 2010, Metroplex Atheists first requested that the invocation be eliminated altogether. After Metroplex Atheists were denied, the City Council re-evaluated the invocation policy, and began reaching out to local religious institutions to expand the diversity of the invocation list. City policy currently dictates that invocation be led by a religious leader, and that their institution be located in Rowlett.

Rowlett Mayor Todd Gottel is defending the policy, saying the city offers invocation slots to every religious institution in Rowlett. Because there are no synagogues, mosques, temples or other non-Christian religious place of worship in the city, that means a Christian generally delivers the invocation.

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Tom Hayden

The Year of the Bible in Flower Mound is at its midpoint, and Mayor Tom Hayden says it's been more successful than he could have imagined. Since he delivered the proclamation at a Town Council meeting last December, more than a million people from 80 different countries have visited the Year of the Bible website (which, for the record, is operated by Calvary Chapel Flower Mound using no taxpayer dollars). Thousands more have sent Hayden emails and, while a few were angry, even threatening, they've been about 80 percent positive. If he had to do it over again he would. No hesitation.

Flower Mound residents, though, are learning that the Year-of-the-Bible speech wasn't a one-off thing. Hayden is a man whose political and religious opinions are stitched large on his sleeve and on his Facebook page.

"Just because I'm an elected official doesn't mean I don't have freedom of speech," he tells Unfair Park. "I haven't checked my First Amendment Rights at the door."

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Tom Hayden

The Year of the Bible in Flower Mound is at its midpoint, and Mayor Tom Hayden says it's been more successful than he could have imagined. Since he delivered the proclamation at a Town Council meeting last December, more than a million people from 80 different countries have visited the Year of the Bible website (which, for the record, is operated by Calvary Chapel Flower Mound using no taxpayer dollars). Thousands more have sent Hayden emails and, while a few were angry, even threatening, they've been about 80 percent positive. If he had to do it over again he would. No hesitation.

Flower Mound residents, though, are learning that the Year-of-the-Bible speech wasn't a one-off thing. Hayden is a man whose political and religious opinions are stitched large on his sleeve and on his Facebook page.

"Just because I'm an elected official doesn't mean I don't have freedom of speech," he tells Unfair Park. "I haven't checked my First Amendment Rights at the door."

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