02/19/2010

This little sister is on her own
This newspaper, owned by the Cross and Patterson families of Denton for decades, has for the last several years been the property of the A.H. Belo Corp., which owns newspapers in Texas, California and Rhode Island. Our readers worry about that from time to time, which is not a bad thing in itself, and it behooves us to occasionally clear the air about the relationship between those of us at this little paper and the Belo behemoth up the road.

02/18/2010

Bad news on the doorstep
Denton finally is following the economic trend of the rest of the country, and the result is gloom at City Hall.

02/17/2010

‘We don’t need no stinking facts’
We were happily skipping through a front-page article about the Thin Line Film Fest when we fell into a pothole. We are not completely out of it yet, and the experience has us musing about truth, art and what — if anything — words mean any more.

02/16/2010

Ready! Set! Go! (to the polls)
Early voting begins today all over Texas for Democrats and Republicans, and we urge our friends of both persuasions to avail themselves of this convenient means of exercising the franchise.

02/15/2010

‘Where did I put that crash helmet?’
This has not been a good week for Denton parents. Snow days may be welcomed by schoolchildren, but many parents are less enthusiastic. Even worse than the snow, we’d bet, was the news that the Denton school district would drop driver’s education courses at the end of this semester.

02/13/2010

Medina vs. Beck: When loons collide
We would have thought that a radio conversation between Republican gubernatorial candidate Debra Medina and commentator Glenn Beck would be a love fest — a meeting of two 18th century minds grousing about Marbury v. Madison while extolling the virtues of Alexander H. Stephens and Roger B. Taney. We were mistaken, and we have spent a little time since the dust-up occurred trying to figure out why.

02/12/2010

Gretchen Bataille in the tumbrel
If Gretchen Bataille’s health is good (we hope and assume it is) and the cops aren’t after her (we can’t think of anything more far-fetched), her abrupt resignation as president of the University of North Texas can mean only one thing: There was a serious argument between Bataille and her superiors at UNT, and Bataille lost it.

02/11/2010

Other Voices / U.S. should press for change at OAS
Since its founding in 1948, the Organization of American States (OAS) has defined its two top purposes as “to strengthen peace and security” and “to consolidate and promote representative democracy.” On the second count, it is failing.

02/10/2010

Shami and Medina: Life on the fringe
Except for the fact that they probably do not share a single political belief, Farouk Shami and Debra Medina have a lot in common. Both are new faces, untainted by the hurly-burly of career politics; both are attacking their opponents from the outer fringes of their respective parties’ bases; and both are refreshingly honest and above-board as they answer questions without the usual tiptoeing-through-the-cowpies so popular with their more seasoned foes.

02/09/2010

Tale of the tape: Paying by the inch
The Denton Parks and Recreation Department says the price of admission to the city’s Water Works Park should be based on how tall you are. The idea is not quite as silly as it sounds.

02/08/2010

Other Voices / New model needed for mortgage financing
There is no end in sight to the federal bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. President Obama’s fiscal 2011 budget proposal said as much in a few phrases that promised nothing more definitive than continued “monitoring” of the two mortgage giants, which have been operating since mid-2008 in the legal and organizational limbo known as government “conservatorship.”

02/06/2010

It’s time to ride into the sunset
Precinct 5 Constable Ken Jannereth has received a suspended sentence for tearing up a gate put up by his homeowners association. We have heard some people say that wasn’t much of a punishment, but it seems about right to us. Jannereth, after all, didn’t turn out to be much of a constable.

02/05/2010

The strange case of Laura Silsby
The government of Haiti claims that Laura Silsby is a kidnapper who whisked children from their parents in the wake of that country’s catastrophic earthquake with the possible intention of selling them to adoptive parents in the Dominican Republic or America.

02/04/2010

Keeping the delicate downtown balance
Denton’s downtown area — the Square and the concentric city blocks circumscribed by Carroll Boulevard, Parkway, Bell Avenue and Sycamore Street — remains a busy and attractive place, but keeping it that way has always taken a lot of planning, money and cooperation.

02/03/2010

Other Voices: Informed voters should be able to smell a rat
In tossing out restrictions on corporate spending in political campaigns, the U.S. Supreme Court left members of Congress with a huge housecleaning chore.

02/02/2010

The geek shall inherit the earth
Robert Mitchell Burke, Daniel Hooper and James Pascoe have the world in a jug and the cork in their hands. At this very moment they are in Harbin, China, preparing to compete against some of the world’s sharpest young minds in the Association for Computing Machinery International Collegiate Programming Contest, which is like the BCS championship football game for collegiate mathematics and computer science students.

02/01/2010

Simplistic views on a hard issue
One does not have to be a raging liberal to sympathize with the plight of illegal day laborers such as those profiled on Sunday’s front page by the Record-Chronicle’s Candace Carlisle. On the other hand, one does not have to be a fire-breathing conservative to see the strain these illegal workers put on this country’s economy, its security and — perhaps most important — its reverence for the rule of law.

01/30/2010

The loneliness of the long-distance speller
The seventh-grade Crownover Middle School student quoted above knows what she’s talking about. When interviewed by the Record-Chronicle’s Britney Tabor for last Thursday’s paper, Miss Salimath had just won the Denton school district’s annual spelling bee. She will now represent the district at the Denton County spelling bee on Feb. 11, where, once again, she won’t be allowed a single mistake if she hopes to win.

Other voices: Allow Haitians into U.S. more quickly
The United States has reacted swiftly and generously to Haiti’s calamity, both with a colossal charitable response from individuals, enterprises and organizations and with a substantial commitment of troops, money, medical help and high-level attention from the government.

01/29/2010

Fry Street dreams: So far, so good
Josh Vasbinder says his company is listening to university students and residents who live near the Fry Street area, and he promises to come up with a mixed-use development for the benighted block between Oak and Hickory streets. It’s impossible to tell at this point to what extent he can or will deliver on that promise, but we intend to take him at his word at this point.

01/28/2010

Commissioners go for an upgrade
The Denton County Commissioners Court has approved a request for new tax-collection software for the county tax assessor/collector’s office. We will trust their judgment for the time being, but will note for the record that $600,000 requires a lot of trust.

01/27/2010

The Texas board of willful ignorance
Being ignorant is nothing to be ashamed of, but it is nothing to be particularly proud of either. A large and disruptive segment of the Texas State Board of Education is not only ignorant — a state that we all share at various times and on various subjects — it is proudly and aggressively ignorant, which goes beyond simple ignorance and ventures into the territory of malignant stupidity.

01/26/2010

A fresh look at Fry Street
If you discount the depressing moon landscape that currently is the southern half of the Rayzor Ranch development project, the most depressing sight in Denton for the last few years has been the forlorn and fenced-in plot near the University of North Texas bordered by Oak, Fry, Hickory and Welch streets. It is certainly the most depressing sight per square foot, packing a short ton of fond memories and missed opportunities into a one-block area.

01/25/2010

The Ryan Express is back on track
Tom Hicks is now free to piddle around with his soccer team, and good riddance. Hicks agreed in principle last week to sell the Texas Rangers to a consortium headed by Chuck Greenberg, a sports promoter with a Veeckian pedigree, and we couldn’t be happier.

01/23/2010

The long, busy life of Walt Parker
Anyone who lives for almost a century can be said to have accomplished a lot. Simply being on this earth for that long makes one a living repository of history, worthy of our interest and respect.

01/22/2010

County considers ‘Pay It or Park It’
Some towns in Denton County want the county tax assessor/collector’s office to withhold vehicle tag renewal to residents who haven’t paid local court fines. Tax Assessor/Collector Steve Mossman says he’s for it, and we’re not against giving it a try. We just hope the idea doesn’t run afoul of the Law of Unintended Consequences.

The definition of a schoolman
Denton school district Superintendent Ray Braswell received a contract extension and a well-earned raise Tuesday night from the school board. He accepted the extension, but declined the raise.

01/21/2010

The Corinth Chainsaw Massacre
It is not hard to imagine what happened when a small band of Frisbee fanatics got permission to construct a disc golf course in Corinth Community Park. One of the lads somehow comes up with a chain saw, and after much conferring and rope tugging, somebody gets the machine running and lays it upside a sapling in the park, with astonishing and gratifying results.

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