Alcohol and Coffee are your Friends

Wick Allison, publisher of D Magazine, bemoans the lack of amenities in the Dallas Arts District for people to "sit and settle, to imbibe an adult beverage, enjoy brunch, or just people-watch over a cup of coffee." Even the addition of the Klyde Warren Park hasn't changed that. Allison pleads with the City of Dallas:

Oh, beloved Arts District people, how many times do I have to say it: alcohol and coffee are your friends. Embrace them. Use food and drink as welcoming arms to invite people to your mini-fortresses of Art. Klyde Warren Park has given you the gift of people. Open up your gates to them!

Source: FrontBurner.

After the jump, lessons for Richardson.

Perry, Schools, and the Truth-o-Meter

At a Capitol news conference on the second day of the legislative session, Texas Governor Rick Perry made a factual claim about public school funding:

We've had public education funding growing at three times the public education enrollment. So you've had a 70 percent increase of funding from 2002 to 2012. You've had a 23 percent increase in enrollment growth. I think under any scenario over the last decade, the funding that we have seen in the state of Texas for public education has been pretty phenomenal.

Source: Texas Tribune.

Surprised? As Daniel Patrick Moynihan famously said, "Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts." No matter what you think about the proper level of funding for public schools, we all ought to be able to agree on whether or not Texas public school funding grew three times the rate of enrollment from 2002 to 2012. Right?

After the jump, PolitiFact Texas hooks up its truth-o-meter to Rick Perry.

Basketball: Richardson 55, Jesuit 34

In a battle of once-beaten District 9-5A teams, the Richardson Eagles defeated the Jesuit Rangers 55-34 Friday night at the Eagles gym. At the district halfway mark, Richardson is 6-1 and Jesuit is now 5-2.

More photos after the jump.

S2L77: Bang Pa-In Summer Palace

Bangkok, Thailand
February 12-20, 1977

The weekend market is on again, telling me that I've spent too long in Bangkok.

Source: Personal travel notes.

From 1977 02 11 Thailand

My last excursion in Thailand was to the Bang Pa-In Royal Summer Palace. It's located on the Chao Phraya River about 10 miles south of Ayutthaya and 50 miles north of Bangkok. Originally built in the 1600s, it served Thai kings when the capital was at Ayutthaya. It fell into disrepair when Ayutthaya was sacked in 1767, but restoration took place in the 1800s. Most of today's gardens and buildings date from that era.

More photos after the jump.

God and Ross Perot

Everybody is gushing about the newly opened Perot Museum of Nature and Science, made possible by a generous $50 million donation by the Perot children in honor of their parents, Ross and Margot Perot.

Q. What is the difference between God and Ross Perot?
A. One is an all powerful being, an object of worship, the source of all that is good, and the other one is God.

See what I did there? Comedy gold. Top shelf. (With apologies to Craig Ferguson.)

Well, not *everyone* us gushing. There's at least one person in north Texas who doesn't worship Ross Perot and that's Jesse Morrell, or at least he doesn't worship the Perot museum. Morrell is a minister dedicated to "open air outreach," that is, a street preacher from Tyler. Morrell recently visited the new Perot Museum and blogged about it.

After the jump, my review of Morrell's review.

Review: Behind the Beautiful Forevers

Amazon

From Behind the Beautiful Forevers, by Katherine Boo:

Abdul rose with minimal whining, since the only whining his mother tolerated was her own. Besides, this was the gentle-going hour in which he hated Annawadi least. The pale sun lent the sewage lake a sparkling silver cast, and the parrots nesting at the far side of the lake could still be heard over the jets."

After the jump, my review.

Spendthrift Sam and Judicious Janet

Recently, I bemoaned the bipartisan agreement that the government needs to "tighten its belt." This conventional wisdom is just plain wrong. I pointed to a column by economist Paul Krugman to explain why.

Apparently, some readers had trouble understanding how inflation and debt can sometimes work to our advantage (and by some readers I mean one in particular). Admittedly, it's counter-intuitive. If government debt contributed to our economic stagnation, how can more government debt get us going again?

After the jump, my attempt at paraphrasing Krugman's argument.

S2L77: Ayutthaya

From 1977 02 11 Thailand

Before there was Bangkok, there was Ayutthaya. The city was founded in 1350 and was the capital of Thailand until sacked by the Burmese in 1767, after which the Thai capital was moved to Bangkok. In recent decades, the ruins of Ayutthaya have been undergoing excavation and restoration. It was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1981, four years after my visit.

More photos after the jump.

Straus versus Perry

The opening of the biennial Texas legislative session featured two speeches that could influence what issues the legislature focuses on. Paul Burka of The Texas Monthly highlights the tension between those two speeches.

After the jump, my own take.

Weak Tea in District 102

Two years ago, newly elected Texas state representative Stefani Carter pissed off local Tea Party activists with her support for establishment figure Joe Straus for Speaker of the Texas House. The Dallas Morning News had the story in November, 2010. Carter's support for Straus cost her "TeaApproved" status from the North Texas Tea Party. The Texas Tribune had the story in January, 2011.

It wasn't just that Carter supported Straus (although that would have been bad enough for the Tea Party). It was that, in the Tea Party's view, in public Carter was professing to be uncommitted, but in private she was pledging her support to Joe Straus. As the North Texas Tea Party put it, "Stefani Carter has no problem talking out of both sides of her mouth."

Two years later, where do things stand? After the jump, let's catch up.