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IRVING, TEXAS (TICKER) —Tony Romo evidently will not be around to help the Dallas Cowboys recover from a painful loss. According to multiple reports, Romo has a broken pinkie finger - an injury that will sideline the Pro Bowl quarterback for four weeks. The injury first was reported Monday morning by ESPN, which cited an anonymous team source. The NFL Network reported that Romo currently is being examined by team doctors. The Cowboys could not be reached for comment. Romo suffered the injury during Sunday’s 30-24 overtime loss to the Arizona Cardinals and originally was diagnosed with a sprained pinkie....

Dallas Republicans enthusiastically greeted Sarah Palin on Friday, fresh off her debate with Joe Biden.

Meifert says Republican vice presidential candidate is ‘a pawn chosen to be manipulated’ Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Sen. John McCain’s controversial choice to be his running mate on the Republican ticket this year, will be in Dallas on Oct. 3 for a fundraiser, and Dallas activist Dawn Meifert is organizing a protest outside the hotel.. A day after the vice presidential candidate debate with Sen. Joe Biden, Democratic nominee Barack Obama’s running mate, Palin is scheduled to speak at a $1,000-a-plate lunchtime fundraiser at the Fairmont Hotel in downtown Dallas. Dallas County Republican Party Chair Jonathan Neerman told The Dallas...

Dallas Republicans enthusiastically greeted Sarah Palin on Friday, fresh off her debate with Joe Biden. "It is good to be visiting here in Alaska's little sister state Texas," the Republican vice presidential candidate told more than 1,000 people at a fundraiser at the Fairmont hotel. She spoke for about 20 minutes, discussing energy, government reform and the tough sledding for the McCain campaign, which trails Barack Obama in most polls, in the final few weeks before Election Day. “It’s not just in Washington, D.C., it’s across the country, the hunger for reform,” Ms. Palin said. Introduced by Gov. Rick Perry,...

DOWNTOWN DALLAS -- Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is making a stop in Dallas, just a day after her closely-watched debate with Democratic rival Joe Biden. Palin arrived at Love Field late Friday morning and was whisked in a motorcade to the Fairmont Hotel in downtown Dallas. Dozens of supporters and protesters gathered near the Fairmont chanting and carrying signs. The anti-Palin signs included one that read "Dick Cheney in a Dress" while Palin supporters chanted "we want Sarah."

Gasoline supplies are tight in Dallas-Fort Worth08:39 AM CDT on Wednesday, September 24, 2008By ZACHARY WARMBRODT / The Dallas Morning News zwarmbrodt@dallasnews.com Hurricane Ike is hitting North Texas gasoline stations hard this week – causing delays in fuel shipments and spot shortages. Drivers should expect more frequent shortages in the next two weeks as the Texas Gulf Coast's refining capacity continues to come back online, fuel distributors said Tuesday. But after that, supplies should be back to normal, distributors said. And prices should remain stable, as the major brands of oil locked in their prices before Ike made landfall. Retail...

Latino advocates and a civil liberties group have filed a federal lawsuit against a Dallas suburb whose officials are trying to drive out illegal immigrants. The groups say the plan by the city of Farmers Branch to ask house and apartment renters to obtain a license is unconstitutional. Rental applicants would be run through a federal database to check their immigration status. The lawsuit filed Friday by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund and the American Civil Liberties Union Immigrants' Rights Project is the latest facing Farmers Branch. The suburb faces several other lawsuits in a nearly two-year...

Sarah Palin to visit Dallas on Oct. 3 07:38 PM CDT on Thursday, September 11, 2008 By GROMER JEFFERS JR. / The Dallas Morning News gjeffers@dallasnews.com Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is scheduled to visit Dallas on Oct. 3 for a fundraiser and possibly a public rally. Since becoming the Republican nominee for vice president, Ms. Palin has electrified the GOP base and helped John McCain surge in the polls. Local Republicans on Thursday were ecstatic that she’s coming to town. “It’s a huge opportunity for Palin to be introduced to the people of Dallas who have seen her on television,”...

St. Hedwig has homes on large lots and a longtime tradition of rural living. And folks there want to keep it that way. “We want to be able to maintain as best we can the reason we moved out here in the first place,” said Kathy Palmer, the city’s planning and zoning commissioner. But a new master plan and recently updated zoning maps are no match for a proposed route of Trans-Texas Corridor 35 that would slice straight through the city of about 2,000 people and create headaches for several city departments, officials said. With neighboring Wilson County, St. Hedwig...

When Students Run the Classroom Here’s an easy question: What would happen if children were allowed to come up with their own grading rules? Common sense — not an immediate recollection of the plot of Lord of the Flies — is all one needs to possess in order to know that rudderless kids just might come up with a system that puts immediate gratification before, say, scholarship. It’s not unlikely, for example, that 20 5th graders could put aside their feuds to agree on the following: Homework grades should be given only when the grades will “raise a student’s average,...

Foods vie for best of fried title at State Fair of Texas 04:52 PM CDT on Wednesday, August 27, 2008 By ERIC AASEN / The Dallas Morning News eaasen@dallasnews.com Who will be crowned this year’s king or queen of fried fair goodness? Maybe it will be a cook who whips up something sweet, like the Fried Banana Split or Texas Fried Jelly Bellys or Fire & Ice, a deep-fried pineapple ring. Or something chocolate, like the Fried Chocolate Truffles or Chocolate-Covered Strawberry Waffle Balls or Deep Fried S’mores. Then again, it could be something savory, like Chicken Fried Bacon or...

Teachers give Dallas ISD's new grading rules an F 12:00 AM CDT on Friday, August 15, 2008 By KENT FISCHER / The Dallas Morning News / The Dallas Morning News Tawnell D. Hobbs, Stella M. Chávez and Karin Shaw Anderson contributed to this report. Dallas public school students who flunk tests, blow off homework and miss assignment deadlines can make up the work without penalty, under new rules that have angered many teachers. The new rules will be distributed when teachers return to their campuses next week. But many who have already seen the regulations say they are too lenient...

....Dallas County continues to see its demographic hue deepen....... More Latinos here are foreign-born than in other parts of the state and nation. About half of the county's Latino population in 2006 was foreign-born. That was the case for only a third of Latinos in the state and about 40 percent nationwide. "Diversity is happening faster than we thought," said the state's demographer. The demographic shift already has meant changes for churches and commerce, which both offer services in Spanish. Schools, governments and workplaces, however, sometimes struggle with the changes and their effects. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, for...

Member of the Texas Sunset Commission today recommended 'radical' changes in the administration of the Texas Department of Transportation, including placing the troubled and controversial agency into a four year legislative 'receivership' and abolishing the Texas Transportation Commission, which runs TexDOT, and appointment of a Transportation Commissioner who would be answerable to the Legislature, 1200 WOAI news reports. But Sunset Commission member Rep. Ruth Jones McClendon (D-San Antonio) suggested going one step further. "What I am hearing form the public is that they are wanting to see an elected commissioner," she said to loud applause from the TexDOT opponents who...

A special meeting about Dallas County traffic tickets turned tense and bizarre this afternoon. County commissioners were discussing problems with the central collections office that is used to process traffic ticket payments and handle other paperwork normally done by the JP Courts.

Spine surgeons at Pine Creek Medical Center in Dallas have established themselves as the leaders of a cutting-edge surgical procedure that utilizes a patient's own adult stem cells to regenerate tissue.   Doctors Douglas Won, Michael Rimlawi, and Francisco J. Battle, all spine surgeons, have extensive experience in harvesting adult stem cells during routine spinal procedures and delivering those cells back to their patients to aid in the treatment of severe back pain.  According to the World Research Group, disorders of the spine are one of the largest public health problems in the U.S. and as the population ages, incidents of...

Late-Term Abortion Facility in Dallas To Close - Eighth Closure Since Bishop Began Prayer at Clinics 24 hours a day, 7 days a week ecumenical effort was organized, with more than 800 people from 89 churches and several denominations The Catholic Pro-Life Committee, the Respect Life Ministry of the Catholic Diocese of Dallas, has reported that Aaron Women's Health Center, a late-term abortion facility in Dallas will be closing its doors on June 28. Aaron's was one of three abortion clinics in Texas authorized to perform late-term abortions on unborn babies older than 16 weeks gestation.  When Bishop Charles Grahmann...

Pro-Life Groups Celebrate Closing of Dallas Late-Term Abortion Business Dallas, TX (LifeNews.com) -- The rash of abortion centers closing down continues and pro-life advocates in Dallas, Texas are excited to learn that they're next on the list. Aaron Women’s Health Center, a late-term abortion facility, will be closing its doors, and that's good news for the people who have prayed for this day to come. The closing follows on the heels of recent closures of abortion centers in other states, including Kentucky and New York.

Two suspects offered jailhouse confessions in the murders of a Garland music studio owner and his friend. Memorial services were held Monday for Matthew Butler and Stephen Swan. The two were found shot to death outside of Zion Gate Records last Thursday. A bicyclist discovered their bodies near State Street and Glenbrook in the early morning hours of June 19. Police said both men were shot several times. Monday Demarius Cummings and James Broadnax, the two teens accused of killing the men, talked about what they say happened that night. The two confessions couldn't have been more different - one...

Drivers who get safely off Interstate 35E after arriving in Dallas from Austin or San Antonio have a certain look of relief – like they just outran a buffalo stampede. Only on I-35, the stampede is trucks. The white-knuckle experience helps make the case for some kind of reliever road, even a tolled one. Making that same case has been a harder sell for U.S. highways along the Gulf Coast and East Texas. Drivers there can judge their own level of congestion, and they have insisted that their mostly rural corridor doesn't warrant the major undertaking of a parallel turnpike....

The City Council's Trinity River Corridor Project committee should open its meeting in about 10 minutes. First item up - a briefing on the name change plan for Industrial Boulevard. There should be some interesting back and forth after a city sponsored survey ended in an overwhelming win to rename the road Cesar Chavez Boulevard. We'll be live blogging the debate. Hope you can join us. Also, in the next blog item, we'll invite your comments and hopefully start a single thread.

AUSTIN — Deirdre Delisi once aspired to be a diplomat, and Gov. Rick Perry may have finally granted her wish. As head of the Texas Transportation Commission, Perry's former chief of staff will test her diplomatic skills in an emotion-filled arena in which a state senator has already called her a "political hack." In an early sign of her peacemaking potential, the 35-year-old Delisi scheduled one of her first meetings as chair with that senator, Transportation and Homeland Security Committee Chairman John Carona, R-Dallas. "I was left with the impression that she genuinely wants a new and fresh start for...

DALLAS - Interstate 30 is closed in both directions at Beckley Avenue in Dallas due to holes in the Beckley Street Bridge. Reports described the hole to be about 6-feet in size and covering the westbound lanes of I-30. Sr. Cpl. Janice Crowther said the interstate was closed to allow TxDOT and the City of Dallas Streets Department to inspect the bridge for safety concerns. Crowther said the "significant size holes" possible posed a danger and there was no word yet on when I-30 would reopen.

It appears as if the illegal’s support is running out of steam here in Dallas. The link is to video I shot of the "protest march" staged by criminal illegal alien Border and immigration law violators. They marched and nobody cared. VIDEO

Nick Gillespie and Matt Welch have written an interesting piece for today's Washington Post in which they argue that the 80's television drama "Dallas" helped win the Cold War. Their case is overstated, but not entirely invalid: It was the booze-and-sex-soaked caricature of free enterprise and executive lifestyles that proved irresistible not just to stagflation-weary Americans but viewers from France to the Soviet Union to Ceau?escu's Romania. "Dallas" wasn't simply a television show. It was an atmosphere-altering cultural force. The voluptuous charms of big oil, beautiful women, and sprawling ranches were dangled before viewers in nearly 100 countries, and spoke...

The Rev. Jeremiah Wright will deliver a sermon at a Dallas church Sunday, one of the first by Obama's former pastor since a media firestorm erupted over controversial clips from his older sermons. Wright will serve as guest pastor at Friendship-West Baptist Church in honor of the Rev. Frederick Haynes' 25th anniversary as the church's senior pastor. Haynes, who has called Wright his mentor, is a finalist to be the next head of the NAACP. Wright will speak during the 8 a.m. and 10:45 a.m. services. Media cameras are being banned from the event in order to prevent Wright's remarks...

Dale Hansen of Dallas's Channel 8 News is "unhinged" about the Pacman Jones trade and believes signing Osama Bin Laden as Wide Receiver would be the moral equivalent. Video here: http://www.wfaa.com/video/index.html?nvid=239208

AUSTIN — Maybe Texas’ transportation problems are a lot simpler to understand than recent fights over toll roads make it seem, North Texas leaders told state senators Wednesday. “My first recommendation: You need to provide a lot more revenue for transportation,” Michael Morris, transportation director for the North Central Texas Council of Governments, told the Texas Senate transportation committee. That was hardly the only suggestion from Mr. Morris or the many others who spoke to the committee, which is seeking input as it readies an approach on toll roads, TxDOT and more for the next legislative session. But it might...

Pacman heading to Dallas Irving, TX (Sports Network) - The Dallas Cowboys and Tennessee Titans have agreed in principle on a trade for suspended cornerback Adam "Pacman" Jones, though terms of the deal are unknown as of yet. According to the Titans, final details are still to be worked out prior to the draft and Jones must pass a physical before the trade will be finalized. The teams were rumored to have first discussed a trade more than a month ago. As late as Tuesday, however, the Cowboys were pessimistic on the prospect of a deal getting done. Jones was...

For years, Texas has been planning a privately financed super turnpike from Mexico to the Oklahoma border. But like rush-hour traffic, the plan for a Trans-Texas Corridor is only inching along. "It ran into a firestorm of controversy in Texas,� said Neal McCaleb, a former Oklahoma transportation secretary. Critics have a wide range of concerns about the corridor, which has a key stretch that would parallel Interstate 35. (Another stretch would extend from the Texarkana/Shreveport area to Mexico.) Particularly upset are landowners who may be in the corridor's path. The Texas Transportation Department calls many concerns myths. The department says,...

Some Republicans groaned at Gov. Rick Perry's announcement that he plans to seek another term in 2010, but Mayor Bill White's camp reacted with glee. White has made no effort to hide the fact that he is looking to run for governor after being term-limited out of the mayor's office next year. And Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, the biggest vote-getter in Texas history, has been more than hinting that she plans to "come home" to run for the same office. She outlined to Texas Monthly last November a plan to resign the Senate in 2009 to make the race, while...

Texas Department of Transportation that claims it has no money for roads uses $20 million in gas tax funds to build a park. Woodall Rodgers ParkThe Woodall Rodgers Park Foundation announced yesterday that the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) would hand over $20 million in gas tax funds to help build a 5.2 acre park near downtown Dallas. The $67 million park is intended to serve as a model public-private partnership with a restaurant, a children's playground and a dog park. It will have no roads. "The park... will connect Uptown, Downtown and the Arts District, and is expected to...

DALLAS (AP) - The fourth suicide this year among mentally ill patients treated at the Dallas VA Medical Center has led the hospital to close its psychiatric ward to new patients, and investigators from the national Veterans Affairs office are expected to arrive next week to assess safety. Joseph Dalpiaz, director of the VA North Texas Health Care System, ordered the shutdown after a man hanged himself April 4. The hospital stopped admitting patients to its 51-bed psychiatric unit the next day; 10 previously admitted veterans are still being treated there. Dalpiaz "decided he wanted to ... give us some...

Official warns against hiring illegal immigrants in Dallas07:48 AM CDT on Thursday, April 10, 2008By DIANNE SOLÍS / The Dallas Morning News dsolis@dallasnews.com Assistant Homeland Security chief Julie Myers had some tough talk for Dallas business owners Wednesday: The crackdown on employers who hire illegal immigrants will continue. And just in case they don't believe her, she detailed recent prosecutions of managers. Ms. Myers, in town for a luncheon hosted by the Greater Dallas Chamber of Commerce, also talked about an initiative aimed at ensuring deportation of criminal illegal immigrants in local jails. Ms. Myers oversees Homeland Security's Immigration and...

As the state's population continues to grow in its urban centers, expansion plans for the highway system continue to be the focus for transportation improvements. The Trans Texas Corridor proposal is aimed to alleviate traffic congestion, improve air quality and provide safer traveling for drivers, among other goals. In 2002, Texas Governor Rick Perry released the plan to create the passageway, which spans northeast from Laredo to Oklahoma and is set to total 4,000 miles in the next 50 years. The $140 billion project calls for the incorporation of new toll roads, commuter railways, power lines and gas pipelines, while...

Cars have been a huge part of our lives. We use them to get around anywhere. It might have been the best invention mankind came up with, but we all hate several common things about cars, such as the cost of gas prices and traffic. We think sometimes in our imagination how awesome it would be if cars had wings, so maybe one day we will fly through terrific! We also despise accidents, high insurance and drunk driving. Sometimes, I feel that we need other alternative means of transportation, such as a subway system in the state of Texas; maybe...

Parent's objection led to the motto being painted over at a Dallas-area elementary --- THE COLONY — A Dallas-area school will put "In God We Trust" back on a gymnasium wall after the U.S. motto was painted over when one parent objected. The motto had been on a wall at B.B. Owen Elementary School in The Colony. District spokesman Dean Tackett said a parent complained about displaying the word "God" in school, so the phrase was painted over. But Tackett said on Tuesday, in response to complaints from other parents about the hasty removal, "In God We Trust" will be...

FORT WORTH -- The Trans-Texas Corridor is now so controversial, merely uttering the words in most political circles is taboo. "We're calling it a 'regional loop' because you can't say 'Trans-Texas Corridor' in the state of Texas anymore," said Michael Morris, transportation director for the North Central Texas Council of Governments. "The Trans-Texas Corridor is a lightning rod," he told visiting state representatives this week while explaining how the corridor would connect to regional highways by 2030. Opposition to the proposed construction of a $184 billion network of toll roads during the next 50 years is so strong statewide that...

DALLAS — Four Texas metropolitan areas were among the biggest population gainers as Americans continued their trend of moving to the Sun Belt in 2006 and 2007, according to Census Bureau estimates to be released Thursday. Dallas-Fort Worth added more than 162,000 residents between July 2006 and July 2007, more than any other metro area. Three other Texas areas -- Houston, Austin and San Antonio -- also cracked the top 10.

South Texas is not only going to get its first interstate - it is also going to get a second and a third. State transportation officials knew one of three southern highways - U.S. Highway 281 in Hidalgo County, U.S. Highway 77 in Cameron County or U.S. Highway 59 in Webb County - would eventually become part of an interstate stretching from the Texas-Mexico border to Texarkana, in the northeast part of the state. Only Webb County is currently served by an interstate. The state's Trans-Texas Corridor plan calls for an Interstate 69 extension linking South Texas to points north,...

DALLAS – Three cars were set on fire in Oak Cliff overnight, the third time in less than a month that arsonists have targeted vehicles in neighborhoods south of Interstate 30. -snip-

SH 130 Concession Company LLC finalized the legal details of a financial close with Texas DOT on a $1,360m toll concession to build SH130 segments 5&6 Thursday and Friday last week in bankers' offices in New York City - at Orrick, 666 Fifth Avenue. The actual money flows should occur on Thursday or Friday (Mar 13 or 14) this week, Jose Maria Lopez de Fuentes, president of Cintra North America, told us this morning. Hundreds of documents and over 20 lawyers were involved last week representing TxDOT, private equity people, banks, mostly European, the TIFIA loan group from FHWA, and...

DALLAS — Artwork depicting the Virgin Mary as a stripper stirred trouble while on display at a small Catholic university before the piece was apparently stolen. The print was part of an exhibit last month at the University of Dallas that featured the work of students at Murray State University in Kentucky. Joanna Gianulis, a senior art major at Murray State, said she was trying to raise questions about perceptions of saints and sinners and didn't intend to be sacrilegious. "How do we know that an exotic dancer is sinful?" she said. "What if she has the best intentions and...

Driving down to Austin lately has become a real trip. I-35 is usually packed for most of the 185 miles, and what used to take three or four hours now can take five or six. Flying down can take almost as long, when you figure in airline security delays, more flight delays, and the time it takes getting into and out of crowded airports. But what if it took 45 minutes to travel from the Metroplex to Austin by train or an hour to make a trip to Houston? Advocates of high-speed rail lines are floating these ideas once again...

HEMPSTEAD -- The Trans Texas Corridor may be the most controversial highway ever built in Texas. That is, if it ever gets built. All month, there have been public hearings throughout the area where people have been showing up in droves to oppose it. People don’t drive very fast on Odis Styers’ family ranch near Hempstead, but TxDOT wants that to change. “It’s quiet, it’s peaceful,” Styers said. “It’s a shame a road is gonna mess it up.” The road is the Trans Texas Corridor. The plans call for it to come through here, and with it: separate lanes for...

Report: Security relaxed at Obama speech Published: Feb. 21, 2008 at 6:27 PM Print story Email to a friend Font size:DALLAS, Feb. 21 (UPI) -- The Secret Service told Dallas police to stop screening for weapons while people were still arriving at a campaign rally for Barack Obama, a report said. Police stopped checking people for weapons at the front gates of Reunion Arena more than an hour before the Democratic presidential hopeful appeared on stage Wednesday, the Fort Worth (Texas) Star-Telegram reported. Police said the order to stop using metal detectors and checking purses and laptop bags constituted a...

DALLAS -- Security details at Barack Obama's rally Wednesday stopped screening people for weapons at the front gates more than an hour before the Democratic presidential candidate took the stage at Reunion Arena. The order to put down the metal detectors and stop checking purses and laptop bags came as a surprise to several Dallas police officers who said they believed it was a lapse in security. Dallas Deputy Police Chief T.W. Lawrence, head of the Police Department's homeland security and special operations divisions, said the order -- apparently made by the U.S. Secret Service -- was meant to speed...

DALLAS -- Security details at Barack Obama's rally Wednesday stopped screening people for weapons at the front gates more than an hour before the Democratic presidential candidate took the stage at Reunion Arena. The order to put down the metal detectors and stop checking purses and laptop bags came as a surprise to several Dallas police officers who said they believed it was a lapse in security.

TYLER - Heated debates are cropping up in rural East Texas communities as the Texas Department of Transportation hold hearings on the proposed the Trans-Texas Corridor. It's the first construction project of it's kind in the country. The Texas Department of Transportation says they want it to make room for a growing state. "A thousand people a day move to texas," says spokesman Larry Krantz,"where are these people going to drive? The population in Texas is going to explode by 60% in the year 2030." Their plans involve moving commercial trucks off existing interstate highways and onto one of two...