Rowlett said his decision to leave KTVT (CBS Channel 11) stemmed from his frustrations with current television news reporting practices.

“This isn’t really news that we are getting today. It is more of a smattering of less important information that is being presented for a specific age group,” Rowlett said. “That is women, 18 to 49. So we are getting a lot of car wrecks and fires and vanity pieces — that is the latest diet or the latest plastic surgery or whatever. But these are not important items in our community.”

Rowlett was also less than pleased about being called a shill by members of the Dallas media. 

“’He’s sold out, he’s a shill,’” Rowlett said as he parroted his critics from the confines of his Preston Hollow home. “That is the easiest thing in the world to say … It takes a little more brainpower to understand what we are doing.”

You can read more about it here. Once you’ve heard Tracy speak his peace, leave us your thoughts and opinions in the comments section. 

Do you think Tracy and the rest of the Shale.TV staff can provide an unbiased view of drilling in the Barnett Shale? Or is it some elaborate PR campaign aimed at improving Chesapeake Energy’s public image?

E. Paul Zehr is a professor of kinesiology and neuroscience at the University of Victoria in British Columbia. His new book, Becoming Batman: The Possibility of A Superhero could help bring those dreams one step closer.

Set to debut in October, the book addresses the realistic and not-so-realistic aspects of becoming a real-life caped crusader.

Clark’s interviewed Elwonger before, for a story she wrote about the DARE program at McCullough Intermediate.

Apparently, ‘Officer Hollywood,” [the nickname a group of sixth graders gave her] didn’t like the story, because when Clark contacted her and asked to talk about the recent controversy, Elwonger said she didn’t think too highly of Clark’s reporting skills.

“You’re probably going to slant this like you did the other story you wrote about me and stab me in the back. With a knife.”

I’m not exactly sure how the DARE story was slanted, but for someone who wanted to be in the spotlight of the small screen, she sure is shy of Park Cities People.

The golf course will also be reconfigured, apparently.

More details to come.

She says the reality TV show was an idea that she and a business partner had decided to pitch a few years ago. The website that we linked to was meant to be the first part of a presentation to prospective producers. They were also working on a treatment, but decided to abandon the plan, she says, because she had too much else going on in her life at the time, including her duties as DARE officer at Highland Park Middle School. She says she would have gotten permission from the UP police chief before formally pitching the program. She doesn’t know why the website is still up and running.

Police Chief Gary Adams was, apparently, not aware of the website until Merritt pointed it out yesterday. Elwonger told me that her job has been placed in jeopardy by this incident, and that she’s been called in to speak with the chief and her police captain. “It was just a crazy dream idea that we were going to try,” she said.

Stay tuned.

Does CNNMoney.com have any credibility left?

I’m sure he’s out fundraising and shaking hands, I even saw some of his supporters at the Lake Highlands Fourth of July parade, but it seems to me Sheriff Valdez has given him some opportunities to get his name and positions out there, and he hasn’t taken the bait.

Take for example last week’s back-and-forth between Valdez and the county commissioners court. Valdez was going to let a crew from the Discovery Channel film inside Lew Sterrett for an episode of an upcoming program.

Valdez said the documentary would give the county an opportunity to show the jail in a positive light and highlight the improvements that have been made during her two-year term. The county commissioners took exception to the filming, and said it could open the jail up to potential liability lawsuits, eventually putting a stop to it.

So where’s Cannaday out there picking sides? Maybe he agrees with Valdez, and that’s why he didn’t say anything, but it just seems to me that he’d want to put some issues between himself and the sheriff, if for nothing else to get some press.

The show was supposed to show “day in the life of” vignettes of various jails, and the county jail popped up on Discovery’s radar because of it’s well-publicized five consecutive failed inspections, as well as the high percentage of female officers that staff the jail.

Campaigns like this don’t really get ramped up until a month or two before the election, but it just seems like a missed opportunity for Cannaday.