Two Men Who Nearly Ruined Dallas

Lori Stahl writes rhapsodically today in the News about retiring Federal Judges Barefoot Sanders and Jerry Buchmeyer. It is less a news story than an editorial, and a highly selective editorial at that. Nowhere does it mention that as of 2006, due to Judge Sanders’ social engineering over 30 years, only 7,821 of DISD’s students were white, comprising just 5% of the district’s total students when whites make up 49% of the district’s residents. And while the article touches gingerly on Judge Buchmeyer’s well-known affinity for the bottle, it nowhere asks how his disease might have contributed to a sense of personal grandiosity that led him to overturn an election and impose a 14-1 City Council system on a city that had rejected it, leading to graft and corruption on a scale Dallas hasn’t seen since the 1930s. In other words, the article is nothing more than an exercise in myth-making, praising noble intentions and ignoring actual results. But social engineering has always been about being “fearless” and feeling noble and never concerned much with actual results. So if today, after 30 years of Judge Sanders’ micromanagement, only 6% of DISD’s students are “college ready” it’s not his fault. After all he’s noble. And if 14-1 has created a ward system where intimidation and payoffs are the price of doing business, it’s not Judge Buchmeyer’s fault. He’s “fearless.” Such is the power of myth, brought to you courtesy of your local daily newspaper.