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NOTES FROM THE PUBLISHER A June Bonanza

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Our City’s Black Leadership

D HERITAGE IS THE NAME WE’VE GIVEN TO the mini-magazine we’ve created to celebrate the role of the African-American community in Dallas, We decided that it’s time to focus on the African-American community for a reason.

For the past 30 months or so we’ve sent out a reader survey to a small sampling of our subscribers. In addition to the standard questions about that month’s issue- which articles did you read and which didn’t you read-we also ask a few open-ended questions, such as, what is the single biggest problem facing Dallas-Fort Worth? The overwhelming majority of subscribers month after month put race relations at the top of their lists.

I was surprised by the response, perhaps because I only returned to Dallas three years ago from New York, where racial turmoil is a staple of daily life. Dallas, with its civility and courtesy and, as far as I can tell, genuine goodwill among the races seemed almost paradisical by contrast. Or maybe my surprise comes from the fact that I don’t watch the 10 o’clock news, where six people with placards can pretty much assure themselves of eight minutes of air time. Or maybe it’s because power struggles between groups, whether over a school board or a bond issue, don’t strike me as anything especially new or especially remarkable; after all, the Madisonian framework for our entire constitutional system was based on the fact that groups will contend with one another for power.

What did strike me is how otherwise sensible people-and our subscribers are among the world’s most sensible people- get flummoxed over matters of race.

The first rule, it seems to me, in dealing with questions of race is to ignore them. Simply tell the truth. If a public official who happens to be black is a scalawag, say so. Just as race cannot be allowed to be used as a weapon-as some whites have used it for generations-neither can race be allowed to be used as a shield, as some blacks try to use it now.

The second thing is to remind ourselves of our common aspirations and achievements. That’s what has led me to publish this special issue. I want to remind our white readers of what they already know but sometimes allow the 10 o’clock news to make them forget: that their black colleagues and neighbors are exactly like them. I also want the African-American community to recognize something about itself that it, too, seems to forget: It has produced achievers and leaders outside of the political realm who are fully capable of running this city. The 50 citizens profiled in this issue could run any city on earth. We’re lucky they’re in Dallas, and our challenge to them should be to take their rightful place in making this city the best it can be.



Stolen Valor

FOUR HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND Texans served in the military during the Vietnam War, and I was one of them. One hundred and eighty-five thousand Texans actually served in Vietnam, and my brother was one of those. Two hundred and fifty-nine men from Dallas were killed in the war, and another 1,380 were wounded in combat. Thirteen Texans were awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for their bravery and devotion.

That’s what makes me so angry about the frauds and phonies B.G, Burkett has uncovered in his quest to set the record straight about Vietnam veterans. Our adaptation this month from Burkett’s book, Stolen Valor, co-authored by our own Glenna Whitley, contains just a small fraction- specifically related to Dal las and to Texas- of what Burkett’s investigations have revealed. Only last week, a professor at a prestigious East Coast university who had long regaled students with tales of his heroism in Vietnam was unmasked by Burkett as a fraud and forced to resign his post. Space only permits us to give you a small sampling, and 1 hope you will find it important enough to want to read the entire record that Burkett and Whitley have painstakingly assembled. It makes for fascinating reading, and I believe it will be regarded as an important historical document. More importantly, it restores honor to those men and women who gave their lives on the chaotic battlefields of Southeast Asia.



History’s Lessons

WHILE BURKETT AND WHITLEY HAVE been busy setting the historical record straight, others of us have been busy trying to understand what history can teach us. SMU’s Jeremy Adams, UTD’s Gavin Hambley, and 1 have coauthored Condemned to Repeat It (Viking, $19,95), a book that tells 50 stories from all epochs of history and draws lessons-some ironic, some poignant, all pointed-which are meant to inspire, nourish, and yes, forewarn. It was great fun to do. and I hope you’ll find it great fun to read. And, sales never being far from a publisher’s mind, 1 hope you’ll find it to be a great graduation present, too.

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