Chesapeake Facts May Not Be Ones We Need

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram has one reporter who has never managed to annoy me, with either misinformation or by writing something ridiculous or by acting like a shill for the Chamber of Commerce and Fort Worth's Ruling Junta.

In other words there's this guy who writes for that paper, named Mitchell Schnurman, who rather pointedly takes on some of the little issues that many of us in the Fort Worth zone make note of, but which are not much examined by the local paper of record.

A couple weeks ago, Schnurman was appalled, as were many, by the bizarre turn of events that had Tarrant County College abandoning their ambitious, likely to have been quite an impressive addition to Fort Worth, that being a new college on the banks of the Trinity River, to buy Radio Shack's Corporate Headquarters, which Radio Shack built just a few years ago. This boondoggle is costing the taxpayers a lot of money.

In today's Star-Telegram, Schnurman takes on the Chesapeake Energy/Tracy Rowlett controversy. Chesapeake Energy has many people here shaking their heads in bewilderment at their bizarre ad campaign.

Here's a blurb of what Schnurman had to say....

"Capitalism is driven by self-interest, even in journalism, but is Chesapeake’s goal to enlighten the public or keep the gas flowing?

It may hope to accomplish both, but no one should doubt Job No. 1 in North Texas. Chesapeake is making billions by pumping natural gas, not producing news shows.

Rowlett says the Barnett Shale is the biggest story since the Stockyards a century ago. The natural gas play is boosting the local economy in a significant way and is an important piece of the energy puzzle. I’ll even buy Chesapeake’s argument that drilling is worth the "short-term inconveniences" of noise, construction and truck traffic (although that’s easy for me to say because no pipelines are being buried in my yard)."

Click here to read the entire column.

Schnurman's honest, opinionated, factual style is more what one would usually find in FW Weekly, than the Star-Telegram. Maybe none of the powers that be at the Star-Telegram and the Ruling Junta get around to reading what he writes, maybe that's how he is getting away with telling the truth...