By Mike Norman
mnorman@star-telegram.com
A week from today, we'll debut a new feature in this space. We call it "All Points."
The writer is a very interesting person. It's you.
We hope you'll enjoy the experience.
For those who are familiar with the language of today's social media, think of it as a crowdsourced newspaper column. Each week, we'll pick the topic, allow you a few days to collect your thoughts and send them to us, then publish the best responses in the next Monday's paper.
It's a cross between letters to the editor and our daily STEW (Star-Telegram Editorial Writers) question.
Unlike letters, we want to pick the topic, because we want the benefit of many people writing about the same thing. It's also different because we'd like the responses to be a little shorter, 150 words instead of the 200 for letters.
It's unlike the STEW for the opposite reason. Most STEW responses are very short, some just one word. That's OK for "All Points," too, but we're also looking for the 150-word responses.
In the weeks ahead, we hope to pick a variety of topics, some very serious and some not-so-serious, but all playing off of something in the news. That's how newspaper columns work: topics of the day, thoughts and strong opinions of the writer -- you.
We hope our topics and your responses will go a little deeper, a little beyond the run-of-the-mill arguments on public policy.
A few words about the technicalities: We prefer responses sent by email to
letters@star-telegram.com. Put "All Points" in the subject line. Time is short, and email responses move faster.
Some people who often send us letters to the editor will wonder whether an "All Points" response counts toward their limit of one letter per month. The answer is no, letters to the editor will be considered separately for publication.
That leads us to an important point. The column you are now reading is about 600 words, the equivalent of four 150-word "All Points" responses. If we use the space previously devoted to letters to the editor on Mondays, we get maybe three more "All Points" writers in the paper. That's all the room we have.
If we are as provocative and engaging as we believe we can be in selecting the topics, we'll get many more responses than that. We'll pick the best for the newspaper and publish the rest online at
star-telegram.com/opinions. On the website, they'll show up under the "other voices" tab.
Got it? Let's get started:
"All Points" topic for Monday, Jan. 7: Gambling proponents are expected to try again during the coming legislative session to get approval for casinos and/or race track slot machines in Texas. The Fort Worth Stockyards and Lone Star Park in Grand Prairie are listed among possible locations for casinos or slot machines.
The usual arguments are about capturing revenue and jobs that now go to neighboring states, about boosting purses for Texas horse breeders so they won't move elsewhere, or about gambling bringing with it social ills that offset potential gains. Gambling is often touted as a source of tax revenue for public schools.
There must be more to it, or the discussion would have been settled long ago. The arguments haven't changed for at least a decade.
Is gambling a vice in itself? Is that what has Texans conflicted about casinos and slot machines? Or is it lack of faith that the promised rewards will materialize?
Please email us your responses by the end of the day Wednesday. And by the way, we posed this question, from "gambling proponents" through "materialize," in exactly 150 words. That's how tightly worded we hope the responses will be.
Mike Norman is editorial director of the Star-Telegram.817-390-7830Twitter: @mnorman9
Looking for comments?
