Patriot Mobile, stop whining about Grapevine police. Your ‘gift’ was fake and selfish | Opinion

If you really support your local police, the way to show that is not by bashing them for a week on national media.

And if you want to throw a pizza party for police families, the way to do that is with a quiet gift to a local association or benevolent fund.

Not by getting big photos promoting your private business on city social media pages. And definitely not by raging on political shows for a week to get even more attention.

That’s how the politically driven cellphone reseller Patriot Mobile handled its Jan. 12 donation of a $1,500 fancy pizza party to Grapevine police, followed by a week of virulent attacks after police decided to regift the activists’ “gift.”

Look, people give police pizzas every day.

They deliver them to stations. They send them to patrol posts.

They do it out of the goodness of their hearts.

Not to mooch publicity.

If the police don’t eat the pizzas, the donors just say thanks and move on.

They don’t take their delicate hurt snowflake feelings to national political talk shows, or rail for a week about how it’s all the fault of — in executive Glenn Story’s words — “folks who are way left and wanted to defund the police.”

Patriot Mobile can still quietly donate a pizza party anytime to the local police association.

Instead, the company has chosen to run what amounts to a national advertising campaign berating Grapevine officials as ingrates for regifting the pizza.

Basically, Patriot Mobile has proved that Grapevine made exactly the right decision. The company’s gift was all about politics and marketing, not charity.

Story told local radio entertainer Dana Loesch: “It’s a little unsettling to know a government office is run like that.”

It’s a little unsettling to know that if somebody doesn’t want his pizza, he’s going to unleash a national backlash.

Look, I agree the city of Grapevine mishandled the regifting part of this. Police could have passed the pizza party along to a charity without a long social media speech distancing from Patriot Mobile, a city business but one with a strong local political bent.

But lost in all the hubbub is the simple truth of the Texas Constitution: It’s illegal for cities, schools and public agencies to give advertising away free.

The Constitution specifically bans government agencies from granting any “thing of value.” That includes social media advertising generating attention and traffic.

Simply put, the government can’t give stuff away.

Look at other cities’ or schools’ websites or social media accounts. You don’t see free ads for businesses.

If it were that easy to get free advertising, every business in town would make “donations.”

Patriot Mobile’s “gift” was self-serving. Grapevine handled this hot pizza mess as best it could.

Now we see who really supports the police.