7.20.2020

Random Monday Morning Thoughts



  • Wise County three day old coronavirus numbers: 45 active cases with 440 results pending.
  • I saw only a handful of people without masks in a Wise County grocery store and Lowe's over the weekend. You're just making a political statement if you boycott wearing a mask at this point, right? 
  • Texas. The 7 day average continues to trend up, but more slowly, for hospitalizations and deaths, but the reporting of new cases is having a brief turn downwards. But since "new cases" reporting can be so sporadic and wonky, we almost need a 14 day average to make sense of it. 


  • Here's a crash course on Trump's wheels off interview with Fox News' Chris Wallace. Even in the safe bosom of his home media turf, it was a disaster. 
    • He defended the Confederate flag because it "represents the South" and isn't a symbol of racism at all.
    • Thought Christopher Columbus discovered America
    • "I don't care what the military says" about renaming military basis. 
    • "We won two world wars. Two beautiful wars."
    • Still thinks the coronavirus will just "go away" because "I've been right probably more than anybody else."
    • After being confronted with the death tally of over 135,000, his response was, "It is what it is.
    • Could not say that the he would "accept" the upcoming election results. 
    • Bragged about passing a cognitive test which is normally given to those suspected of mental decline and includes a question asking to identify the picture of an elephant.
  • Civil rights leader John Lewis died over the weekend, and then Rep. Marco Rubio decided to post a tribute picture of him and Lewis. The bad part was that he actually posted a picture of him and the late Elijah Cummings. He later deleted it.
  • They didn't care one iota. The flags were at half-staff over the White House in honor of Lewis for less than 24 hours.
  • Local radio guy Mark Davis, who used to be somewhat reasonable and objective while at WBAP but is now nothing but a dishonest Trump fanboy on little-listened to KSKY, got stiff-armed by Mark Cuban last night.  
  • Davis has always been a little sketchy. For some reason, Fox 4's Good Day has him on as a weekly guest. They need to reconsider that. 
  • If my early morning drive in Wise County on Saturday was any indication, law enforcement is back to working traffic in a full throttle manner. I saw three (!) Bridgeport cops on 380, two Decatur cops on 287, two DPS troopers, and one sheriff's deputy. All were parked looking for speeders.
  • I haven't received a speeding ticket since 1991. 
  • As training camps are expected to open this week, I'm not sure what the NFL players and their union were doing with their orchestrated Twitter attack yesterday claiming the NFL has not formulated sufficient safety protocols. They say they want to play but are also threatening not to play.  But it might be just as simple as the players doing a power play to eliminate all pre-seasons games this year and that's it. Edit: I might be right. The NFL just backed down to one pre-season game this morning. 
  • A federal judge ruled on Friday that the state Republican convention could be held in person in Houston after all. (The judge, Lynn Hughes, is the only federal judge in Houston holding in person hearings.)  Then a federal appeals court overruled the federal district judge on the very next day. Basically ignoring them all, the Republicans voted to hold it virtually anyway since its too late to do anything else.
  • This is wild: A person dressed as a Fed Ex delivery guy knocked on the door of a federal judge in New Jersey and then opened fire when her son answered. The son, 20, was killed, and the judge's husband was critically injured. The judge, who was also home, was not injured. (In the link, there's a very strained Jeffrey Epstein connection.)

  • College Football: The great Phil Steele unveiled his Top 25 which might be irrelevant since there probably won't be a season. But for the meantime, Aggie should be very happy.
  • Twelve misdemeanor possession of marijuana criminal cases were filed in Wise County on Friday. It's time to rethink that, isn't it?