1.13.2020

Random Monday Morning Thoughts




  • Oh, one thing I forgot to add to my otherwise perfect weather forecast on Friday: "And, I promise you, we will have a freak snow storm on Saturday morning. Huge flakes. Might even be a couple of inches."  I can't believe I left that out. Thanks.
  • You've probably seen the crazy video footage of gunshots ringing out at a south Dallas high school basketball game but, if you haven't, hear ya go. 
  • Best Picture nominees were just announced. 
  • It was 70 degrees yesterday in D.C. 
  • Jimmy Johnson learned he will be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame last night. I knew they normally announced the inductees during the Super Bowl week so I wasn't sure what was going on. Here's the deal: This year there will be a Centennial Class of 15 people in addition to five regular inductees. Yep, twenty people will go into the Hall of Fame in 2020.  That kind of cheapens it. (Side note: How is Dan Reeves not in and Jimmy is?)
    • Mrs. LL was watching Jimmy's reaction on TV last night more than me, and she blurted out, "Who's that guy with the huge hands!?"  She was referring to the Fake Babe Ruth representing the Hall. 
  • This headline got my attention because it wouldn't surprise me, but I don't think it's accurate. The story says, "In 1999, the number of death certificates mentioning alcohol was 35,914. That number jumped to nearly 73,000 in 2017."  Yes, that's doubled but that doesn't tell us much, does it? How many more deaths in general did we have in 2017? We need a per capita number before we can say "doubled." 
  • I'm surprised Trump doesn't build a monument to this guy. He checks all the boxes. 

  • From the Star-Telegram: "A Tarrant County district judge is putting vulnerable children at risk by reversing a longtime practice of appointing volunteers to advocate for them as they move through the child welfare system, a group that trains the workers alleges."  That may or may not be true. What is true is that a district judge, Alex Kim, is taking a stand about the use of CASA volunteers to be involved in CPS cases. He questions why people who couldn't officially be a party to a lawsuit are allowed access to unredacted CPS reports -- something even parents aren't allowed to see. That's a bold move. And politically unpopular. You don't see judges, who are elected, take stands like that very often.
  • I've got a lot of questions about this problem a former Fox 4 gal is having.
  • "Businessman" is the most generic term ever invented. 
  • Oh, my. Has their been a documentary about the street performers on the Hollywood Walk of Fame? I don't think this is the first wheels off story. 
  • Every now and then I think about the crazy Super Conducting Super Collider which is buried in North Texas. 
  • Messenger: Above The Fold.
(They are talking about us in that textbook story.)

at 8:29 AM

1.10.2020

It's Friday. Let's Get Out Of There.






at 2:30 PM

Random Friday Morning Thoughts



  • Obviously you are here for a Wise County weather forecast because you can't trust those snake-oil salesmen in the big city.  I'm you man. I've been in the lab all night. 
    • First, the temperature: This weirdly warm temperature we have right now will last all day. Around 9:10 p.m., you'll begin to feel the winds shift to the north and then temperatures will plummet. You wake up at tomorrow morning with temperatures at or below freezing, it'll be cloudy, and winds will be gusting. It'll crack into the low 40s tomorrow afternoon but, with the high winds, basically all of tomorrow is miserable. But winds will almost completely disappear tomorrow evening.
    • Now the rain. I think it'll start before noon today, but then hard stuff will come down all afternoon. It will begin to taper off around 5:00, but it'll still rain somewhat into the early evening.
    • Largemouth bass are good near boat docks using spinners, rattletraps, and Alabama rigs.
  • Five people just "happened" to call on the same day? He didn't name them last night. (And this is possibly in response to the Lincoln Project's first commercial which is a little NSFW.)
  • Mike Leach coaching at Mississippi State is fantastic. I don't wan't him coaching my team, but I like him coaching a team I can root for.  (I think I finally became fascinated with him when he went on the insane "fat little girlfriends" rant while at Tech.)
    Video here.
  • This map is fascinating. I'm not saying I could point out the exact location of Iran, but I at least would put a pin in the Middle East.  But who are those people who thought Iran was in Australia, near Memphis, or in the middle of the ocean?
  • It's a little weird: On Tuesday morning I mentioned, for no reason at all, that the U.S. shot down an Iranian civilian airliner in 1988.  Then twelve hours later Iran shoots down a civilian airliner. 
  • A Boyd assistant principal has been arrested for Intoxication Manslaughter. (As an extreme side note: This is the first week on the job for Boyd's new superintendent Tamara Vardy. Think she expected to deal with something like this?)
  • On my D.C. trip, I located and walked by Jeff Bezo's new house he bought for $23 million and then renovated. (You pay $23 million for a fixer-upper?) Anyway, I found this shot of it from a story yesterday. It's a view from the house across the street which he also just bought for $5 million.
    I think he actually first bought that one and one of those beside it.
  • "And I promise you Mexico is going to pay for it" in 2016 really meant, "I'm going to declare a fake State of Emergency and steal from the Department of Defense and then declare it a victory in 2020."
  • Random Vanna White trivia: "White dated Playgirl centerfold/Chippendales-dancer-turned-actor John Gibson in the 1980s, and they eventually became engaged. In 1986, Gibson was killed in a plane crash."


at 8:30 AM

1.09.2020

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts



  • It was weird seeing Republican senators standing up to Trump yesterday after getting a very poor military briefing.  But they forgot that they don't question The Party and that The Party is now Donald Trump. (Mike Pence was doing damage control on Fox and Friends this morning with the "just trust us" defense.)
  • Oh, my.
  • The Tarrant County DA is taking a leave of absence for an unknown length because of an unknown medical condition.
  • Speaking of, 2020 didn't start off too well for the Tarrant County DA Misdemeanor section.
  • TCU's basketball program has received a Notice of Infractions from the NCAA which is weird because the program hasn't been very good.
  • I'm want this former Bridgeport gal's press agent. Story.
  • Who would have thought that a totally unqualified politician would be appointed to the head the Department of Energy, would then do nothing at that job for two years, then resign, and then start profiting off of the gig?
  • That Houston drug raid, where cops made up information to get a search warrant and then murdered an innocent couple and their dog while executing it, continues to break new ground. I have never heard of a grand jury visiting a crime scene. 
  • The Southlake twitter feed is doing bits again this year.  I'll say it again: It's funny and clever, but one of these days they are going to get it wrong and simply slapping "allegedly" in one tweet isn't going to cost their ampletaxpayer base a pretty penny. Complete thread here. (But I'll agree those are good security cameras, though.) 

  • In more serious Southlake news, a high school senior was struck and killed by a car last night. 
  • Puerto Rico has been rocked by earthquakes that have left 2/3 of the island without electricity. Trump has tweeted about it once. I don't have to state the obvious reason why.  
  • I always dog the Texas criminal defense organization's "Trial Tip Thursday" and they didn't disappoint today. Sure, your guy has just been found guilty and the victim is now testifying about the impact of the crime as the jury is about to decide punishment, but, go ahead, tell her she's not "healing" the right way. That couldn't possibly backfire, right? 
  • A New York Times columnist raised some eyebrows yesterday when he tweeted the following. He later deleted it, but the Internet didn't seem to believe his claim.
  • This license plate was issued to a Fort Worth man and then revoked. 
  • I didn't mention that the contempt proceeding against the Dallas DA for allegedly violating the "gag order" in the Amber Guyger trial was dismissed because, quite frankly, I don't understand any of it. I don't understand why it has to be prosecuted by outside counsel, and I don't understand why the DA's office couldn't fight it themselves but had to bring in a ridiculously high priced lawyer at taxpayer's expense. And I don't understand how "gag orders" are constitutional -- an issue currently before the Texas Supreme Court, by the way. 


at 8:30 AM

1.08.2020

Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts



  • Well, Iran launched missiles at American bases in Iraq that either were poorly aimed or intentionally slightly off target or we had warning they were coming and got everyone outof harm's way. In any event, everyone needs to take a deep breath. 
  • Then again, when both sides are battling like children on Twitter, we probably have something to worry about. 
    After the killing of Soleimani

    After last night's strike
  • It's ih-RAHN, not eye-RAN. It's ih-RAHK, not eye-RACK.
  • Ten thousand a minute? Just from Iran? The governor is lying again. (But the Texas Agricultural site was briefly "hacked" with an image referencing Iran, but a child could hack any site headed by Sid Miller.)
  • Ok, the case below is proof positive that the recent unintentional revision to Texas' marijuana law is a game changer.
    From the Texas Tribune (They get mad at me when I don't reference them.)
    • To recap, before the law changed law May, any usable amount of marijuana was a crime.  Well, the law changed to say it's only marijuana if there is over 0.3% THC in it. But you can't just look at the weed and readily determine whether its illegal weed (greater than 0.3%) or not (less than 0.3%). Yep, now it is turning out that any given marijuana case might not involve any marijuana at all.  And the government put this guy in jail for a month on a hunch. A hunch that was wrong. 
    • And that story just involves the problems with even deciding to arrest someone. Practically speaking, the next step of prosecuting the cases has become a nightmare as well because every misdemeanor weed case will now absolutely need a lab report. There's no more, "Oh, come on. We all know weed on the street has over 0.3% of THC in it so just have your guy admit it and take my generous plea bargain." Nope. We absolutely don't know if it has over 0.3% THC in it. Heck, how can a defendant even know the chemical make-up of his weed? Nope. Get a lab report. And that costs money. No, that costs your tax-payer money, and that expense can't be justified.  It's now a law which is impossible to enforce and de facto legalization in Texas has occurred as soon as everyone realizes it. 
    • Think I'm wrong? This is from earlier this week: 
  • I referenced the DPS troopers shooting the guy in South Dallas 16 times yesterday. Now the Dallas Morning News has obtained the dashcam and bodycam videos. It's on YouTube here. The guy jumped out of his car in a driveway and was running to a home, and he did in fact have a gun.  But look how this all started: The soon-to-be dead man didn't signal on a quiet residential street. There is no way a Dallas Police officer even thinks about making a traffic stop in the first place. 
  • This story is even crazier than the headline. And the victim's name was Kevin Bacon. 

  • Baylor's Matt Rhule is headed to the Carolina Panthers. It's amazing what he did for Baylor, and I'll always be thankful, but he started looking to leave for greener pastures after his very first season. There was always something unsettling of having a coach who made it clear he was looking to get out. But it amazingly never impacted recruiting or the effort on the field. 
  • I love wheels off election stories, and we have one out of Houston where a sitting district judge got kicked off the ballot because he paid a $1,500 filing fee instead of the required $2,500.
  • I love this new rule for the XFL.  I truly don't know which one I'd choose. The risk v. reward all seem to even out to me. 
  • There is no greater waste of money whenever any sizable government entity awards a big contract. This headline alone got my attention -- paying almost $2 million just to get people interested in the census? You kidding me? But then I saw this paragraph!: "As part of the deal, [Sophia Johnson 's] Alpha Business Images will pay nearly $400,000 to a subcontractor, JBJ Management, for outreach to the Asian American and African American communities. JBJ Management is owned by Johnson’s husband, Willis Johnson."
  • There's an "And Another" out of out own little Paradise, Texas which might involve the most underwhelming facts as far as "And Anothers" go. It is on . . . 
  • Messenger: Above the Fold


at 8:30 AM
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