- Wise County Active: 25 (That was from Friday night, the last update, but we took a big jump).
- Texas hospitalizations:
- COVID and Sports: In just 48 hours over the weekend, the college football season was placed in big jeopardy. The Big 10 shut down practices among reports it was seriously considering moving games to the Spring, the MAC actually shut down its season for the Fall, and Sports Illustrated released a story that said the real problem is the long term consequences that COVID-19 has is on the heart.
- I know my time is running out for this to come true, but I continue to believe there is no way we have UIL high school football in Texas. It would be a last minute bombshell announcement, but I still think it is coming.
- Remember that
Florida Georgia high school last week where the kid almost got suspended for taking photos of the crowded hallway? Well they announced yesterday that it would cancel classes today because of new COVID cases. - While you weren't paying attention on Saturday, a handful of Republican chose Wise County's state senator Pat Fallon to take a vacant seat in Congress. That means Senate District 30 is open and will be on the November ballot. That will cause a mad, mad scramble. How many will be on the ballot? 5? 10? More?
- Here's who the West Texas oil men are mentioning for that state senate seat. Stickland? He doesn't live in the district, does he?
- Wise County Judge J.D. Clark posted this image of downtown Decatur from 1916. I think that perspective is facing North. (Those double turrets are on the the east side of the courthouse.) That would have been right around the time cars were first showing up in the county, although I'm not sure where everyone was when this photo was taken.
- Trump announced he was signing a bunch of executive orders over the weekend which would impact things like unemployment benefits and the payroll tax since Congress couldn't, you know, pass something called a "law."
- He signed the Executive Orders in front of his golf club members while he was spending a three day weekend at Bedminster, New Jersey. There's something similar here I can't quite put my finger on.
- I've notice the Wise County Jail is now routinely slapping INS holds within 24 hours on people who are arrested for simple misdemeanors.
- The name of a 30 minute show on the local Fox affiliate on Sunday morning: "Did Talcum Powder Cause Your Cancer?" Let's kill all the lawyers.
- All the headlines on local DFW media on Saturday read that Amber Guyger had appealed her murder conviction. That's not even close to correct. She appealed the case last summer (she had 30 days to do so). What happened was that her brief was filed in the Dallas court of appeals last week. You can read it here.
- Hey, for you lawyers out there, what do you think about citing an English case of "Jaggard v. Dickinson, 3 All ER 716 (1980), 1981 (QB) 527" as your best case, dedicating six full pages to it, and even attaching a copy of it to the brief?
- What if I added that Guyger's brief included Google Streetview images of the street where the event in Jaggard occurred, those images being 40 years after the fact, and asking the Dallas Court of Appeals to take judicial notice of them?
- When this building collapsed, it was quite the sensation since it was caught on video. But not many people noticed this bit of news from over the weekend.
- According to the Update, Decatur ISD will reconsider banning students from taking part in extracurricular activities if they choose "at home" learning. The vote was 4-3 last time.
- Wise County active: 16 (-3 from yesterday.) I was going to ask if Ernest Angley had come through the county, but no one would understand what I'm talking about.
- Texas hospitalizations:
- I'm always checking in on conservative talk radio and there has been a major trend over the last month. That being: The pandemic is over-hyped and is all part of a master plan to get Trump out of office. "Just watch. It will go away after November 3rd." I bet I've heard that a dozens of times. I'm not sure what happened to the every-life-is-precious crowd.
- Trump signed an Executive Order yesterday banning TikTok in 45 days. There's so much going on there: (1) It's just a stunt. It will never happen because he can't do it legally or practically, (2) How's that 20-something vote gonna work of for ya? (3) Remember when executive orders were evil?
- Yesterday, the State of Texas put the kibosh on jury trials through September.
- The two students who took images at a Georgia High School have been suspended for doing so. North Paulding County high school principal Gabe Carmona made an announcement over the school intercom, warning that "Anything that is going on on social media that is negative on our light... there will be consequences for both students or anyone who sends out those pictures, so please be careful." Someone needs to introduce Mr. Carmona to the First Amendment and §1983. This isn't a "Bong Hits For Jesus" type of case.
- "Thighland." I've always heard its beaches were fantastic.
- This Texas alligator tried to munch on a 4 year old , but it didn't work out for him. And for the first time in Liberally Lean history, I'll mention a game warden without dogging 'em.
- This will be built pretty close to Wise County. It will be on Highway 114 on this side of the Texas Motor Speedway.
- Texas Tech's women's basketball coach was fired one day after a USA Today story came out. In just two years "12 players have left amid allegations of abuse by the coach and two assistants." That was quick.
- Over the last two months we've seen a trend, especially in college football, of college athletes joining together in protest about the way they are treated and exploited. As far as exploited, I still can't wrap my head around how we plan to go forward with this fall season by taking measures to protect predominately white crowds by limiting seating to 25% as they watch predominately black athletes roll around in piles on a field in front of them. And it's being done for one reason and one reason only: Money.
- Funny bit.
- Tricked up: I don't even remember the Rangers playing an exhibition game in the Alamo Dome.
- Messenger: Above the Fold
- TTWF? Texas Tech University at Wichita Falls?:
- Wise County active: 18. That's -3 from yesterday and puts us under the magical threshold number set by Texas to be released from restrictions. Honestly, I have no idea how that works. I think we would have to apply to be removed from the restrictions, and then I don't know what happens if the very next day we clock in at 21 cases. Would we automatically lose our exemption that was just granted?
- Texas hospitalizations. The trend down continues (assuming the numbers aren't permanently jacked up since the reporting was transferred away from the CDC).
- What exactly is the plan for Texas schools if some kid, which you know will happen, comes down with COVID? Sure, you send him home to self-quarantine, but what about the rest of the class? They just meet the next day like nothing happened?
- I'm not sure I trust the Walmart crowd to behave once one car's occupants start mouthing at another car because, you know, "They were giving us the stink eye and disrespectin' us." (Looks like Prosper or Plano or your only local choices to find out.)
- Everything has started off smoothly in that case.
- Heard one of the afternoon hosts on The Ticket say that he thought the amount of ammonia nitrate housed in the warehouse in Beirut "would have violated some zoning laws or something like that."
- There are just two places in Wise County where I can use Apple Pay with my iPhone. I feel extremely cocky and high tone when I get to use it.
- If Trump plans to win on the perceived Biden gaffes, Biden should invite him to a game show set in Yo-Semite named "Person. Woman. Man. Camera. TV." Seriously, that seems like a very bad topic to hang your hat on.
- You never hear about anyone just flat out freaking out when on their literal death bed. You would think that at least someone would have a panic attack when death is imminent. But I've never heard of that. I think that's weird.
- I keep seeing headlines that the FBI has "raided Jake Paul's home." I'll admit that I have no idea who Jake Paul is.
- Wise County active cases: 21 (+1)
- Texas hospitalizations. I bet that curve will start flattening out instead of plummeting.
- Breaking: UConn will announce today it will not have football this Fall -- the first FBS school to skip the season due to COVID.
- A faithful reader, recalling a post of mine a few weeks back regarding a white supremacy sticker I had seen near the Wise County courthouse square, sent along a new story regarding the group Patriot Front. From the new story: "The Parker County Sheriff’s Department arrested the three men on Saturday after watching them place stickers on two different signs on the Parker County Courthouse lawn, according to the men’s arrest warrants." I have no idea if the two stories are related. (Here's a second article on the arrest.)
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From the new story
- There's not much to say about the Beirut Boom other than "wow." Of course, there might be someone out there goofy enough to call it an "attack" based upon him speaking with "our great generals."
- A new meme which inserted a 1982 Far Side cartoon into it yesterday caused me to learn that the cartoon was so confusing back in the day that the author tried to explain it.
- Below: Just a random sentence I took out of this week's Messenger from a column from their intern who flies and back and forth to college several times a year. As Ticket fans would say, "Cue the Vivaldi!"
- Sheriff Joe, assuming he's not out prematurely locking up brown people this morning, is still watching the election results to see if he'll get a shot at getting his old job back. The last numbers I saw:
- I've dogged this lawyer ever since I learned he used to be in Texas with a scam of drafting anti-immigration ordinances for cities and then rake in lawyer fees defending them when they were challenged in court. He would almost always lose those cases. Then he ran off to Kansas where, as of last night, he has now lost his second big state race in a row.
- Trump was on Fox and Friends this morning explaining why he thinks schools should open: "This thing's going away. It will go away like things go away."
- Didn't I just ask "What's the deal with Fort Hood?" Here's something new.
- Messenger: Above the Fold
- Wise County active: 13. That's -7 from yesterday. We must have had a someone selling a miracle elixir on the courthouse square that I missed.
- Texas hospitalizations:
- Nothing to see here. Just Liberty University president Jerry Falwell Jr. "posting a picture of himself with his pants unbuckled, underwear showing, a glass of 'wine' in his hand, and his arm around a woman’s waist?" He deleted it. (It was apparently from a party on a yacht with a theme of some TV show named "Trailer Park Boys" which doesn't clear things up one bit.)
- New York magazine is taking no prisoners.
- I don't run into Fort Worth that often, but has anyone else noticed the wrecked car on 287 sitting at a 45 degree angle under the overpass at the Saginaw cutoff? It's been there for weeks.
- Another 287-into-Fort Worth observation: I'm no apartment mogul, but anyone else think it's weird to shove in a ton of new apartments in between the Williamson-Dickies plant and and a new monstrous self-storage warehouse?
- It's election day in Arizona which means my long time nemesis Sheriff Joe, 88, is trying to get his old job back. He's running to be the the Republican nominee to get the chance to face the incumbent who beat him by 11 points four years ago. Thoughts and prayers.
- Trump seemed about as interested in Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick earlier this week as the rest of us are.
- I don't know who on his staff is letting him do these interviews, and he got killed in the new Axios interview on HBO last night. All 35 minutes of it is on YouTube. Spoiler alert: It ain't Frost/Nixon.
- TCU coach Gary Patterson had a team revolt yesterday when he used the N-word. He didn't call a player the word, he just uttered it when he told a player not to use it. And he did it on two separate days. The whole thing is a little weird, but I've bet his players have been looking for an excuse to dogpile him for years. He's said to be a royal jerk.
- It's been out for a while, but here is Texas Football's Preseason Top 10 for 4A. This might be the only rankings you ever see. Decatur is #10. Random observations: #1 Waco La Vega beat Decatur in the state semis a couple of years back. Argyle is good at everything. I went through Dumas a couple of years back and it didn't look like a 4A town. I had never heard of El Campo. According to wiki, it looks like a consolidated school district between Houston and Victoria and has been 4A for over 40 years.
- Ringtones have gone away, haven't they?
- Say what?
- A Rockwall police officer and SRO has died of COVID.
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