Deion's house had broken pipes during the ice storm of 2011. (He has since sold the place and most of the land around it to a developer for a subdivision. Here is the home now on Zillow.)
- Yesterday, I had to re-locate to a secure location just to make sure Liberally Lean wouldn't be kept down by Big Energy, The Man, The Weather, and any other co-conspirators.
- How is ERCOT doing? This was the headline yesterday afternoon. What a cluster this has turned out to be.
- Your anger about the widespread power outage is in direct proportion to whether you have been affected by it. Random outrage example:
- The most appropriate headline comes from the Texas Tribune:
- Gov. Abbott was all over TV acting mad about the situation. Buddy, the Texas establishment has created this situation. You guys care more about whether the Mavericks play the National Anthem than whether the state will be crippled because of something called "cold weather." You and your cronies need to look in the mirror.
- No, it wasn't because of the windmills. Quit lying. And Fox News has been doing a lot of this in the last 24 hours
- Back to Abbott, you have got to have a special amount of hubris to lead a state that is as far away from implementing the "Green New Deal" as possible, but somehow blame this current disaster on AOC. And he blamed windmills. That's a lie. And what's he doing wasting time on Hannity during a crisis? He's a con man, but just keep on voting for him.
- Remember Texas politicians mocking California for not being able to provide electricity?
- Here's a graphic of the power grids. We are in the green one that cares about profits over the pubic welfare.
- ERCOT is a non-profit corporation. Here are the salaries headed by people with oil industry ties:
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$814,909
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- Did you know that ERCOT has asserted in Texas courts that it can't be sued claiming sovereign immunity and won? The Texas Supreme Court is now considering the case. That court, which is also full of politicians because they are elected, will now rule against them since they know everyone will be watching. Funny how that works.
- Any legislative hearings over ERCOT, and politicians were all pounding their chests for them yesterday, will just be for show. Just like the multiple round tables Abbott held on gun violence after the El Paso massacre, they will be held in order to look like something will be done.
- If any changes are made, you can rest assured they will be so insignificant as to hardly be noticeable, yet certain groups and individuals will make a fortune implementing them. It's the way Texas does things.
- Downtown Dallas went into light saving mode last night. This, too, will last only a couple of days.
- Below is how not to be the mayor of Colorado City, Texas. I mean, literally. If you write that as mayor of Colorado City, Texas, as this guy did, you will find yourself being forced to resign within 24 hours.
- A busted pipe creates a waterfall in Victory Park in Uptown Dallas. Video.
- A waterfall from the roof at the downtown Hilton in Fort Worth. Video.
- The national level Republican Mommy and Daddy are fighting.
- Because of the reduction in COVID hospitalizations, as of yesterday "Wise County businesses can return 75 percent capacity." Of course, we would have to find a business operating under 75% capacity for that news to matter.
- Messenger: Above the Fold
- This will be bare-bones. I’m a victim of Big Energy at the moment.
- We made it through the day yesterday, but the power then went out at midnight. It is still out.
- We are fine (thanks to my excellent survivalist skills and that Doomsday Preppers magazine I picked up at Brookshires), but this is dangerous for some people.
- I know people in Decatur who have been without power for 24 hours. Bridgeport, because of their unique power situation, is in good shape I’m told.
- And lots of people in the metroplex are told to boil their water on their non-working electric stoves.
- Saw this yesterday posted by a weekend Ticket host who had been without power . . . .
- I don’t understand the energy grid issues, but it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know this is royally screwed up. This isn’t all due to an ice storm that snapped power lines across the state. This is all because of predictable cold weather.
- What the hell is Ercot anyway? And “transmission owners” are ordered to “shed megawatts”?
- Best I can tell, Texas has its owned screwed up grid because it had a beef with FDR.
- How much natural gas was wasted in West Texas fracking?
- Should we add this event to our “Texas is the greatest state in the nation” list?
- The Dallas Stars were shamed into canceling their game last night at the last minute. They didn’t see anything wrong with heating up an empty AAC. They have been tone deaf lately.
- Wichita Falls got to -8 last night.
- I’m putting Decatur officially at -4.
- Tarrant County is closed today, and I assume that includes District Clerk Tom Wilder’s office who has shown reckless disregard for the lives of his employees over the years.
- I tapped this out on a mobile device with frozen fingers. Hardest Working Man in Show Business.
- That hot opinion on melting was posted after the Super Bowl in Arlington was over. I guess we'll see if my observation was correct today and tomorrow. But, then again, we aren't going to even hit 20 degrees today.
- I don't know if we have an "official" temperature anywhere in Decatur, but I'll put it at 1° this morning.
- Snow on the beach in Galveston this morning.
- The snow was great and impressive yesterday, but those flakes were never huge for a sustained amount of time. I don't think anything will ever match February 11, 2010. DFW Airport recorded 12.5 inches and Haslet topped out at 14.4 inches.
- I haven't heard about Wise County being subject to "rolling blackouts" last night/this morning, but it's happening all around the state. They are supposed to be for 15 to 60 minutes, but I'm seeing lots of complaints out of the metroplex this morning that the power had been out for hours.
- If an employee of the Tarrant County District Clerk's office died in the I-35 pile-up because her boss, Tom Wilder, is a jerk who never closes the office and was willing to gamble with the lives of county employees, he needs to resign. It's the least he could do to show respect for her family. (Here's a link to the email referenced below.)
- Horrible news that I'm sure you've heard . . .
- Trump avoid impeachment for the second time, but the Senate at least got close to the 2/3rds that were needed: 57-43. You might have missed it, but for about two hours on Saturday morning the trial almost turned into a substantive spectacle when the Senate surprisingly voted to hear witnesses. But then they immediately changed their minds. This statement of Republican Congresswoman Jaime Herrera Beutler was put into the record by agreement in lieu of calling witnesses.
- If that bored you and you're just looking for an entertaining moment from Saturday, then this video clip is that. I think the Senate was laughing at his pronunciation of Philadelphia. And a very underrated part of the clip is at the end when he says, "I haven't laughed at any of you."
- Ted Cruz isn't even trying any longer.
- Uh, the Babylon Bee is parody.
- Great picture of him meeting with Trump's lawyers during the impeachment trial.
- Local legal related news:
- Random girl's basketball news:
- If you've got a couple of spare minutes, check out the "comedy" routine of this guy. Video.
- I actually watched two movies over the weekend.
- Bombshell - I really liked this, but it's for a niche audience. The best thing about it was Charlize Theron who was a dead ringer for Megyn Kelly. And the brief appearances of the fake Bill O'Reilly and the fake Sean Hannity were fun for a guy like me.
- The Last of the Mohicans - I had never seen this, and I've got a shocking verdict on it: Big thumbs down. I loved Daniel Day-Lewis in Gangs of New York and There Will be Blood, but he really didn't have a chance to act in this thing. I found it incredibly corny with horribly designed action scenes. And there were way too many close-ups of Day-Lewis running at me. (But I did love this line in the film: “I would rather make the gravest of mistakes than surrender my own judgment.”)
- Pretty good graphic for federal judge appointments in Texas over the years:
- I wonder if it is worth investing in a generator.
- That post above was about Prince not appearing at a Super Bowl party in Addison because he hadn't been paid as agreed. It was a disaster in that people who paid "$1,500 a ticket" or "$25,000 a table" weren't told about he cancellation which had occurred earlier in the day and showed up for the event. As outlined in later Dallas Morning News story years later, Chris Arnold was heavily involved.
- There are simply no words to describe what happened in Fort Worth yesterday. After watching the second video of the incident unfold, I was done. I didn't want to see any more. So far we know the identities of two of the six fatalities: Aaron Watson, 45, of Fort Worth, and Tiffany Louann Gerred, 34, of Northlake. The Medical Examiner puts the time of death for both at 6:13 a.m.
- Edit: One of the victims was Christopher Ray Vardy, 49, from Boyd.
- The story was on the cover of the The Wall Street Journal this morning:
- In my next criminal trial in Wise County, can I get that special deal where I meet with a couple of jurors halfway through the trial so they can tell me what they think I should do next?
- Headlines from the last hour: Republican Golden Girl Nikki Haley finally came to her senses and has turned on Trump:
- Anyone cocking an eyebrow at this story? "Van Duyne called police after she heard a shot and saw a body on her front walkway at around 3:45 p.m. [on Wednesday.]"
- Surprise: The government refuses to prosecute the government.
- Random bad cop news I saw this week:
- The White House this morning.
- Dave Ramsey with some loving words of financial encouragement. Good lord, man.
- I can't tell you how close the facts of this Idaho criminal justice disaster came to happening in Wise County in the Lauren Whitener/Aric Maxwell case: A murder/rape was committed, DNA was left behind who didn't match the guy the cops targeted, but a conviction based upon a coerced confession was obtained that put the man in prison. But 20 years later he was freed and the true killer, who had lived nearby, was identified by a familial DNA investigation. The only difference is that Aric Maxwell, in the Lauren Whitener case in Wise County, never confessed despite over 15 hours of interrogation spanning five different interviews. He was arrested, indicted and kept in jail for six months anyway. I'm still as pissed off about it now about as I was last year.
- Speaking of: Time which has passed since the Wise County Sheriff's Office has failed to solve the murder of Lauren Whitener in her home at Lake Bridgeport: 588 days.
- Messenger: Above The Fold
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