10.13.2021

Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts




I don't remember the school funding lawsuits back then, and I'm not sure whatever happened to them. I also don't remember that movie which I used a graphic that was was completely unrelated to the story.    
  • If there is anything we've learned over the years is that accepting a cause of death from a Medical Examiner is a dicey proposition. Here the death is ruled a "manual strangulation" instead of a "ligature strangulation." That's pretty specific. And this finding was made even though the ME also believes she had been dead "three to four weeks" when found.  Be cautious.

    • Someone asked me this the other day, and I still don't have an answer for it: How exactly did Gabby Petitio's case gain national traction? I mean, it was in the news even before she was found dead and even before the bodycam video of her and her boyfriend being stopped in Utah became public.  Why? What caused her case to become national news when hundreds (thousands?) of young women go missing every year?

    • Side note: We might want to leave the father alone. Moments ago: 

  • American Airlines and Southwest Airlines, among others, have decided to ignore Gov. Abbott's Vaccine Mandate Ban and will follow the federal directive.

  • I suppose Abbott will want these to go away:

  • The President's press secretary took a shot at Ted Cruz yesterday, and The Dallas Morning News piles on this morning by including this photo with the story. 

  • In the middle of the night, the Texas House approved a new map for state house representatives. Wise County is still moving to District 64 with incumbent Rep. Lynn Stuckey, but the revised map changes the lines in Denton County to include Robson Ranch and little more Republican area. That helps Denton County Republican voting power over Wise County Republican voting power.  
    New map gets Robison Ranch area.

    First version of the map was limited to 
    "inner city" Denton. 

  • Yet another death at Fort Hood.  The army might consider invading and occupying that place to figure out why that keeps happening. 

  • I don't know why it would be otherwise, but the public access to the Tarrant County Medical Examiner information always seems a bit odd to me. 


  • Is that a Starbucks or a Whataburger going in on Highway 380 in Bridgeport? 

  • I know I'm getting old when a social security story causes my radar to go off. 

  • Big, if true. 

  • Random attorney job out there. When I first started reading it, I was thinking, "That sounds like a gawd-awful job." Then it got worse. 

  • Messenger: Above the Fold

at 8:31 AM

10.12.2021

Random Tuesday Morning Thoughts




 I posted this less than clear picture because a faithful reader had taken it in downtown Fort Worth across from the Worthington Hotel and sent it to me. You know what that was? An "Occupy Wall Street" protest. Remember those? 

  • Greg Abbott announced yesterday that, by invoking the magical "executive order", he can control how a private business wants to decide as to how it wants to make its workplace safe. 


    • This is the same governor who dictated a mask mandate and closed businesses. 
    • This is the same governor who, once the right wing bashed his head in over the mask mandate, said this when he announced he would withdraw it:

    • Of course, Abbott's vaccine ban is unenforceable and illegal under the Supremacy Clause. This is all for show. 
    • By the way, when are we banning the polio vaccine? I think it, too, is "safe, effective and our best defense." 
  • As much as Abbott has taken a beating in the polls (and has tried to remake himself into a mini-Trump to save himself), I still think he wins the Republican nomination next year.  Assuming COVID doesn't get him, Allen West can't win. And Don Huffines is a simpleton with statements like this yesterday. You want to tell us which tax will replace it?

  • Say what?

  • Raiders coach Jon Gruden is abruptly out after more emails surfaced and were published by The New York Times last night. He had six years left on his $10 million a year contract -- a contract I always thought was nuts. In case you want to know what he wrote, here you go.  As they said on The Ticket this morning, "He hit all the numbers on the Old White Guy Bingo Card." And these headlines, even from Fox News, are really uniform.  But I expect Fox News to start coming to his defense as the day unfolds.

  • I'd bet everything I own that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals overturns this ruling from yesterday. 
    That's quite the glamor shot of the killer, however.

  • When crime is down, you create crime to justify your job. This was a sting operation entrapping adults online by cops posing as women and men offering sex for money.  And look at the taxpayer expense: "[1] Tarrant County Sheriff Deputies in the Human Trafficking Unit worked in the detail with [2] Fort Worth and [3] Arlington police, the [4] Texas Department of Public Safety, [5] the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, [6] the Texas Office of the Attorney General and [7] Tarrant County constables."  Notably absent is the Tarrant County DA's Office who now has all those cases dumped on its lap.



  • Don't look now, but the price of oil is on the move. 

  • The new water fountains at the Wise County Court Center (don't call it an "annex") have a place to fill your water bottle. And it keeps track of "bottles saved." Very progressive.

  • Of all my thoughts on the great College Football Saturday, this was the most random: What's the purpose of all of those arm bands? Heck, what would be the purpose of even one of them? 

  • I finally watched Lincoln starring Daniel Dale Lewis.  I love that guy.  And the cast is so large and so great that I was constantly asking myself " Wasn't that guy in" O Brother Where Art Though? Breaking Bad? Deadwood? House of Cards? The answer each time was always "yes."


at 8:33 AM

10.11.2021

Random Monday Morning Thoughts





Nelson Cruz would eventually end up being the goat (the bad kind) when he misplayed a fly ball in Game Six of the 2011 World Series. But before that, I had forgotten he hit a walk off grand slam against Detroit in Game Two of the American League Championship Series.   It was his second homer of the game. That was 10 years ago yesterday. 

  • COVID thought: The open question is whether we will have a "winter surge." Looking back at last year, the uptick in hospitalizations began right around now. But the summer surge we are just now getting out of started about a month later than last year's summer increase so it could be a delayed winter surge start, too -- assuming it happens at all. I have no idea. 

  • Governor candidate Allen West, who is unvaccinated, was admitted to the hospital on Saturday as he fought COVID. He also proved, as evidenced by his tweet below, that he is one dumb guy. And who else wants to tell him that "monoclonal antibody infusion therapy" is made by "Big Pharma"?:

    • Last Thursday:

  • The only thing we know is that he was "doing a stunt." (Google map location.)

      

  • Southwest Airlines had an awful weekend, and no one can get a straight answer as to what is going on. The only thing we do know is that this ain't Herb Kelleher's airline anymore. He wouldn't have let this happen.  (As of 7:00 a.m., they had already cancelled 348 flights today.)

  • I told you the Fifth Circuit would do this before breakfast.

  • This Texas Monthly headline made me gulp.

    • But the money paragraph from the story tells us we aren't sure what exactly happened. If she tried to distribute the four stacks to each different court in a proportional amount equal to the size of each stack, this doesn't sound quite so nefarious. In fact, she could have been trying to keep it more fair than just "random." (Although using the random method keeps you out of trouble.)

  • Here is Southlake Carroll ISD's book banning matrix. That makes it pretty easy to ban anything you want using the most subjective of criteria. And I suppose that is precisely the point. 

  • A televangelist must be running the Wichita Fall Times Record News now:
    A newspaper promoted Bible verse? I *had* to click on that. 

    Yep. Robert Jeffress or Joel Osteen must be behind this. 

  • I bet I've watched every OU/Texas game for the last 30 years. That was the wildest one I've ever seen. (And I had to have two screens going since Baylor/WVU started at the same time.)

  • Video worth watching: The family of the Aggie kicker as he lined up for the final winning field goal against Alabama.

  • Another Aggie video:

  • We all knew that if a ball bounces off Jose Canseco's head and goes over the fence then it is a home run. However, last night we learned that a ball that hits the fence, then the ground, then the player, and then goes over the fence, is a ground rule double. Watch.

  • I'm finally getting around to reading this. Actually, I'm "reading" it via audiobook which is what I normally do. But there are some books where I just need to make my own handwritten cheat sheet to keep by as a handy reference. This is one of those books. 

  • Happy Columbus Day or Indigenous People's Day. Only in America where people have to choose sides about a holiday. 



at 8:33 AM

10.08.2021

It's Friday -- Let's Get Out of Here

at 2:30 PM
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