5.23.2022

Random Monday Morning Thoughts




A massive gator was found in the Trinity River not far from Eagle Mountain Lake, and a controversy ensued as to why it was killed. 

  • Early run-off voting final numbers for Wise County. The 2,458 beat the 2,078 total from two years ago despite having four extra voting days back then.  But we probably have 48,000 registered voters in Wise County, Tomorrow is election day.

  • Seen in Decatur this morning.

  • The Loving County Judge got arrested for allegedly taking lost cattle for his own instead of selling them at public auction after notice as the law requires. Fun fact: The entire population of Loving County, Texas is 117.


  • I finally got to a Texas Monthly feature article on Gov. Abbott on Saturday. This was the most interesting part: The amount of money he has received over his life from a lawsuit filed because a tree fell on him while jogging in the 1980s. He's still getting payments. 

  • In revolution news that Americans just casually brush aside for some reason: 
    • From Friday: More proof that we've got a judicially conflicted Supreme Court Justice with a crazy wife. 

    • Meanwhile, Trump over the weekend was using his own social media network to repost seven QAnon posts and then went further by specifically reposting one urging a "Civil war."  He and his hardcore followers aren't going away.  (Hitler's Nazi party had just 37% of the vote in 1932, the rest of Germany turned the other cheek to his rantings, and he then relentlessly maneuvered himself into the leader of Germany as a dictator. The comparison is in plain sight.) 

    • The Stormtroopers (actually the Hood County constable's office), are now doing a criminal investigation of the "book review committee" of Granbury ISD for not removing "objectionable" books. Note that it's the same constable constable who previously sent out an email instructing deputies to join Oath Keepers -- the same group whose leaders are now under indictment for Seditious Conspiracy related to January 6th. It's all in plain sight.

  • From Saturday:


  • Baylor is getting "woke"?


  • The event upon which this story happened in April, but it is now being picked up nationally.  Reading extremely between the lines, it sounds like the police question whether she was "abducted" from the Maverick's bathroom.  Not that it makes any difference -- persuading a 15 year old girl to run away with you is the functional equivalent of abducting her. 

  • I've seen billboards in Decatur about "Bitcoin ATMs" and now a Fort Worth firm is expanding the practice in convenience stores. If you want to put paper U.S. Currency into a machine in exchange for "digital money" and pay 11% for your trouble, knock yourself out -- but I ain't joining you.


  • Dallas SWAT bragging about recklessly blasting through a backyard fence looking for drugs. (They failed to mention what they were looking for or what they did, or didn't, find. It could have been marijuana.)

  • Random legal stuff: A federal judge issued a wild order last week in a California case where he recused himself because "I lost the ability to trust the honesty of defense counsel [and] I cannot take anything defense counsel states at face value."  Then it got weirder because he "sealed" the order after he recused himself.  Court watchers were able to grab a screenshot before that. Here's a Twitter thread of someone trying to unravel what happened. 

  • Great and shocking thread about how Highland Park ISD was intentionally turned into a white enclave surrounded by Dallas ISD. 

  • Tiger Wood's pain apparently really flared up after a string of bogeys on Saturday. He then withdrew. Told ya. 

at 8:31 AM

5.20.2022

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

at 2:30 PM

Random Friday Morning Thoughts




Good grief. That's still harsh 10 years later.

  • Rhome politics is a mess. A council member is suing the new mayor over her Facebook comments (No. CV22-04-251), and at this week's council meeting the mayor and the city administrator went at each other.   The council meeting is on YouTube and it gets pretty entertaining if you have a few minutes, and I've got it cued up for most relevant parts here. (There is a bizarre "You got served" audio that comes from somewhere around 1:05.00, then the audio gets bad for about 60 seconds before getting better. The best part of the argument is at 1.18.00 or so. But it's all entertaining if you like train wreck meetings.)

  • He is still at it. A liar, and a clear and present danger to democracy.

  • I'm no political consultant but, if I'm Chuck Schumer, I'd have my sign maker increase the size of the font of the word "for" in his sign yesterday.

  • A Play In Three Acts
    • Act I: Get ahead of a bad story that is coming by calling it "political."

    • Act II: Decide that wasn't good enough. Call something coming an attack specifically by Democrats and that the attack is imminent. Get Republicans on my side.

    • Act III: Next day the story breaks which otherwise would have nothing to do with politics.

    • Encore after Elon has left the building: She says he offered to buy her a horse?
  • The President is in South Korea right now in case you didn't know. 

  • A couple of not guilty verdicts in Tarrant County felony cases this week. 

  • The January 6th Committee now wants an audience with a Georgia Republican who they believe led a tour of the Capitol building on January 5th -- something which he previously denied under oath. 

  • Defeated freshman Congressman Madison Cawthorn posted a rambling threat yesterday, but what the heck is "Dark MAGA?" They worse than regular MAGA?

  • Random killing on a house boat near Galveston seems fairly interesting. Rest of story here.

  • Don't forget that the TDC escaped inmate is still on the run.

  • Sports quick hits:
    • The fight between Alabama Nick Saban and Aggie's Jimbo Fisher is great, and Jimbo is a genius for calling a press conference yesterday just to go on the attack. That only endears him to Good Ags everywhere. (Although Jimbo does sound a lot like King of the Hill's Boomhauer when he speaks.)

    • College football is breaking right before our eyes. One of the best receivers in the country quit his school to go play for USC and a big bag of cash. 

    • No way!

    • Once Tiger Woods has a couple of bogies, he suddenly starts to limp. But it seems to only happen once his wheels start to shoot off. 

  • 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: 1,050 days.
  • Messenger: Above the Fold

at 8:32 AM

5.19.2022

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts





I've been in the accurate criminal justice prediction business for a long time. 

  • Deadly shooting this morning at the gates of Lockheed Martin (where lots of people from Wise County work.)  Edit/Update: It was suicide. 


  • Trump continues to be a clear and present danger to the United States.  Yesterday, with mail-in votes in Pennsylvania having to be counted before we know the results of their Senate election, he did exactly what he tried to do in his last weeks in office when he attempted to overthrow our government.  He explained the exact same game plan that he used: Lie about the facts - call it an attempted stolen election without evidence -- and try to seize power. 

    • He doesn't even care or realize that this time he's lying about other Republicans "stealing an election." 
    • That should be an exhibit in a trial against Trump for the January Insurrection if we had an AG who cared about enforcing treason laws. He has always admitted his crimes in plain sight. 
  • The New Yorker pegged the new governor-elect in Pennsylvania's rise to power over a year ago and explained how he's part of the new Christian Nationalist moment. This excerpt is perfect. 


  • Former Ticket host and Boyd's own, Greg "The Hammer" Williams, has apparently had a heart attack.

  • Amazingly, last night nine Republicans voted against allowing low-income parents to use WIC benefits to have more options to buy baby formula.  The final vote in favor of the proposal to help the poor was 413-9. The nine was composed of a who's-who of nutcases.


  • Of Tarrant County interest: Below is a list of the top contributors to Matt "I Ban Books" Krause who is in a run-off for Tarrant County DA. A spreadsheet of all his contributors should be here.
    Highlighted is West Texas rich man oil money

    • Here is a link to the PDF of opponent Phil Sorrells' most recent campaign financial filing.
  • This was both pretty funny and awkward from yesterday. The moment he said "Iraq" he recognized the irony but he tried to lean into it. Video.

  • I could have saved them a lot of money for the time they spent on that poll.

  • And we wonder where people learn to hate.

  • I'm tempted to go down a rabbit trail. I glanced at a rather innocent looking story in the Dallas Morning News about Fort Worth's Fred’s Texas Cafe new location on Camp Bowie West. Then I learned it sits on the property of an old Steak and Ale -- the same restaurant location of a capital murder crime scene in 1989. And a link in the story led to an article from 2012 was about a court temporarily stopping the defendant in that crime from being executed because the State was medicating him in order to make him competent so they could legally kill him.  I had to stop for the time being at that point, but I didn't want to.  

  • I had Bridgeport childhood flashbacks when I saw this yesterday. I climbed up in that thing many a time. 

  • Say what? She Hulk - Attorney at Law? It's real and part of the Disney and Marvel series which presumably means it is made by people who know what they are doing.  Trailer. It looks horrible.

  • He got lucky yesterday, but so far we were supposed to be on our way to "EIGHT" possible record highs. We've had only one (Sunday).

  • Sound of Music news.

  • Legal nerdy stuff that I don't understand: Did the Fifth Circuit just dismantle the SEC yesterday? Have they gone that crazy?
  • I chose it because of the picture and the Cruz headline . . .  



at 8:31 AM
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