Random Thursday Morning Thoughts

The spot for the new Fuzzy's was getting a paint job 10 years ago. I don't ever remember it being that bright -- it doesn't look that way now. 

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• We flirted with it darkness and no a/c for a bit yesterday, but made it another day. Texas!
  
  
  
• The fact that so many people were so naïve that they couldn't believe the 10 year old pregnancy/travel to another state to get an abortion story is really amazing.  And even if that particular story turned out to be untrue (we learned yesterday it wasn't), the exact same thing will happen again somewhere this week or this month. Guaranteed.
  
  
  
•  Earlier yesterday, before the story broke, the Wall Street Journal declared it false:
  
  
  
• Congressman Jim Jordan had to delete this.
  
  
  
• ESPN's Clay Travis had a hot sports opinion about it to (below) which he completely retracted yesterday.
  
  
  
• The Hood County Sheriff's Office tells us we need to turn to Jesus in an official Facebook post.  I know so many people that see nothing wrong with this, and it blows my mind. 
  
  
  
• Excerpt on Facebook:
  
  
  
• Hey, I'm no defender of Trump but just attempting to call a witness, but not making contact, is not witness tampering.  It's not even attempted witness tampering.   I wouldn't recommend it, but people are getting way too bent out of shape about it.
  
  
  
• I don't think I've ever posted anything from the right wing Daily Caller, but they reported yesterday that, in fact, Mexico was going to pay for it.
  
  
  
• I'm still watching that mysterious mass death at a bar in South Africa. The bar owner was arrested yesterday but it wasn't for causing the deaths, but just for providing alcohol to minors.  The "poisoning" angle is still out there because "South African investigators have since ruled out the stampede theory." But the more I read it seems like you can rule out the phenomenon where people get so packed in together that their chests can's expand and they suffocate. In that scenario, the bodies show no signs of being "trampled" at all. 
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Well this is awful.  A camal walking on Chisholm Trail Parkway south of Fort Worth was hit and killed by a car.  No one knows exactly where it came from.
  
  
  
• I just finished this book which was peculiarly different but good.  It's really three short books in one: A guy killing multiple people in Alabama in a crazy insurance scam, the liberal Southern lawyer who represented him, and Harper Lee going back home to spend years researching a book about it all which was never written (or at least published).
  
  
  
• I'm proclaiming yesterday as one of the slowest news days of the year.
  
  
  

Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts

I ended up being wrong about it being a murder. The name was John Rodman Steele if you want to go down that rabbit hole.

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• Moments ago. Ugh. 
  
  
  
• More video was released late yesterday from the debacle in Uvalde, and it was worse than what you expected.  A four minute edit is here. The full 1 hour and 22 minute video is here. 
  

  

  
  
  
  
• I think this frame from the beginning of the video might stick with me forever. Good gawd. 
  
  
  
• The reaction and response of police was shown to be, like we knew, horrible. It doesn't look like anyone was in charge, and certainly no one was willing to act. Hand sanitizer should not be on your priority list. 

  

  
  

  
  
• Looking at the lock screen of the Punisher while children are being slaughtered is not a good look. 
  
  
  
• The January 6th hearing yesterday revealed that Trump had planned all along for the mob to march to the Capitol to stop Congress from certifying the electoral votes. It was a pre-planned coup.
• A tweet announcing the planned march down Pennsylvania Avenue was drafted but not sent. 
  
  
  
• Why was it not sent? It was decided that an announcement during Trump's speech would have more of an impact. The My Pillow guy was in on the plan. "Kremer" below is Kyle Kremer who was a major organizer of the rally. 
  
  
  
• And why did Steve Bannon announce to his podcast audience on January 5th that "all hell was going to break loose" the next day? He had inside information. Trump and Bannon talked on the phone at 8:53 a.m. for 11 minutes on January 5th according to phone logs.
  
  
  
• And this nutcase actually believed she was appointed as Special Counsel to Trump. And from the way the unhinged meeting sounds, she just might have been. 
  
  

  

  Worst Dr. Pepper commercial ever. 
  
  
• Random throw away thought:  I'm going to end up buying that panda art in the background before all is said and done. It has really grown on me. Or maybe it's just the feeling I get from hearing this guy talk about all the lunacy that was surrounding Trump in the final days. 
  
  
  
• Twitter officially sued Elon Musk yesterday. And, as predicted, they don't want the $1 billion penalty fee but, instead, they want him to buy the company for the $44 billion he promised. 
  
  
  
  
  
  
• I wondered about this possibility when those fires broke out.  Teenagers and houses under construction can be a bad mix. 
  
  
  
• These are the faces of new federal judge nominees announced yesterday. And they will all be confirmed. 
  
  
  
• Very nerdy legal stuff: This excerpt from a concurrence in an otherwise forgettable Fifth Circuit opinion from two days ago is 100% true. 
  
  
  
• I'm coming back to this quote but in this form. I might print it and frame it. 
  
  
  
  
• Messenger: Above the Fold

Acknowledgment: Liberally Lean Might Not Be Loading and/or Crashing Some Browsers

 My crack team of System Engineers is tearing the place apart trying to find the problem. It might be limited to tablets and, specifically, iPads but I'm not even sure about that. But it appears that Windows is not impacted. 

Edit: It's possible that something I embedded, which I normally wouldn't, is causing the lockdown in Apple operating systems. (Someone also mentioned that a Macbook Air won't load the page either.)

 I deleted an animated gif from July 4th to try and solve it. 

I took down last Friday's "Let's Get Out of Here" since the problem seemed to develop after that.

Developing . . .

Random Tuesday Morning Thoughts

Ten years ago we still hadn't had the runoff election between Ted Cruz and David Dewhurst, but this was the first sign that Cruz might actually win.  (Dewhurst had been attacking Cruz for doing legal work for a Chinese outfit. I thought that was stupid and was backfiring, but now I doubt that had much to do with it.)

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• I don't think Abbott and DPS are on the same page on this one. And I'm kind of surprised Abbott is taking this stance.
  
  
  
• I'm not sure how that line ever got into Jill Biden's prepared speech. It wasn't impromptu. Video. That's an unforced error. 
  
  
   
  
  
  
• An officer with a constable's office in Harris County is in hot water for "hard" high-fives to the opposing team after a little league game. Video.
  
  
  
• The January 6th Committee will focus today on the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers connection to Trump and the Insurrection. But one thing which they will bring up is something which I hadn't put together . . . . 
• There was a crazy meeting in the Oval Office on the evening of Friday, December 18th when the nutcase entourage of Sidney Powell, Michael Flynn, and former Overstock.com CEO Patrick Byrne managed to get in the White House and just happen to catch Trump's eye. Over the next several hours, Trump advisors (especially Eric Herschmann) would battle the conspiracy theorists in the Oval Office as they urged Trump to seize voting machines and take other insane action. 
  
  
  
• But it would be later that same night, after midnight, when Trump will in effect summon the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, and others to Washington for January 6th in a tweet. (Which also marks the first time in American history that a president called for a protest against the peaceful transfer of power.)
  
  
   
• It had only been a couple of months since Trump had told the Proud Boys in a national debate to "Stand back and stand by." Now they were coming. 
  
  
  
• New poll released yesterday which I believe. 
  
  
  
  
  
  
• The New York Times focused this morning on a different part of the same poll.  The headline is technically true, but admittedly the actual polling numbers gives you a different feel. Then again, Trump's stronghold on the Republican Party is finally beginning to show signs of slipping away. 
  
  
  
  
  
  
• How Hershel Walker is a Senate Republican nominee is one of life's great mysteries. Video.
  
  
  
• The Alpine, Texas police department tried to get cute on Facebook. The comments didn't find it that funny.  
  
  
  
• If you are interested in school politics, this might interest you out of Wichita Falls.  The WFISD superintendent announced his resignation earlier this year "after controversy and protests arose about his plan to make cuts to staffing to fill an estimated $8 million to $9 million hole in the 2022-2023 budget."  It looks like he over-projected enrollment which is a big no-no and which caused a financial crisis. 
• However, the guy was able to find a job at Victoria ISD right away and started it on July 5th. 
• But get this: He just told the Victoria school board that "Based on the overwhelming negative and defamatory social media unrest, however false that it maybe, I feel that it is in the best interest of the VISD that I resign my position effective July 11, 2022." The social media "unrest" doesn't appear to be related to any personal scandal but just Victoria folks finding out about the budget problems while he was at Wichita Falls. 
• By having his Wichita Falls resignation take effect on June 30th, he was able to collect "$112,440 in bonuses and other payments" and "did not have to repay the WFISD money for tuition and fees from his pursuit of a doctorate degree at the University of North Texas."
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Real estate headlines in Dallas Morning News today. The cooling off continues.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• That escaped mental patient from the Wichita Falls hospital was captured in Austin on Sunday.