9.12.2023

Random Tuesday Morning Thoughts




LeBron, Jerry Jones, and Hulk Hogan before the season opener in 2013. At the time, Hogan's daughter, Brooke, was engaged to Cowboys center Phil Costa. They would split up later in the season.

  • I-35 last night. South of downtown. Three dead. Three critical. Five vehicles were involved. It started with a minor  two vehicle accident and they were on the shoulder. A third vehicle, in an ill-advised move, tried to assist with protection by partially blocking one lane. Then two big rigs collided with the third vehicle and chaos ensued. 

  • Paxton impeachment trial quick hits:
    • We could have deliberations begin on Thursday or Friday. 
    • But, from an  entertainment standpoint, Paxton's lead lawyer Tony Buzbee ruled the day yesterday because the prosecution team let's him get away with anything. This is really becoming incredible. Rusty Hardin, for the impeachment team, just sits back and watches it all happen instead of objecting.

    • Case in point, Buzbee will get a witness to say something he wants and then announce to the chamber, "Let's let that sink in for a moment" and then repeats the answer and pauses for effect. This happened at least three times yesterday. 
    • Paxton is not being impeached because of an affair, but his mistress was mentioned for the first time in testimony. That had to be awkward. Here's an old picture of her with the presiding judge, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick. And worse, Paxton's wife was sitting just feet away from the testifying witness. 

    • We had our first female witness. The impeachment team decided to have a female lawyer ask her questions. This is, after all, backwoods Texas.
    • I still think he will be convicted. He should be convicted. I can't believe anyone thinks otherwise if you care one iota about character, honesty, and decency. 
  • Good grief.


  • At 6:00 a.m. now less . . . 

  • New Emerson poll for Iowa is out. Trump is down, but so is his closest challenger. 

  • I meant to mention this yesterday: Here is a whole thread of the MyPillow guy going crazy during a deposition earlier this year.  And I do mean crazy. If you watch just one, go with this one.

  • Business News in One Second. This is near Argyle.

     

  • Random ad for the City of Addison in 1988. Pretty good little ad. 

  • DraftKings thought it would be a good idea to have a special 9/11 three team parlay wager yesterday. They called it "Never Forget."  Uh, perhaps they have. They later apologized.

  • Very nerdy legal stuff: Over at the Fifth Circuit, the judge's are arguing over how to use the Bible to interpret a statute.  Sheesh. Things are going just great. 
    Majority

    Dissent

  • So that over-hyped Aaron Rogers experiment didn't work out?


at 8:30 AM

9.11.2023

Random Monday Morning Thoughts




And you know who bought it back then? The guy who is currently Ken Paxton's lead impeachment defense lawyer: Tony Buzbee.

  • I really want to know what the settlement was ("terms were not disclosed"). If it was anything other than Marriott saying, "You dismiss the case and we won't pursue sanctions" they paid to much.  But I seriously doubt they paid anything at all. 

  • Impeachment quick hits:
    • This trial is full of lawyers past their primes who care more about themselves than their presentation. Exhibit 1 is Dan Cogdell who tried to cross-examine an old Texas Ranger and embarrassed himself of Friday afternoon. 
      Video is cued up to the above here.


    • The best lawyer I've seen is a little know one named Mitch Little (although he does a poor fake outrage acting job.)

  • When you saw this picture after January 6th, how much prison time did you expect him to get. I would have guessed way more than 57 months. He was sentenced on Friday.


  • JFK Conspiracy News: Yesterday in the New York Times (free link), it was revealed that a now 88 year old secret service agent is coming forward and saying he found the the "magic bullet" in the limousine where Kennedy had been sitting and then placed it on Kennedy's stretcher. The official story has always been that investigators found  it "on a stretcher believed to have held Mr. [Gov. John] Connally at Parkland Memorial Hospital, so they assumed it had exited his body during efforts to save his life."


  • We have Twinkie business news this morning. Heck, it's even Cup Cakes news:


  • USA Today on the morning of 9/11/01:

  • Dak Prescott being sedated for 11 hours to get this "sleeve" tattoo on his leg seems very dangerous. Side note: That's ugly.

  • WFAA's Mike Leslie did play by play for a livestream of the Decatur game on Friday. A 3 hour rain delay with the game ending at a 1:12 a.m. didn't dampen his spirits. Here is video of the final play.  Full game here. 

  • Let me tell you, I haven't seen the Evil Empire look that good since right before Colt McCoy hurt his shoulder in 2009.

  • Art Briles was the field at the OU game in an OU shirt. His son-in-law is the offensive coordinator for the Sooners. 

  • My family friendly blog does not allow me to post this photo of Trump's reception at the Iowa-Iowa State game. 


at 8:31 AM

9.08.2023

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

at 2:30 PM

Random Friday Morning Thoughts




That was 10 years ago when Trump was a private citizen and Abbott had just announced his candidacy for governor.  I had Trump on my radar even back then. 

  • Impeachment Updates (not all that much):
    • We had tears yesterday from  whistleblower Ryan Vasser. I'm not sure that was justified.

    • Some of that guy's testimony really blew up on social misdemeanor by the MAGA Paxton fans because he said that he and other whistleblowers had "no evidence" of Paxton wrongdoing when they went to the FBI. But that it is misleading. He said in his response to this line of questioning that they "took" no evidence -- meaning documents. (YouTube at 8:41:12) The responses in general, however, were very, very loosely worded. 
    • Rusty Hardin should clean this up.
    • Random observation: The Lt. Governor is doing a pretty good job as judge, but he tends to side with the Paxton lawyers on most objections.  My guess is that he knows there will be a conviction but he wants no one to be able to accuse him of not giving Paxton a fair trial. 
    • Random observation #2: I feel sorry for whoever "Eric" is. He's the guy working for defense team led by Tony Buzbee who is charge of coming up with documents and putting them on the screen at a moment's notice. I bet he gets yelled at a lot -- unjustifiably so. 
  • The embarrassment at DPS just keeps coming. Friday morning appointments have been cancelled (with some exceptions which I wouldn't count on.) 

  • The record high for this day is 100 degrees. It will be shattered. 

  • There were bits executed at the U.S. Open last night.


  • This event really isn't on my radar but others are apparently interested.

  • The coach who was the plaintiff in the coach-leading-prayers-on-the-field case (after the Supreme Court majority changed the facts of the case on the fly), took the field for one game last weekend for the first time since the decision, showboated by taking a knee, and then promptly resigned two days ago. 


  • WFAA Channel 8 will live-stream the Decatur High School game tonight. (It can normally be seen on Youtube via a local production which I presume will still go on.)

  • The guaranteed money is $43.8 million over the five years. It's the biggest NFL contract ever. 

  • I really don't know much about Chief's holdout Chris Jones but him showing up at last night's game with two Tony Soprano looking guys as agents was a power move.  

  • Legal nerdy stuff out of Fort Worth Court of appeals yesterday: The facts of this misdemeanor assault case against a Pilot Point police officer are exactly the kind of facts where, as a defense lawyer, you think you can win it, but you always realize that your job is very hard.  He was convicted, and the conviction was affirmed. 
  • Time which has passed since the Wise County Sheriff's Office, despite having a full male DNA profile, has failed to solve the murder of Lauren Whitener in her home at Lake Bridgeport: 4 years and 64 days.

at 8:29 AM
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