Random Thursday Morning Thoughts

I still do that. Although "leaving work behind" is not what it once was.

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•  The West Texas Oilman Pac is in full force as it tries to buy two Wise County elections.
• It continues to dump a piles and piles of cash in to Andy Hopper's campaign. By my calculations, they are around $400,000 in contributions to him for this election. Some recent ones: 
  
  
  
• And in one of the strangest choices, the PAC has funded sheriff candidate Cary Mellema.  Why in the world are the West Texas Oilmen interested in rural Wise County's sheriff's race? Good job by the Messenger for picking this up and running with it in yesterday's Update:
  
  
  
• Am I wrong or did gas prices just jump 40 cents overnight? 
• Justice Alito was been discovered to have flown yet another popular Insurrection flag. And he is still sitting on Insurrection related cases before the court. 
  
   
  
  
  
• Lawsuit news. There are 92 DPS officers named in the lawsuit. I'm not sure they'll get anything because I'm royally confused about how sovereign immunity works in these type of cases.   The insurance carrier for the City of Uvalde has already ponied up its policy limits of $2 million but, considering the massive discovery and legal costs they would have incurred, it was probably cheaper just to just give it up. 
  

  

  
  
  
  
• Fox4Terry was working last night. 
  
  
  
• A legal pleading gets filed asserting a normally routine claim of contributory negligence and the next thing you know American Airlines is having to throw "outside counsel" under the bus for blaming a nine year old girl.  I'm desperately looking for the pleadings and/or the names of the law firm -- a firm where heads are rolling this morning. 
  

  

  
  
  
  
• Video.
  
  
  
• A pretty big storm/high winds went though Belton last night causing quite a bit of damage to the main strip. 
  
  
  
• Ouch.
  
  
   
  
  
  
• The Business Second™. Maybe the housing market isn't slow after all.
  
  
  
• Am I to understand that the Mav's Kyrie Irving wore these in the playoff game last night?
  
  
  
• Messenger - Above the Fold

Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts

We forget about the wheels off tenure of the Toronto mayor.  He would die from cancer two years later. 

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• Trump trial:
• Despite promising us he would testify, Trump rested his defense yesterday without doing so.  This should come no surprise.
  
  
  
• Ronny Jackson embarrassed us yesterday by showing up at Trump's trial. He was there with other groupies including Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick.
  
  
  
• Trump suggested a federal restriction on contraception yesterday (he'll get us policy very soon, you know) but later backed off those statements. 
  

  

  
  
  
  
• Local connection mentioned in this story.
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Here's someone's breakdown of Stucky's most recent campaign filing:
  
  
  
• Tarrant County will pay a record $1.2 million settlement. Does this guy know how to run a jail or what?
  
  
  
• If we thought that the D.A. in Atlanta would face public repercussion for having an affair with the special prosecutor she hired to help with the Trump election fraud case, we were mistaken.  The judge, also up for re-election, won as well.
  
  
  
• Despite the headlines, it's not his decision. It's that of the D.A.'s office. 
  
  
  
  
• Legal nerdy stuff: The Trump jury trial just got more complicated and messy. They lawyers had a conference yesterday to prepare the jury charge so we now have a bit of an idea on what exactly the jury will be asked. Stay with me here. 
• First, the jury is asked whether Trump falsified business records.  That's a misdemeanor which (1) is a dumb law and (2) is a misdemeanor and (3) he can't be convicted of it alone because it's barred by limitations.  
• But if the jury finds that he did that, they are next asked whether he falsified those records with the intent to commit some other crime. If so, that's a felony which he can be convicted of. 
• This is where the wheels fall off. The "other crime" that the prosecutors have now identified it as New York Election Law § 17.152 makes it a crime to “conspire to promote or prevent the election of any person to public office by unlawful means.”  Wait a second. What the hell does that mean? That says nothing more than "hey, it's a crime to commit some other crime."  
• So now we've got another step because there has to be another law that was broken to make the conduct "unlawful means" under 17.152.  Yesterday, the prosecutors ask the judge to instruct the jury of three other laws that make the conduct unlawful: (1) a federal election law violation, (2) falsification of other business records (sheesh), or (3) "a tax crime."
  
  
  
• Maybe I'm missing something, but for those three "other crimes" to be so critical to the case, I haven't heard prosecutors so much as mention them throughout the trial.  
• This is an absolute cluster. And did I mention the jury will be asked all of the above thirty four times because the prosecutor thought it was a good idea to make it a 34 count indictment -- one each for 34 business records (even those which were only invoices created by Michael Cohen?) (PDF of indictment.)
• I may be wrong, wrong, wrong, but I don't think there's anyway Trump gets convicted. 
• Once you get past the "that's disgusting" reaction, this really is a pretty interesting legal question. It's not illegal to just think those thoughts. And it wouldn't be illegal for him to pencil sketch those thoughts, right? But if he uses a computer to produce fake images of those thoughts we've now entered into the arena of a crime. 
  
  
  
• Finally.
  
  
  
• Trump appointed 243 federal judges in his four year term. Today, Biden will have his 200th confirmed.

Random Tuesday Morning Thoughts

Ten years ago, gun rights activists finally figured out that you could opwn carry any long barreled firearm in Texas.  And then they started showing up everywhere around DFW.

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• Early voting numbers for the races of Wise County Sheriff and State Representative.
  
  
  
• Someone has saved, and now weighed, the mailers in the Stucky/Hopper campaign in Wise County. Current leaderboard: Stucky: 14.3 ounces. Hopper: 1 lb. 3.3 ounces.

  

  Hopper

  
  

  

  Stucky

  
  
• Related: Hopper's new financial report is out (PDF).  This one got my attention. That lady has donated to the Texas Oilman PAC before. 
  
  
  
• Trump trial.
• We have some chaos, but I don't understand kicking the press out of a public courtroom for a public trial. 
  

  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Trump supporters showed up wearing the same outfit yesterday.  I'm no history buff, but I think it's normally a bad sign whenever the far right starts wearing the same uniform. 
  
  
  
• Look who is going to embarrass us today.
  
• Every keeps saying the criminal cases against golfer Scottie Scheffler with "go away", and maybe they will, but the way the DA was arguing over a continuance for a simple arraignment yesterday is not a good sign. Video.
  
  
  
• Open AI has now pulled its voice for its virtual assistant after Scarlett Johansson revealed she had been offered, but turned down, their request to be the voice model. Then, it seems, OpenAI went ahead and used her voice anyway. (The assistant hasn't been rolled out to the public yet, but the video demo is wild.)
  
  
  
• Let's check in on Fox News.
  
  
  
• Sure, let's blame the restaurant. Looks like the Plaintiff's lawyer is out of Houston.
  
  
  
• I saw this story about a guilty plea of a woman charging $3,000 a pop to transport immigrants. It got my attention because she worked in the D.A.'s office as a victim assistance coordinator, but I didn't expect this: "Garza was driving a DA's office vehicle with official markings when a Victoria County sheriff's deputy stopped her near Victoria on Dec. 7, 2022.."
  
  
  
  
  
  
• So Trump has a new campaign video referencing, “Strength significantly increased by the creation of a unified Reich.”?