Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts

• Lots of people going nuts over the three teenagers involved in the shooting of the Australian baseball player in Duncan, Oklahoma. "Where's the coverage like Zimmerman and Travon Martin?" they yell. Well, they aren't even close to the same. The Zimmerman case had a great issue of self defense which was worthy of discussion. The Oklahoma case is just a horrible crime with a prosecution that will follow.
• That being said, the coverage is everywhere.  It was the second story on NBC Nightly News last night (behind the foiled school shooting in Decatur, Georgia.)
• Odd observation: Has there been very little wind this summer? Being a former lake dweller, the Texas winds always seem to ruin beautiful lake days. But this summer?
• It was a "blue moon" last night even though it was just the first full moon of the month. I'd never heard of that type of blue moon until yesterday. Always thought it was the second full moon in one calendar month.
• I love Arial America on The Smithsonian Channel. It's basically an hour dedicated to each state with nothing other than a helicopter equipped with a hi-def camera showing you all the important landmarks of the state with a narrator giving a brief history lesson about each locale. 
• A fake news story about Tony Romo breaking both legs had people freaking out last night. 
• It's a little weird that I watched some of Outbreak last weekend and yesterday there was news they had tracked the Tarrant County measles source to Copeland's church near Newark. That's very Outbreak--ee--ish.
• The Musers did a segment this morning on a "great article" in the Dallas Morning News over the weekend about the history of the Johnny Manziel family.  Wasn't that article just a repeat of the Deadspin article I linked to a couple of weeks ago?
• Fox 4 had a lawyer on last night to talk about the liability, if any, of a baseball club for a fan struck by a foul ball. He was really good until he kept talking about the "Assumption of the Risk" doctrine. I haven't practiced civil law in twenty years, but I know that doctrine was abolished a long time ago. (Without looking it up, wasn't it a 1970s Texas case that killed it involving some type of cattle company? Farely? Fairly?)
• Man, I like the Dallas Police Chief. Every six months or so he'll fire half a dozen officers for transgressions. And with that big of a police force there's bound to be that many committing fireable offenses. At least he pulls the proverbial trigger and gets rid of them.
• I don't understand the case of Justice the tortured dog. If the news report is correct, a guy reached a plea bargain in the case yesterday for five years in TDC. However, the judge then made a finding that a deadly weapon wasn't used and sentenced him to two years instead. (See Texas Penal Code 12.35(c)(1) vs. 12.35(a).) That doesn't make sense. A judge can either accept or reject a plea bargain. If rejected, the case just goes back on the docket. The judge can't just change the terms of a plea bargain or modify the sentence. (But for what it's worth, that two year sentence is probably a State Jail sentence which must be served day for day so its not that great of a deal.)