Random Friday Morning Thoughts

• Yesterday, the AP was floating around a shocking video of the Syrian Rebels executing government soldiers. And U.S. bombing will support those guys? 
• Prediction: Congress won't approve any Syrian strikes. Nor should they. 
• Peyton Manning through for seven touchdowns last night. Seven. I thought he was done two years ago when he sat out the year with a neck injury.
• Anyone else suffering from allergies? I had everyone in the house tell me last night that I sounded awful. 
• So what did Mrs. LL do after reading about wanting to go to the Ole Miss game and see The Grove on Saturday while in Memphis for the weekend? She bought tickets!
• And for those who have seen The Ghosts Of Ole Miss, I've read that bullet holes from that night of rioting can still be found on one of the famous campus buildings. I'll definitely track that down. 
• I'm hearing lots of good reviews about Drinking Buddies -- kind of a ramped up When Harry Met Sally.
• The Ticket's Mike Rhyner talked yesterday about his traffic accident I posted about. It is amazing he wasn't killed, and he attributes side air-bags for still being alive. I'm not sure I've got side air bags. 
• Is this really the aTm president mimicking the Johnny Manziel "I've got money" gesture?
• Hitler's bodyguard died yesterday. I would have lost a bet if you had asked me if he was alive. 
• A young Tarleton girl was bucked off her horse near Santo and has died. Seems so ironic. Everyone else is dodging in and out of traffic and she dies being in a serene environment. 
• Breaking: Unemployment rate drops to 7.3%.  (Funny, though. I can't find a single story in the "lame stream" media that doesn't say the drop is due to people who have stopped looking for work. Wordkyle's power is greater than I thought.)
• As expected, District Judge Sharen Wilson announced her intent to run for Tarrant County DA yesterday. So what does supporter Sheriff Dee Anderson say about her? “She is a tough but fair judge." Ok. I like that. Anything else? "She sided with law enforcement. She supported law enforcement. She continues to support law enforcement to this day,” said Anderson. So she was a judge who "sided with law enforcement"? That's fair? That's impartial? 
• It all kind of blurred together over Labor Day. We all jumped on the Rhome cop for shooting out the tires of the car with four kids in it, but in a second chase on Monday involving Chad Ervin of Springtown  (which ended up with a trooper crashing his patrol car "miles away") a trooper also shot out the tires of that car. Did everyone watch Smokey and The Bandit or something?
• And the trooper who wrecked his car "miles away" on a slick road during the chase was conveniently not named in any published report. 
• And in the Dallas DA dysfunctional world: "Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins has launched a criminal investigation to find out whether two judges improperly encouraged a third judge to hold him in contempt of court."  (Behind paywall.)  Everyone in that sentence works for the government.

Uh, Oh

Major Accident (Wise Co. - Boyd) River Valley Motocross Park on CR4757 - Wise Co. EMS on scene of 2 motorcycles... http://t.co/6TbiMnjwo7
— DFW Scanner (@DFWscanner) September 5, 2013

War, Fashion, Advertising -- America!

"Boots on the ground" or not, let's not forget about sandals, pumps and loafers. #Footwear
— Kenneth Cole (@KennethCole) September 5, 2013

Ticket Fans: It Looks Like The Ol' Grey Wolf Was In A Car Accident Around Noon

pic.twitter.com/e0zH4LvlKF
— Mike Rhyner (@theoldgreywolf) September 5, 2013

I think Rhyner has been mailing it in for years, but I still like having him around on the radio dial. From the Twitter reaction, this seems to be his car. Probably some loaner from some car dealer advertiser -- I gather that's a typical perk in the radio business.

But that was a pretty good pop. Hope he's OK.

Edit:

@theoldgreywolf Wow I work right next to that Qdoba in the bg. That was a mean wreck. You okay?
— Steven Korner (@guapozx) September 5, 2013

The Only Johnny Football Gif You'll Ever Need

This first appeared on Jay Leno (which is stunning that they did something actually funny.)

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts

• “I didn’t set a red line,” President Obama said during a news conference in Stockholm. “The world set a red line.”  Negative spin: That comes across as backing off the red line at best and lying at worst.  Positive spin: He's still says there's a red line (that was crossed so that's why he wants to bomb them), all he's saying that he didn't set the line personally.  
• Hearing WBAP's Hal Jay talk about Syria is painful. He wants to "kill them all" meaning "kill every man, woman and child" (his words) who supports terrorism -- although he hasn't quite figured out how you figure out who those people are. 
• I'm sticking with my theory: The President doesn't really want to bomb Syria but wants Congress to say "no". That way he has it both ways: (1) He will have honored Congress' and vicariously the People's wishes, and (2) he can always say he personally wanted to save lives but was not allowed to do so.
• Veteran state Tarrant District Judge Sharen Wilson is giving up her courtroom to run for Tarrant County district attorney. It's hard to think of someone I would want less in that office. In the interest of justice, she does not need to win.
• Sports issue I'm undecided on: I absolutely believe in the theory that some players can put a team on his back and carry them at the end of the game. RG3, Michael Jordan, Major Applewhite and Vince Young (at UT), Staubach, etc.  But what about a pitcher? Yu Darvish has been criticized lately for not being able to do that at the end of a game. But does that theory apply to that position? Doesn't an arm simply get tired and there's nothing you can do about it? Then again, did Clemens and Schilling just fight through it during the day?
• Johnny Football is on the cover of next week's Time with the title, "It's Time To Pay College Athletes."
• Does everyone who learns Spanish forget it if they don't use it?
• Whenever Karl Rove appears on TV (normally Fox), he always uses a handheld white board and a marker. That's such a (deceased) Tim Russert rip off that it's painful. 
• Thanks for all the tips about Memphis. I really appreciate it. We'll probably sneak over to West Memphis, Arkansas and see what little there is to about the Memphis 3. (Mrs. LL is obsessed with those HBO documentaries.) I wanted to see the courthouse of the trials but apparently they were tried in Jonesboro on a change of venue.
• I had no idea that Ole Miss was a relatively short drive from Memphis and that a home game was Saturday night. I could have added it to my football stadium tour list especially since I've always heard about The Grove. (I don't think Mrs. LL will go for it, but you never know.)
• Got mad at Mrs. LL over the weekend when I cleaned out the refrigerator and found basically a whole Domino's pizza that went to waste. Then I cleaned out the food pantry and found about three full cereal boxes of mine that I had let go to waste. 
• I purposely avoid Breaking Bad thoughts because I feel for those who don't watch it and are sick of hearing about it. 
• "Dozens" of Baylor students are under investigation for an alleged marijuana ring where they are only consumers. Like TCU, a bunch of kids will have their careers sidetracked because of a goofy weed investigation. (That link goes to the Baylor student newspaper which is like reading Pravda -- the administration of a private school basically controls the content.)

Our Wise County Republican Party Better Step It Up

Caldwell County is just crushing you. (And note the holster with a gun on one side and Bible in the other.)

For you very few Evil Roy Slade fans out there, I wonder if there's a stick of dynamite on page nine.

(Thanks, Jennifer.)

"Let me introduce you to my hand cannon."

Source – A thief who pulled a gun on a store cashier left with his tail between his legs when the clerk – an Iraq War veteran – reacted quickly using his years of training. Jon Lewis Alexander, 54, had a gun pulled on him while at work, but within a split second he’d pulled out his own firearm and had it inside the thief’s mouth. The tense exchange took place in a store in Marionville, Missouri, and was caught on CCTV.

Hey, it right up there with Jules Winnfield taking the gun from Honey Bunny's boyfriend in the restaurant near the end of Pulp Fiction. 

Edit: Lots of people are saying this is fake. If it is, basically every news organization in the country has been fooled. 

Breaking Near Houston

Link.

There are supposed to be some "social media pictures". Sheesh. Kids just can't put down the phones.

Burleson's Retta Baptist Church Going All Quentin Tarantino. Or Not.

It's a film that the church was heavily involved in And the pastor thinks the R rating slapped upon it by the MPAA may involve some religious discrimination. If the Dallas Observer story is correct, he may be right:

The R, according to the movie poster, is for "some" drug use (a young mother smokes weed, then gets her kid taken away) and violence (the boy's father arms himself and raids a church to get the child back), both of which seem fairly staid when compared with Hollywood fare.

 "When people have seen the film, they are shocked by the rating," [Pastor Chuck] Kitchens told the Southern Baptist Texan.

Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts

• Overnight death: Ariel Castro, the crazy guy who kept three girls secluded in his house for a decade in Cleveland, is dead.
• Whenever I hear his name, I think about a crazed Nicholas Cage yelling, "I'm Castor Troy!" in Face/Off. (And the names aren't really close at all.) 
• Donald Trump donated $25,000 to Greg Abbott.  That's all I need to know.
• Strange lines are being drawn on the Syria bombing issue with conservative and liberal being strangely intertwined. It's like cats and dogs living together.  Heck, I'm hanging out with The Hard Right opposing any attacks. (And only 36% of Americans support an attack.)
• Good grief, even Sean Hannity and I agree that dropping bombs on Syria is an Act of War that requires Congressional approval. 
•  Syria's civil war has killed an estimated 100,000 and now we are bent out of shape because a few hundred were killed with chemical weapons? We didn't think we needed to take action after the first 99,000 were dead? Bombs and bullets didn't offend us?  
•  "Non-practicing" lawyer Brian Cuban (Mark's goofy brother) yells out hot legal opinions about "revenge porn" on CW 33 and D Magazine makes fun of him. (And then he got all pissy in the comments in that link before then pimping his new book.) 
• Sports: (1) I'm not sure I knew that Fox Sports has the Big 12 No Huddle which condenses each weekend game into 50 minutes. Good stuff. (2) Bridgeport's/TCU's Colin Jones, as most expected, made the cut with the Carolina Panthers. Remember that he was drafted by the 49ers in 2011 but traded early in the season last year to Carolina for a 7th round pick in 2014.  (3) Baylor has another NFL First Round draft pick bust as 2011 selection Danny Watkins was cut by the Eagles (but will sign with the Dolphins who'll give him a chance.) (4) I don't think that TCU/LSU game was all that close -- LSU outgained the frogs 448-259 and TCU scored by way of a kickoff return and by benefiting from a fumble recovery inside the 10. 
• I posted the news of the death of Tommy Morrison and someone made an anti-Obama comment within 10 minutes.  I'm so glad I'm not the guy who hit the "submit" button. 
• During my long weekend by myself, Mrs. LL gave me a list of "to dos". The oddest one? Let the Family Cat out for ten minutes a day because "she likes to go in the backyard and eat grass."
• I'm in Memphis this weekend for my nephew's wedding. Suggestions? 
• Mrs. LL last night: "Hey, it's your girlfriend!!" (when Ann Coulter appeared on TV.)
• Dallas ISD Superintendent Mike Miles has his house on the market, and attorney Paul Coggins delivers the report into the investigation into Miles on Friday. (Side note: In late July, Coggins was hired at a cost "not to exceed" $100,000 to conduct the investigation --- that was an easy, easy $100,000.)
• Fort Worth motorcycle death. The guy was 69.
• A high school running back gets his helmet turned around after a face mask violation  but keeps running blindly -- and gets crushed.
• I wouldn't go so far as to say "details" were emerging in the very odd shooting death of the Denton football player . . . 

Above The Fold

And While A Hearing Was Going On Today About Whether We Should (Senselessly) Bomb Syria, This Happened

Sen. John McCain. Wanting bombs to drop and going all in.

Source.

Meet "Vodka Samm" -- Today's Internet Star

She's become an Internet sensation after being arrested at the Iowa Hawkeye football game this weekend for Public Intoxication after she blew a .341 on a portable breath test device. Oh, my.

She was on Twitter as @Vodka_Samm as it all went down tweeting "Just went to jail. #yolo", "I'm going to get .341 tattooed on me because its so epic" and "My mom hates me too."  She probably hates herself now since she's deleted the twitter account.

YOLO, indeed.

Dead At 44

I knew he had a bizarre life but I didn't know it was that bizarre.  Up can coming boxer, star of Rocky V, actually became World Champion for a few months, got AIDs, denied AIDS even existed, then (maybe) tested HIV free, and then spiraled downward as evidenced by a shocking book in photo.

He died Sunday.  (Good write up in Grantland.)

High School Coach Fight!! Alabama Style!!

They replay it an zoom in best they can around 1:07 mark.

Edit: Forgot the story link.

Random Tuesday Morning Thoughts

• Former Bridgeport coach V.M. Hill died yesterday.  I'm not sure I ever both feared and respected a coach as much as him. (He retired in the 1970s after coaching the 7th grade team and 8th grade team to undefeated seasons.) 
• Texas Republicans, you so crazy: Wacko Dan Patrick seeks to oust David Dewhurst as Lieutenant Governor. But Patrick supported Dewhurst last year in his battle for the U.S. Senate against Ted Cruz. Now Patrick challenges Dewhurst for Lieutenant Governor and this weekend announced he supports Cruz for President calling him "Reaganesque".
• The Chief Justice of the Texas Supreme Court will step down  because of "personal financial pressures" although he said, “I’m going to move on to some new challenges, though I’m not sure what yet.”  That makes absolutely no sense. 
• When I was in high school, I was at the girl's varsity basketball game when I saw one of our Bridgeport players launch an air ball. I instantly said, "That girl is awful" only to discover her little sister was in front of me as she wheeled around and gave me a glare. I still remember to this day the panic I felt and the only thing I could think of to say was, "But she tries hard." 
• Mrs. LL had a mini family reunion in San Antonio this weekend and rented a house. She also took the Family Pup who managed to escape while everyone was out for the day.  She got an email advising her that she had been found. Lucky. 
• Baseball notes: (1) We hate C.J. Wilson, but is 10-1 with 2.79 ERA in his last 15 starts. (2) Official Liberally Lean guy Chris Davis has 47 home runs, (3) The Rangers are 2.5 games from missing the playoffs completely. Edit: I'm wrong on the last one.  Baltimore is the last one out in the wild card right now at 73-63. Oakland and Texas are at 79-58 (with the other wildcard spot going to Tampa Bay at 76-51.)
• I've ranted against the silly Improper Photography statute for years and finally, last week, an appellate court out of San Antonio held it to be unconstitutional on its face.  (Former Williamson County DA John Bradley and I got into an online argument about it but couldn't find it.) 
• That awful case on the coast involving the Boyd girl that I wrote about last week ended up on Fox 4 and the cover of the Wise County Messenger. I think both of them learned about it here. 
• Edit: Forgot to mention that Harris County DA Mike Anderson, 57, died over the weekend. He sent out an email in May to his staff notifying them that he had cancer. And was certainly was the aggressive kine: He was in hospice care at the time of his death. 

Who Made A Run For It?

Wise Co. Pursuit *UPDATE - Pursuit has ended near Bridgeport, subjects in custody.
— DFW Scanner (@DFWscanner) September 2, 2013

Oops:

If She Had Only Wanted A McMuffin, Crisis Avoided.

Language warning.

That girl be high. Bath salts?

What are the chances of the guy pulling up after her saying, "So I take it that McNuggets are not an option, huh"?

And it's  good to know the Inkernet as already made a rap video out of the incident.

Edit: Even though this video has exploded over the last couple of days, it's three years old. Mrs. LL discovered she was indicted on  Felony Vandalism and sentenced to Jail for 60 days and had to pay McDonald's for the window. Name: Melodi Dushane.

"Never Hit A Woman"

Skip to 1:15.

The girlfriend of some truck driver slaps this guy. Hard. He does what I hope any guy would do and restrained himself and walked away. You can see him stare into the air as he gained his composure.

But what would the public reaction have been if he had instantaneously fired a punch right back at her?

Near Bowie. By Gunshot.

Link.

Am I This Cynical Without Justification?

Man, this seems so obvious to me.  I don't think the President has any desire (or at the least is undecided) about launching a few (meaningless) bombs on Syria. So what does he do? He launches a huge PR campaign talking about how children are being killed and we need to do something!!! But he'll wait for Congress to authorize it* before taking any action.

The chances of Congress saying yes? Probably very little. Most Democrats are anti-war. And almost all Republican's are anti-Obama -- so whatever he wants, they don't like it.  I don't think there's a chance in the world Congress will authorize a strike on Syria.

So how does it end? Congress says "no", the U.S. does nothing, but the President can forever say he tried to save lives.

Politics 101.
___________
* Which even the strict constitutionalists shouldn't argue with it. Dropping bombs is an Act of War which can only occur with the authorization of Congress.

Indulge Me: College Football Random Thoughts

• Tech beat SMU on Friday night, and SMU QB Garrett Gilbert is simply awful. And I'll never forget him, as a Texas recruit who had yet to play a down, being on the cover of a UT magazine with the title "The Next Great Texas Quarterback."
• TCU's QB Casey Pachall is one tatted up guy. He was replaced in the third quarter against LSU, and I'm not sure he'll ever start again.
• I wrote a month ago that TCU would regret playing LSU on opening weekend. By that I meant they'd lose that game but might not lose another one. They lost 37-27.
• Cowboys Stadium seems like a morgue for an NFL game but the greatest venue ever when college teams play there. 
• I really, really dislike Gary Patterson. It's impossible to hate Mack Brown. I'm not sure what I think about Kliff Kingsbury, but I think I like him. Kevin Sumlin needs to get control of his scene. 
• Texas Tech is in great shape. They've got a true freshman quarterback who looked fantastic in his first game. And he may not be the NFL prototype which means he might be at Tech for four years. 
• I love this sport but, the older I get, the sight of young kids withering in pain when they tear up a knee or a shoulder makes me question the whole thing. 
• Baylor played Wofford (a replacement after SMU cancelled their scheduled meeting) and put up 692 yards of total offense. One thing Baylor is: An offensive machine. They led the nation in offense last year and were second in 2011.
• North Dakota State beat last year's National Championship contender Kansas State by scoring with 24 seconds left after going on a monstrous 18 play, 80 yard drive that took up eight and half minutes. As much as I love the wide open spread offense, that type of drive is the true measure of a beat down. 
• I've always used Yahoo! Sports to check on scores and get recaps. They've redesigned it so poorly that I have to use ESPN. 
• ESPN's College Game Day was four hours long. That's way too long. 
• Texas has joined the hurry up spread offense craze and put up a school record 715 yards of offense against a hapless New Mexico State team in a 56-7 win. Keep your eye on The Evil Empire -- they might be really, really good. 
• It's an Offensive World: 27 teams put up more than 500 yards of offense. 
• Johnny Football played great in the second half against Rice but got an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty after being taunted by a couple of Rice players. The guy is great. The guy is an idiot. But, man, ESPN's Sports Center is hard on that guy. 
• Three Aggie defensive starters are suspended for the first two games. Even more amazing is that no one knew it until seconds before kickoff. You'd think bettors would kind of like to know that a little earlier. 
• Because of Miami in the 1980s, the NCAA instituted very strict rules where any crazy celebrating would be penalized. And, man, was it enforced. At first, at least. I'm seeing stuff these days in every game which would get a 15 yard penalty just three years ago.
• North Texas drew 22,000 in a 40-6 win over Idaho. Not bad a bad win. Not a bad crowd. 
• I bought a University of Miami t-shirt the other day. When I showed it to Mrs. LL she broke out in song with, "I'm talking about the U!"  (There are a handful of guys that understand that and love her right now.)  
• There was a fake punt in the Villanova and BC game that I had to watch five times to figure it out.  I love the fake punt. 
• I don't understand the knew 'targeting' rule that got at least three payers ejected yesterday. (There were two Baylor players who delivered viscous hits which didn't even draw a flag.) 
• Beaten down moment of the weekend: FAU is being blown out by Miami but their head coach decides they should spike the ball in the final seconds to at least get another play off. You know, "play until the clock stops." One problem: It was fourth down. Video.
• Boise State lost to Washington. So? It's only the 13th time they've lost since 2002. Think about that. 
• Alabama's Christion Jones scored on a kickoff return, a punt return, and a receiving TD. No one has ever done that before. 
• In an upcoming movie, author Malcolm Gladwell (Outliers, The Tipping Point) says that football will eventually be "ghettoized". What does that mean? It's hard to say delicately. Basically, once society finally understands the risks, anyone who is smart and has the resources, if need be, will not let their kid play football but steer him to other options.