8.30.2024

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






Random Friday Morning Thoughts




That elevator is now being permanently removed in the renovation since it wasn't originally there (obviously). It occurs to me that there will quickly come a day when no one will remember that old elevator at all.


  • Overnight: "[R]esponding officers found an officer who’d been shot in his marked patrol vehicle. Officers exchanged gunfire with a suspect, and two other officers were shot." The chase ended up on I-35 which led to the suspect being shot on that highway in Lewisville and the freeway being shut down.


  • They were all of Haitian descent, but that's all we know.

  • The old-school me will never get used to small schools football playing, much less opening the season, on a Thursday night.

  • For a pro-life guy, Trump says that he thinks a six-week ban is "too short."  So why was he hellbent on overturning Roe v. Wade?


  • Decatur news from the Messenger provided without comment.

  • We have the dumbest state attorney general.

  • New religious diversity map based upon the census. Hey, at least we are more diverse than Parker County, but I think that's because the category of "Hispanic Catholic" help us with our score. 

  • Trump yesterday: He started this math challenged rant by once again saying immigrants are taking jobs from blacks (but at least he avoided the phrase "black jobs.") Video.

  • New this morning. Where is the outrage?

  • Legal nerdy stuff: A Wise County felony assault case was affirmed last night by the Fort Worth Court of Appeals. The opinion hasn't been released yet, but local lawyers -- and maybe others -- will find the first point of error in the defendant's brief very interesting. 
  • 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: 5 years and 56 days.

8.29.2024

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts




And by audit, I didn't mean the money was stolen but was implying they never actually collected the amazing amount that was pledged over the phone. I bet it was under 50%, if that. 


  • What a horrible wreck yesterday in Wise County which became national news.   At the risk of going into dangerous speculation, is there any chance this was a group of immigrants? Not having any names by now is just weird. But there is a report in the Messenger that the van "came from Florida."



  • Who are these gullible victims with all that money?
     

  • I asked the Liberally Lean Weather Team™ about this forecast from the National Weather Service, and my boys told me those temps might actually be a little high for Wise County. They went with 85 degrees on Sunday and 80 degrees on Monday. As far rain chances, they like Monday better than Saturday or Sunday. Book it. 

  • Trump has had another stellar couple of days. First he used the Arlington National Cemetery in TikTok videos despite being warned do so - a warning which prompted his team to have a physical altercation with a female cemetery official about it. The campaign said the next day that the worker must have been "suffering from a mental health episode" at the time.


  • Then he went absolutely psycho on Truth Social yesterday by reposting some of the craziest crap you've ever seen.  I'll say it again: For the life of me, I cannot believe that this man is the Republican nominee for President.
    • First he went full Hitler. 



    • Then he posted this which would have automatically disqualified him in a normal America.


    • Then he went literally full QAnon over and over again.  How is this even possible in a sane world?  


  • It's working out great for him. Here's Fox News' new poll about the swing states and how things are changing. 

  • This is an actual shot from Chicago yesterday during the first game of the double header with the Rangers. (But you might want to take a look at an amazing catch from later in the day.)

  • Messenger - Above the Fold



8.28.2024

Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts




"LOS ANGELES — The fantastical story of the Southern California football player Josh Shaw leaping out of a second-floor window to rescue a drowning nephew was, it turns out, too fantastical to be true."


  • If there was ever a major back-story crying out to be told but was not, it's this story.

     

  • Good lord. We knew something happened to her two weeks ago, but we finally got the details yesterday. "[She] said her right eye was knocked out of its socket after a student threw a wooden hanger at her during the first week of school."


  • Lots of yelling and screaming about this from Trump yesterday, but it was just the special counsel refining the most important indictment in the most important case in the light of the incomprehensible Supreme Court immunity ruling. (It you want the details of what the changes were in a nerdy way, this thread is good.)


  • Speaking of the Insurrection, we have another sentence. Not enough. 

  • One of those cool rocket boosters that returns back to Earth and lands upright has finally failed after its 23rd mission early this morning. Video


  • It sounds like this was a plea bargain for probation but, if so, I don't know why they are doing the sentencing in September. 


  • I-35 in Oklahoma had a bit of trouble yesterday. That's the trailer of an 18 wheeler definitely pointing the wrong way.

  • In one of the cheesiest and cringiest things you've ever seen, Trump released a two minute commercial yesterday where he tries to convince you to buy his trading cards.  It's amazing. He even threw in a couple of "people are saying". 


  • I have questions: (1) Why would anyone listen to these chowderheads?, and (2) How in the world can Amazon sell over $100 million in advertising in order to turn a profit?

  • The NFL will now allow a team to sell "no more than 10 percent of its ownership to private equity from a list of firms approved by the league."  But I remind you once again they have an arbitrarily self-imposed "salary cap" for players.


  • Very legal nerdy stuff: We had a ruling yesterday regarding drug dogs (you know, those amazing animals that can smell marijuana even when it is in gummy candy form and hermetically sealed). Well, an appellate court said that if the pooch sticks its snout inside a vehicle's passenger compartment in order to sniff the weed, then it's an illegal search.  Makes sense, I never believed an officer can stick his head inside a vehicle to detect an odor, but I've never seen a case perfectly on point -- although others with imperfect facts have tried.  
  • AI writing offense reports? What could go wrong . . .