legal news

Finally … a jury summons!

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Nearly six years into my Collin County, Texas, residency and I finally — finally! I am telling you — received a jury summons.

Call me a glutton for punishment, but I want to be selected to serve on a trial jury.

I came close once to getting selected for a trial jury. It occurred in Amarillo back in the late 1990s. I got the summons, reported for duty, then got herded into a jury pool waiting room where we cooled our jets for most of the day.

Then the judge who managed the jury selection, 47th District Judge David Gleason, excused us. I must have been the only juror wannabe who expressed disappointment at that moment.

You see, I long have been fascinated by the criminal justice system. I have wanted to serve on a jury since the time I first became eligible, which I guess was when I turned 21 years of age.

I never received a jury summons when I lived in Oregon. I have received several of them since moving to Texas in the spring of 1984. Except for the near-selection in Randall County, my other summonses ended with a “don’t report” order, meaning the court system didn’t need me that day.

I suppose I could seek an exemption based on my age; I am 75 years old now and I do not have to report. I won’t do that. I want to serve on a jury.

My reporting time is about a month away. I am going to hope for the best and hope they need me to do my duty as a citizen. Hey, it’s the least I can do.

national news

‘L’ word doesn’t exist

Donald Trump wallowed today in the “L” word to describe the 2024 presidential election.

In Trump’s universe, the “L” word is shorthand for “landslide.” He kept saying during a rambling, nonsensical presser with reporters in Mar-a-Lago, Fla., that he defeated Vice President Kamala Harris in a “landslide.”

Let me be crystal clear — again! No, he did not ride a landslide of votes to victory in 2024!

He made some remark about winning the popular vote by “millions of votes.” Let’s see, he pulled in fewer than 2.3 million more votes than Harris. Let’s also note that more than 155 million ballots were cast. Now, when you say “millions of votes” separated them, my own perspective tells me it’s more than what Trump rolled up against the VP. Yes, he won more votes than any Republican presidential candidate in history, so I’ll give him that.

But the landslide he said he scored does not exist.

I just want to be clear on that point.

I won’t go into the rest of the idiocy that flowed from this fellow’s mouth. Doing so would mean I would miss something critical.

Landslide? It did not occur in 2024.

national news

Electoral certification? Nothing to it … this time!

Just as some of us had predicted, Jan. 6 came and went today without a hitch. Congress met to certify the results of the 2024 presidential election and the vice president … who came out on the losing end of it, declared it official.

The deal was done, just as the U.S. Constitution prescribes it.

A point of context is in order, of course. Four years, another Congress and another vice president gathered in the Capitol to do that very thing. The nimrod who lost the election, Donald Trump, had other ideas. He said the result was rigged. He sent the mob to the Capitol to stop the process.

The attack on our government has relegated Jan. 6, 2021, to a list of infamous dates: Dec. 7, 1941, and Sept. 11, 2001, come immediately to mind. We now just refer to the latter date as “9/11” and we know what it means.

When you say “Jan. 6” these days, we know what you mean there as well.

It’s not supposed to be remembered in that fashion. It’s a routine event, conducted peacefully, orderly and in keeping with what the founders envisioned. It is the hallmark of our democratic republic.

Vice President Kamala Harris made me proud today when she declared that Donald Trump had been duly elected president. Not that Trump had won by defeating Harris, but that she did her constitutional duty without fear of an uprising.

It is how our government is supposed to work.

Uncategorized

Getting old is OK, however …

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Forgive me for reneging a little on a promise I made regarding this new nutrition and weight-management program I have just begun.

I said I wouldn’t bore you with nitty-gritty details I take at every step along the way. I want to share one item with you. So … bear with me.

The Veterans Administration has a program that teaches us how to control our meal intake and change our lifestyle. I have gotten far too heavy for my own liking. My dear bride’s passing from cancer nearly two years ago sent me into an eating frenzy I didn’t realize was occurring in the moment. But it was.

I am working my way out of that former life. I have just started that long journey. I have decided that my older age — I just turned 75 a little while ago — has robbed me of the discipline I was able to employ many years ago.

Once, in my mid-20s, I had gained a lot of weight. I decided to join my wife, who had just given birth to our first son, in a weight-loss program. It worked famously. I peeled off 52 pounds. If I may sound a bit conceited, I was proud of myself.

Those days are long gone. I have put even more weight on this aging body. I need professional help. I sought it out at the VA and the agency has responded by putting me on this program.

I am entering the program with an abundance of confidence, although I cannot yet declare whether it will bear the fruit I seek.

I can declare — therefore I will do so — that I need the help from the VA nutritionist with whom I am working. Just maybe she will keep me focused sufficiently to reach the finish line after completing my stated goal.

Uncategorized

Give it a rest, wackos!

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Right-wing wackos have been pissing me off for decades, but by golly they have stretched my tolerance past the breaking point this past week.

President Biden rewarded 19 deserving individuals the Presidential Medal of Freedom. They range from Bono, the U2 front man, to the late Sen./Attorney General/and probable president Robert F. Kennedy.

Among those honored were two people who have drawn the ire of the right-wing cabal, former U.S. Sen./Secretary of State/first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton and progressive political activist George Soros. Why, the right-wingers just can’t tolerate the idea of these individual being honored with the nation’s highest civilian award.

What did they do to disqualify them? Clinton ran for president twice, in 2008 and in 2016. She was nominated by Democrats to run against Donald J. Trump; she lost the 2016 election. However, during her many decades in public life, Clinton became a champion for the underserved, for women’s rights, for children and for democratic principles.

And Soros? He came to this country from Hungary to build a better life for himself and his family. He has been a progressive political activist, giving tons of money to fellow progressives running for office and for causes they support.

The right-wingers don’t like either of them. That is just too … damn … bad!

Sure, they have made some mistakes. Who in the hell hasn’t?

They have earned the recognition that the president has bestowed on them. The right-wing kooks need to shut the hell up.

legal news

‘Yes’ on judicial election reform

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Nathan Hecht has called it a career, stepping down from his post as chief justice of the Texas Supreme Court.

He didn’t exactly leave completely on his own terms. State law forced him. to retire at age 75. So, he did.

I want to join others who have saluted his 35 years on the state’s highest civil appellate court and his lengthy legal career.

Hecht is a reformer. He sought to make the legal system more accessible to lower-income Texans. It’s a fascinating goal for a man thought to be a rock-ribbed conservative Republican jurist. Which brings me to a fundamental point I want to echo.

Judge Hecht also favors judicial election reform. He doesn’t like the way Texas chooses its judges. We elect them on partisan ballots. In this day, if you’re a Republican, you have a built-in advantage simply because you belong to the predominant political party. It used to be that Democrats held that kind of power.

Hecht doesn’t like the current system. He wants to see judges elected as non-partisans. As the Dallas Morning News noted in an editorial saluting Hecht’s tenure: “He also wisely used his high-profile and strong reputation in Austin to push the Legislature for a new system for selecting judges. Partisan elections, he said, put judges in the unfortunate position of becoming political. He famously told the Legislature in 2019: ‘A judicial selection system that continues to sow the political wind will reap the whirlwind.'”

And it has. I have seen too many good judges turned away — at the state and county levels — simply because they belong to the party out of power.

The current system too often turns jurists into potential political hacks.

I hope Judge Hecht continues to use his voice to seek needed change in Texas’s political system … by removing judges and judicial candidates from the partisan cesspool.

local news

New mayor pledges ‘transparency’

Stop me if you’ve heard this before … a new politician promises to bring transparency to a government he wants to lead, but then somehow falls short of delivering fully on the pledge.

Princeton’s new mayor, Eugene Escobar Jr., has said he wants to improve transparency at City Hall. OK, fine. The person he defeated in the December runoff, Mayor Brianna Chacon, made the same promise back when she first was elected to the office.

To my admittedly feeble eyes, Chacon fell a bit short of delivering the goods. I am going to cite the city’s hiring of Mike Mashburn as its city manager in early 2024. Chacon called it a “transparent” process … but it wasn’t.

I was covering the City Council meeting the night Mashburn got the nod. A lot of the run-up process caught me by surprise. Transparent? No.

Chacon had interviewed Mashburn, who was an assistant city manager in Farmers Branch. She was the primary interviewer. Chacon said she brought in some “key” department heads to talk to the young man.

Then, on the night of the council meeting, she introduced Mashburn to the council members. They were meeting him for the first time in executive — or closed — session. After visiting with the fellow for about an hour, they voted unanimously to hire him. Council then reconvened the open session and affirmed the decision with a unanimous vote.

I submit that Mashburn’s hiring was not a transparent process. It was shrouded in secrecy. If the new mayor is intent on improving transparency to city government, he can start with opening up the way the city hires its key management personnel.

The city manager is the only person the council hires. The manager is in charge of hiring everyone else. However, the mayor presides over the city government and he or she can set the transparency tone simply by insisting that these processes be conducted in full public view.

Princeton opened its new municipal complex touting its many windows as a symbol of transparency. Perhaps the new mayor can deliver on the symbolism.

Donald Trump

Trump’s angry because of this? What … ?

Donald Trump has expressed displeasure over the nation’s salute to one of his predecessors at the time of a presidential inauguration.

Small-mindedness has hit a new low.

President Biden ordered all flags to fly at half-staff for 30 days to honor the late President Jimmy Carter. Trump will be inaugurated on Jan. 20, while the flags will still be flying at half-staff. Trump thinks that disrespects his return to the presidency.

Give me a break … man!

Carter died near the end of the year just passed. President Joe Biden’s order was totally proper and in keeping with longstanding national tradition. Of course, Trump doesn’t respect any tradition that he deems diminishes his own role, which this one does not!

For the incoming president to bitch about flags flying in honor of a great statesman only sullies Trump’s already rotten reputation.

local news

It’s me vs. solicitors

My friends tell me I possess a fairly even-tempered disposition, that they like that as a rule I don’t get too rattled.

I am afraid that’s about to change as it regards door-to-door solicitors.

I have posted next to my front porch a “No Solicitation” sign. It’s been out there for years. And … for years solicitors have ignored it.

I young man rang my doorbell today, carrying some material for a home security system. I said “no” to him. He was on his way.

He chose to ignore the sign, I guess.

From this very moment on, I am going to tell solicitors of the sign. I want to point it out to them. I might also spew a few four-letter words at them for seemingly ignoring my plea to stay away.

I am declaring a state of war between me and the door-to-door cabal out there. I feel better now.

national news

Jan. 6 to come … and go

Pop quiz time: How many Americans do you think knew that Jan. 6 was a politically significant date prior to the onslaught that occurred on that date four years ago?

My guess? Damn few of us knew.

I mention that because on Monday, Congress is going to gather in the Capitol Building to certify the Electoral College result from the 2024 presidential election … just as it did four years ago when the traitorous mob stormed the Capitol seeking to overturn the result of the 2020 election.

Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump four years ago. Trump rejected the result, calling the election “rigged” and “stolen.” He sent the mob to the Capitol, imploring the goons to “fight like hell.” They did. You know what happened.

Four years later, Trump defeated Vice President Kamala Harris. Will the VP summon a mob to attack our government? Nope. Won’t happen. She took her loss with grace, dignity and class.

Jan. 6 falls precisely two weeks before Inauguration Day. Every four years, Congress and the incumbent vice president gather to canvass the Electoral College votes and then certify the winner.

The irony, of course, will drip from the event that takes place next week. Harris was elected duly as vice president in 2020 and this year she will preside over Congress’s ritual certification of an election that produced her defeat by the individual who incited an insurrection four years ago. I have to wonder if she’s gritting her teeth at the idea.

But this post-election certification will go off without a hitch because the guy who lost the previous election — and denied President Biden the peaceful transition he deserved — will have won.

Many patriots, such as me, will accept the result … even if we dislike the outcome.

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