Archive for the ‘Politics’ Category

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You’re going down in flames, you tax-fattened hyena! (#52 in a series)

Tuesday, January 8th, 2019

I don’t mean to seem lazy, but I can’t put it much better than Reason‘s “Hit and Run” did:

Chicago Alderman and Notorious Nanny-Stater Ed Burke Charged in Federal Corruption Scheme

I know: a corrupt Chicago alderman? Who’d thunk it? From the Tribune:

A federal criminal complaint unsealed Thursday charged Burke with attempted extortion for allegedly using his position as alderman to try to steer business to his private law firm from a company seeking to renovate a fast-food restaurant in his ward. The charge carries a maximum of 20 years in prison on conviction.
The complaint also alleged Burke asked one of the company’s executives in December 2017 to attend an upcoming political fundraiser for “another politician.” Sources identified the politician as Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, who is running for Chicago mayor.

I missed this story, but there was an FBI raid on Burke’s office a few weeks ago:

Prosecutors revealed during the 10-minute hearing that the FBI found 23 guns in the raids on Burke’s City Hall and ward offices in November. As a condition of his bond, Burke, a former Chicago police officer, was ordered to surrender the firearms and any others he may own within 48 hours of his release.

This is amusing: I can’t tell if Burke was a member of Crooked Mayors Against Self-Defense (or if he was even eligable, being an alderman) but he was a big time gun grabber:

But while he was trying to deny residents of one of America’s most violent cities the right to defend themselves and their property, he was protected day-and-night by a team of four Chicago police officers. Having personal bodyguards is not a typical perk of a city alderman, but it’s one Burke has enjoyed for decades, at taxpayer expense, due to threats made against him in the early 1980s.

Of course, innocent until proven guilty, yadda yadda, but: they caught him on the wire. I’m looking forward to Alderman Burke going to prison for a long, long time.

Posted in FBI, Guns, Law, Politics | Comments Closed

City Council updates.

Monday, January 7th, 2019

The new council members get sworn in later today.

However, the city hasn’t updated the contact information yet. For example, the page for District 1 has Natasha Harper-Madison’s name on it, with “Biographical information coming soon”, but the email form still says “Send email to Ora Houston”.

Point being, I’m not ignoring that the contact information pages need to be updated: I’m just waiting on the city of Austin, and Travis County, and Congress, to get their acts together.

Posted in Admin, Austin, Politics | Comments Closed

Things I have been neglecting.

Friday, December 21st, 2018

I really haven’t been doing a good job of keeping up with APD firings.

It isn’t that I’m in the tank for the police department now that I’m doing the Citizen’s Police Academy stuff: I don’t feel like I am, and updating you on firings and other disciplinary actions is a good way to show that the department takes these things seriously.

The problem is more that I’m busier now, both personally and professionally, than I have been in quite a while. I’m not complaining, but it does cut into my blogging time. Heck, as you can see, I’m having trouble even keeping up with obits.

But: when someone in a command rank at a major metropolitan police department gets fired, I kind of feel like I have to take note of this.

Here’s the story from the Statesman.

Here’s the official memo from the chief.

I’m not going into details here because the story has a lot of salacious elements: if that’s your bag, you’re welcome to read the less detailed Statesman article or the much much more detailed disciplinary memo.

The gentleman in question plans to appeal, and his legal representative accuses the chief of “inserting himself into the private life and figuratively the bed” of the officer. I can sort of maybe see that point: there’s a lot of stuff in the memo about whether his behavior, even if there was consent involved, is a violation of the law.

BUT: it seems pretty clear to me from the memo that the gentleman in question also tried to hide information (left his cell phone at another person’s house, deleted videos) knowing he was under investigation. That’s a huge violation of department policy, and (in my humble opinion) justifies a firing by itself.

Posted in Austin, Cops, Law | Comments Closed

Austin politics.

Thursday, December 13th, 2018

So the run off election for city council members is over.

Sabino “Pio” Renteria is going to retain his place in District 3.

Natasha Harper-Madison is the new District 1 council person.

Paige Ellis is the new District 8 council person.

As I’ve said previously, I will be updating the City Council contact page, but it will be after the new members take office and I can get their information: I think that will be early January.

Posted in Austin, Politics | Comments Closed

Obit watch: December 1, 2018.

Saturday, December 1st, 2018

George Herbert Walker Bush. NYT. HouChron. WP. LAT. Lawrence. McThag.

Posted in Heroism, History, Obits, Politics | Comments Closed

Administrative note.

Wednesday, November 7th, 2018

I get a lot of hits on the contact information for Austin City Council members page.

Just so everyone knows, I will be updating that and the other contact pages, but not until after the new folks take office, which I think will be January.

Posted in Admin, Austin, Politics, Texas, Travis County | Comments Closed

Obit watch: November 1, 2018.

Thursday, November 1st, 2018

NYT obit for Victor Marchetti. (Previously.)

Willie McCovey. SFGate.

Posted in Books, History, Law, Politics, Sports | 1 Comment »

As the flaming hyena turns.

Thursday, October 25th, 2018

Remember Dawnna Dukes? Remember what an enormous nothing-burger that whole thing turned out to be?

She’s suing the Statesman, Margaret Moore (the current Travis County DA) and Rosemary Lehmberg (the previous DA), “an investigator with the state auditor’s office”, and three former aides.

The lawsuit, filed late Wednesday by Dukes on her own behalf and without a lawyer, seeks $7.8 million for malicious prosecution and defamation.

The fact that she’s proceeding pro se with a defamation suit is not a good sign. But I Am Not A Lawyer: I’d ask Ken White for his take, but he’s pretty busy these days.

On the other hand, she’s probably proceeding without a lawyer because she’s broke:

The 12-term Austin Democrat said investigative stories by the Statesman, followed by corruption charges that were eventually dismissed, left her financially ruined — saddled with a $187,000 legal bill, deprived of consulting contracts and unable to find additional work.
As a result, her lawsuit said, Dukes’ credit cards were canceled, her car was repossessed and her home and East Austin commercial properties were foreclosed upon.
“The trauma due to financial hardships and loss of reputation aggravated (Dukes’) health issues and, to this day, there is still a lingering inconsolable grief caused by her substantial loss,” the lawsuit said.
Dukes also blamed her legal trouble for her defeat in the Democratic primary in March.

I’ll try to keep an eye on this one. Especially the discovery portion of it: that should be a lot of fun.

Posted in Austin, IANAL, Law, Media, Politics, Texas | Comments Closed

No stars, no bucks.

Wednesday, October 24th, 2018

In case you haven’t heard, customers who get water from the City of Austin are under a boil water notice. The water treatment plants are overwhelmed by the volume of silt and organic matter that’s being stirred up by the release of water from the dams, as a result of the continuing rain in the area.

At my office, the water fountains, water dispensers, and coffee makers are completely shut down. (Even though the fountains and dispensers have their own filtering systems.) I’m lucky: the MUD that services our house in Lakeway is not impacted by this, we don’t have to boil our water, and I can put coffee in my Yeti cup (thanks to my beloved and indulgent sister) before I leave in the morning and keep it hot until I finish it off.

But I digress. I tried going over to the Dunkin’ Doughnuts near my office yesterday to see if they could do one of those big coffee boxes for the office. They just laughed at me. (Hey, I figured these places had their own water filtration systems.)

I just called over to the Starbucks nearest our office to see what their status was. (Again: Starbucks brags about their water filtration system.)

Not only was that Starbucks not doing the big coffee boxes, they were not brewing coffee at all. The guy who answered the phone told me none of the Austin Starbucks (79 of them, I think he said) were brewing coffee: if I wanted coffee, I’d have to go to Cedar Park, Georgetown, or Round Rock.

What does a Starbucks do if they can’t make coffee? I guess you could boil water (or heat bottled water) and do tea from teabags. Maybe serve pastries?

One of my cow-orkers said earlier that they expect this to go on for another twelve days. I can’t find any news or official government source that’s reporting an expected duration for this boil water notice, though, so I’m taking that with a grain of salt.

I swear, you people are going to make a prepper out of me yet.

Posted in Austin, Hysteria, Politics | 2 Comments »

Obit watch: October 18, 2018.

Thursday, October 18th, 2018

Yesterday’s headline of the day:

Nevada’s famous pimp expected to win election despite death

NYT obit for Dennis Hof.

Felix Smith, pilot for Civil Air Transport.

Civil Air Transport, which was later run by the C.I.A., was a back-channel carrier assembled in 1946 by former Lt. Gen. Claire L. Chennault of the Army Air Forces using surplus World War II planes and a supply and maintenance ship and recruiting pilots from the Flying Tigers, a volunteer World War II unit famed for its exploits in the skies over China. The airline’s aim was to undergird the Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek in the protracted civil war against the Communists.

CAT evolved into the legendary Air America.

Posted in History, Law, Politics | Comments Closed

Quickies.

Wednesday, October 3rd, 2018

Our short national nightmare is over:

The Republic of Texas Biker Rally and the Heat Wave car show will go on at the Travis County Exposition Center, but the Travis Central Appraisal District will have to scramble to find another venue for thousands of property tax protest hearings after county commissioners voted Tuesday to continue contract negotiations for the two highly popular events.
After a heated debate, commissioners voted 3-2 Tuesday, with County Judge Sarah Eckhardt and Commissioner Margaret Gómez against, to move toward contracts with the event organizers on renting the Expo Center, leaving the appraisal district out of the mix.

Chimene Onyeri, the guy who shot Judge Kocurek: life in federal prison.

Paul Molitor out as manager of the Minnesota Twins. 78-84 this season and no playoffs.

Posted in Firings, Law, Politics, Travis County | Comments Closed

First they came for the gun shows…

Tuesday, September 25th, 2018

…and I wasn’t a gun owner, so I didn’t say anything.

(No, wait: actually, I did. Previously.)

Then they came for the ROT Rally and the Heat Wave car show.

Travis County commissioners will vote Tuesday on whether to lease the banquet hall to the Travis County Central Appraisal District instead. The lease would be from May to August, making the banquet hall unavailable for the Republic of Texas biker rally, which would take place in June, and the Heat Wave car show, which is scheduled for July.
Organizers with both events said that not having access to the banquet hall could be a deal-breaker.

…

If commissioners approve the agenda item on the banquet hall lease, “there won’t be a ROT rally in 2019,” Bragg said. “If they decide to postpone the decision, there’s room for negotiation.”
The same goes for Heat Wave, said David MacDonald, the show’s owner.

I don’t have anything against motorcycle people: some of my best (virtual) friends are motorcycle people. And I kind of agree with part of the argument: why give the space to the county (basically moving money from one pocket to the other) instead of letting a profitable event that brings in a host of visitors every year pay to use it?

But as I said several years ago: there are more deaths associated with the ROT Rally every year than were ever associated with the old Saxet gun shows at the Expo Center. The ROT Rally is always something I find vaguely obnoxious. Fortunately, most of it is either downtown (which we avoid during ROT Rally) or out at the Expo Center. But you still have roads clotted with bikers, many who seem to have bolted on the loudest exhaust pipes commercially available. That weekend’s usually a mess, and I wouldn’t miss it terribly if it was gone. (I don’t have the same reaction to the car show. That just maybe barely impinges on the fringes of my consciousness. Maybe they could do that in WillCo?)

Posted in Politics, Travis County | 2 Comments »

Yes, we have no bananas…

Friday, September 21st, 2018

…but we do have $17 million worth of Bolivian Marching powder.

Posted in Law, Texas | Comments Closed

Obit watch: August 26, 2018.

Sunday, August 26th, 2018

Running a little behind. These are all pretty much just for the hysterical record: they’ve been well covered elsewhere, and I just don’t have a lot to add.

Neil Simon.

John McCain. NYT. WP. Lawrence.

Robin Leach.

Posted in History, Obits, Politics, Theatre, TV | Comments Closed

Obit watch: August 21, 2018.

Tuesday, August 21st, 2018

David Rothenberg died on July 15th at the age of 42. His death was not widely reported until late last week.

He worked as a visual artist under the name “Dave Dave” in Las Vegas:

Mr. Rothenberg became a close friend of Michael Jackson, who encouraged him to pursue a career in art. Through brightly colored 1960s-style Pop Art paintings and drawings, he sought to promote positivity, he wrote on his website, particularly through a series called “Lifted.”
“There is a lot that happens in people’s lives, but that doesn’t define them as a human being, it makes them stronger,” Mr. Rothenberg told The Las Vegas Review-Journal in 2016.

Here’s the rest of the story:

He was 6 in 1983 when his father gave him a sleeping pill in a motel room in Buena Park, Calif., near Disneyland, and then doused his bed with kerosene and set it on fire. The attack left burns on more than 90 percent of David’s body. His father, who was said to be in a bitter custody fight with his wife, Marie, then fled.
“He was working at a restaurant in New York, and he had saved $10,000 for this trip to California,” Mr. Rothenberg told The Review-Journal. “On the trip, he was planning to kill me.”

I swear that I’ve written about his father, Charles, previously, but I can’t find that blog entry now. Charles Rothenberg spent seven years in prison for attempted murder before being paroled. He went on to commit other crimes: I recall them being mostly financial. He’s currently serving a 25 to life sentence in California under the three strikes law.

For the historical record: Kofi Annan.

Posted in Law, Obits, Politics | Comments Closed

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