One word: diversification.
More:
Meth, coke, cigarettes, and missile systems? Most crooks specialize in one or two areas, but not Mr. Chen; he apparently wanted to be the Wal-Mart of smugglers. You’ve got to give the guy props for ambition.
Edited to add: Darn it, I just realized; if he had done something with booze (untaxed maotai?) he could have had the trifecta.
On Friday, the Statesman was pushing a Sunday profile of Maurice Pierce.
“Who is Maurice Pierce?” you ask. You may remember him from this blog entry back in December, but if you don’t: Pierce was one of four men charged in the “yogurt shop” murders, had the charges against him dropped, and resurfaced back in December when he cut a cop’s throat and was shot dead.
Oddly enough, the promised profile never showed up either online or in the print editions of Sunday’s paper. I shall be keeping my eyes open; perhaps they decided to push it out a week for some reason.
In the meantime, our local paper brings us the happy news that SB905 passed the Texas Senate by a vote of 25-6. What would SB905 do?
As Lawrence said when I sent him this link, “Some animals are more equal than others.”
(I’m a wee bit skeptical about relying on the Speciman for coverage of this bill, but I can’t find anything on the TSRA web site.)
I have noted in the past that I don’t like linking to XKCD; if you read this blog, you’re probably reading XKCD as well, so linking to it is like carrying coals to Newcastle or something equally pointless.
I’m breaking with policy because Randall Munroe has two things going today that I really like.
Thing #1: today’s strip. “You become great by wanting to do something, and then doing it so hard that you become great in the process.”
Thing #2: this blog post, which neatly and concisely summarizes what’s happening on the Mississippi River.
(ORCS is the Old River Control Structure, which limits the flow from the Mississippi to the Atchafalaya.)
(Subject line hattip: from the same place that McPhee got his title for The Control of Nature
