Daily Archives: December 5, 2004

SCOTUS whacks Fifth Circuit

Posted on by
Reply

In this extraordinary NY Sunday Times article, U.S. Supreme Court sources provide highly unusual and scathing public criticism of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals and the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals‘ handling of appeals of Texas Death Row inmates. The Houston Chronicle chimes in with a similar article here.
My sense is that the Fifth Circuit judges will not be exchanging Holiday Greeting cards this year with the SCOTUS Justices. And with good reason. The Fifth Circuit must attempt to decipher SCOTUS’s almost indecipherable standards for setting aside death penalty convictions while administering hundreds more of such cases each year than SCOTUS. Although excess volume certainly does justify sloppy adjudication, SCOTUS’s difficult-to-ascertain standards — coupled with prisoners’ easy access to the appellate process — is the real culprit here, not any disrespect for SCOTUS or political agenda, as the NY Times article suggests.

2004 Weekly local football review

Posted on by
Reply

Jets 29 Texans 7.

After leading 7-6 at halftime, the Texans folded in the second half to allow the Jets to win easily. In another miserable performance during a season of inconsistent outings, Texans’ QB David Carr (12/25 for 157 yds, no TD’s and 2 ints) threw into coverage the entire day and once again provided considerable evidence that he lacks even average recognition skills after 2.5+ seasons in the NFL.
With Carr totally ineffective, the Jets gradually began to dominate the line of scrimmage in the second half and ended up rushing for more than 200 yds against the Texans’ beleaguered defense. Nevertheless, other than Carr, the rest of the Texans played reasonably well and this loss is squarely attributable to Carr’s inability to find the hot receiver against the Jets’ stout defense.
With young AFC QBs such as Brees, Roethlisberger, Leftwich, and Palmer all outperforming Carr, the Texans’ management has to be getting nervous that they blew the first pick in their first draft on what is appearing to be, at best, a barely above-average NFL quarterback.
The 5-7 Texans return to Reliant Stadium next Sunday to be sliced into small pieces by Peyton Manning and the Colts.

Cowboys 43 Seahawks 39. The Cowboys scored 14 points in the final two minutes of the game to edge the Seahawks on Monday Night Football. The Pokes’ running back from Notre Dame — Junius Jones — looks pretty darn good and has placed Eddie George so far down the Cowboys’ bench that he is not even mentioned anymore. The 5-7 Cowboys take on the 4-8 Saints next Sunday at Texas Stadium in Dallas.
College Bowl Game Selections

The final games of the regular season worked out well for Texas and Texas A&M, as the Longhorns moved into a BCS Bowl game against Michigan in the Rose Bowl, and the Aggies moved up into the Cotton Bowl on New Year’s Day in Dallas against Tennessee.
However, the EV1.net Houston Bowl on Dec. 29 was a loser in the bowl selection process as the Independence Bowl selected Iowa State, leaving the Houston Bowl with Colorado, which was pummeled by Oklahoma 42-3 in the Big 12 Championship game on Saturday night. The Houston Bowl wanted to match already selected UTEP with Iowa State because the Cyclones improved dramatically over the last part of the season and their fans travel well. On the other hand, Colorado’s supporters are notorious for being the worst traveling fans in the Big 12. Indicative of that trait is the fact that they bought a total of 1,700 out of 8,000 alotted tickets for the Big 12 Championship game.

The other Texas bowls have interesting matchups. San Antonio’s Alamo Bowl has Ohio State playing Oklahoma State on December 29, while Arizona State and Purdue will fling it around El Paso’s Sun Bowl on New Year’s Eve.