Daily Archives: December 7, 2005

The hope of the Texans?

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reggiebush-usc05b.jpgHow exactly does a human body make the kind of cut that USC running back Reggie Bush is making in the picture on the left?
Although the Texas Longhorns must find a way to stop Bush in the Rose Bowl, the Houston Texans and their supporters are just hoping that Bush comes out of the game in one piece so that he will be available for the Texans to select with their first round draft choice in the 2006 NFL Draft (at least Texans GM Charlie Casserly didn’t give that draft choice up in the Philip Buchanon deal). Inasmuch as the current Texans team is nearly unwatchable, take a moment to review this slick USC promotional video for Bush’s Heisman Trophy candidacy and the video that is included with this New York Times article of Bush’s exploits while playing high school ball in San Diego. This young man is really something special.

Got your Rose Bowl tickets yet?

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Rose Bowl logo6.jpgThis US Today article reports on the ticket market for this season’s Rose Bowl game between USC and Texas for the BCS National Championship:

[T]ickets in the Texas end zone were selling for $1,050 apiece. Tickets near the 40-yard line were priced at $4,458.

H’mm. Watching the game on HDTV is sounding pretty good, eh?
Speaking of Rose Bowl tickets, you can always count on Craigslist to generate creative new ways to facilitate the exchange of such hot items with, might we say, more traditional services.

The San Antonio Marlins?

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Marlins_.jpgThe Florida Marlins Baseball Club is making the rounds of potential relocation sites, and the first stop was in San Antonio. Other contenders for the club are Las Vegas, Portland, Oregon, and Charlotte, North Carolina. A move could come as soon as the 2008 baseball season, and such a move could also be impacted by the fact that the current MLB Labor Agreement allows the MLB owners to delete up to two clubs after the 2006 season, so stay tuned.
Interestingly, the potential move of the two-time World Series champion Marlins from Miami is being met with a collective yawn by South Floridians. Craig Depken explains why:

In the end, Miami-Dade County residents will survive just fine without baseball. Although their team won two World Series in their first ten years of existence, in comparison to the sights and sounds of Miami, WS rings are a yawner. In this sense, if the good folks of Miami don’t care one way or the other if the Marlins are in town, why should the rest of us?

O’Reilly’s appalling ignorance of markets

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Bill O'Reilly.jpgBill O’Reilly is a popular Fox News show host and author, but he is really nothing more than a fleetingly entertaining demagogue. Case in point is the following exchange between O’Reilly and Neil Cavuto, another Fox News host:

CAVUTO: Okay. Gas prices are down a lot. Why do you think that is?
OíREILLY: Because theyíre afraid theyíll go to jail. And those C.E.O.s who manipulated themñ
CAVUTO: Why are you sure that they manipulated them?
OíREILLY: I have guys that are inside the five major oil companies – my father used to work for one of those oil companies, by the way – who have told me that in those meetings they look for every way to jack up oil prices after Katrina, every way. When they didnít have to. And they got scared because in my reporting and some other reporting, they said ñ

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The legal research racket

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WestlawButton.jpgIn this interesting post, the Wired GC discusses the potential negative impact of Web 2.0 on high-cost legal research services such as Westlaw and Lexis/Nexis, and then passes along this anecdote that should give pause to the legal research vendors:

Then as I am about to leave my office last night and head home to complete this post, I opened a November 30, 2005 letter from an SVP of West. It was one of those customer-friendly letters you get these days. You know, the sort that starts out ìDear Westlaw Subscriberî and goes on to state:

ìTo help us continue upgrading the Westlaw content and functionality that helps you carry out top-quality research, we will be increasing rates for Westlaw usage by an average of six percent (6%) as of January 1, 2006.î

The price increase helps me? I set my 2006 budget months ago. For most technology-driven companies, upgrades typically lower costs for customers. No mention of any enhancements, either.
Memo to West: a form letter that slaps a long-term customer with a 30 day notice of a unilateral price increase is very much Law 1.0. Risking driving a customer away is rather ignoring Law 2.0.

Read the whole post.

Duke traders acquitted on most counts

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duke energy4.gifIn another stunning loss for federal prosecutors in the post-Enron prosecutions of persons involved in the energy trading industry, a federal jury in Houston federal court yesterday acquitted former Duke Energy trader Todd Reid on all counts of conspiracy, fraud and falsifying books, and acquitted co-defendant Timothy Kramer on seven counts of wire fraud, mail fraud, and circumventing Duke Energy internal controls in connection with the award of $9 million in trader bonuses during 2001. Earlier posts on the case are here, here and here.
As of mid-afternoon yesterday, the jury reported to U.S. District Judge Nancy Atlas that they were deadlocked on 15 remaining counts against Kramer. Judge Atlas instructed the jury to continue deliberating and then informed the attorneys involved in the case that she would declare a mistrial if the jury could not agree on a verdict on the remaining counts against Kramer by the end of the day. Later that afternoon, the jurors sent the Judge a note informing her that they had acquitted Kramer on three more counts and that they wanted to return tomorrow to attempt to resolve the remaining 12 counts (a personal matter of one juror prevents the jury from deliberating today). Judge Atlas agreed to allow the jury to do so.

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