The incomparable Stu Rees of Stu’s Views passes along a common experience shared by most attorneys who have had the “pleasure” of managing a law firm:
The managing partner
Reply
Monthly Archives: November 2007
Mike Leach’s Selective Memory
By now, most folks who follow college football know that Texas Tech head coach Mike Leach received a record fine and public reprimand from the Big 12 Conference for his post-game comments questioning the integrity of the referees who officiated last weekend’s Texas-Texas Tech game in Austin in which the Horns hammered the Red Raiders, 59-43.
But not as well publicized as Leach’s outburst is Leach’s hypocrisy in making the remarks in the first place.
One of Leach’s main gripes with the officiating crew last weekend was that one of the officials on the crew was from Austin, referee Randy Christal. However, what Leach failed to mention is that the last two Tech-Texas games also have had a Lubbock resident as an on-field crew member — Tim Pringle last year in Lubbock and Kelly Deterding this past weekend in Austin.
Moreover, this week’s Tech-Oklahoma game in Lubbock renews a similar controversy after the controversial ending of the 2005 Tech-OU game in Lubbock, but Leach wasn’t complaining about the referees after that game.
Both Lubbock resident Deterding and Austin resident Christal were on the officiating crew during that 2005 game when the officials flagrantly missed a spot on a key fourth down play that kept a last ditch Tech drive alive and then allowed Tech to win the game on a disputed Taurean Henderson touchdown run on the final play of the game.
The video of the blown spot call that kept the final Tech drive alive is below.
It’s 4th down and 3, Tech QB Cody Hodges’ pass is batted in the air and Tech WR Danny Amendola and an OU defender come down with the ball well-short of the first down mark. After the play, both television announcers observe that, even if Amendola caught the ball cleanly, he was stopped well short of the first down marker. The announcers are incredulous when the officiating crew spots the ball and gives Tech a first down:
Of course, that play is followed by the last play of the game where the video shows Tech RB Henderson s-t-r-e-t-c-h-e-s the ball over the goal line. At least Henderson’s TD stretch was a closer call than the Amendola “phantom first down” catch.
To his credit, Oklahoma head coach Bob Stoops didn’t make a public issue of it at the time even though he had a better case than Leach did after his recent outburst in Austin. Stoops’ maturity is one of the many reasons that he is a better and more successful coach than Leach.
By the way, that controversial 2005 Tech-OU is also famous for the following video, which establishes that Lubbock is not only one of the toughest places for a visiting team to play, but also one of the toughest places for a visiting player to give a post-game press interview:
Update: Tech upset the Sooners, 34-27.
Remembering 1968
In 1968, I was a 15-year old concentrating on playing various high school sports in Iowa City, a Midwestern college town. However, even in that somewhat sheltered environment, it was impossible not to realize that 1968 was an unusually tumultuous year. This Daniel Henninger/Opinion Journal op-ed reminds us of just what a wild ride 1968 was:
In 1968, Nicolas Sarkozy was 13 years old. John McCain was 32 and Hillary Clinton was 21. Barack Obama was 7. It is not beyond imagining that the precocious Messrs. Sarkozy and Obama were alert to events in 1968, but for the first wave of baby boomers just touching adulthood that year, it was the beginning of a strange journey.
Nearly any one of the events that went off in 1968 would have been enough to dominate another year. To list what actually happened that year even today boggles the mind, and spirit.
The year began with sales of the Beatles album, “Magical Mystery Tour.” In retrospect, it was a premonition. In late January, North Korea captured the USS Pueblo and crew members. A week later, the North Vietnamese army launched the Tet offensive.
On Feb. 27, Walter Cronkite announced on CBS News that the U.S. had to negotiate a settlement to the Vietnam War. On March 12, Sen. Gene McCarthy defeated incumbent President Lyndon Johnson in the New Hampshire primary, aided by antiwar students that Sen. McCarthy called his “children’s crusade.” Two weeks later, LBJ announced on TV that he would not run for re-election. One week later, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. It was only April 4.
There were race riots everywhere. On April 24, students occupied five buildings at Columbia University, protesting the war. In May bloody student riots erupted in France, likely witnessed by the impressionable Mr. Sarkozy.
On June 3, Valerie Solanas shot Andy Warhol in a New York City loft. Two days later, Sirhan Sirhan assassinated Robert F. Kennedy Jr. In August, the Soviet Union occupied Czechoslovakia. Seven days later, antiwar demonstrators at the Democratic convention fought pitched battles with the Chicago police.
On Nov. 4, having absorbed all this, the people of the United States voted. They gave 43.4% of their vote to Richard Nixon and 42.7% to Hubert Humphrey. Alabama Gov. George Wallace got 13.5%. Four years later, George Wallace was shot while running for president. 1968 lasted a long time.
Whatever civic culture the U.S. had until the 1960s, it was now transformed. After ’68, we had a new kind of political and social culture, pounding like a jackhammer into the older bedrock. The country cracked. Look at those 1968 popular vote numbers; half the country went left and half went right.
Read the entire piece.
The nation’s worst-managed transit system
Tom Rubin is an accountant who has audited many transit agencies and is an expert in transit system accounting. Randal O’Toole channels a Rubin presentation in describing the nation’s worst-managed transit system:
Participants in the Preserving the American Dream conference were encouraged to ride [the] light-rail line to one of the conference events. What they saw was not a pretty picture. Trains were infrequent (one of the supposed advantages of rail is that they run so frequently that riders donít need to consult schedules), the in-street tracks are dangerous (one conference goer slipped on a rail and fell into a curb), and the fellow patrons are not always people you want to be around (several conference goers were treated to the scene of someone becoming violently ill on board, leading one of our members to say, ìSo thatís what they mean by ëvibrant streetsíî).
Beyond these impressions, Rubin observes that [the light-rail system] has ìthe worst operating statistics of any American transit operator.î The reason for this, he says, is that [the area] ó being built mostly after World War II ó is one of the most spread-out urban areas in the country. Not only are people spread out, but jobs are spread out, with no job concentrations anywhere.
This makes large buses particularly unsuitable for transit because there is no place where large numbers of people want to go. So what was [the transit system’s] solution when its bus numbers were low relative to other transit agencies? Build light rail ó in other words, use an expensive technology that requires even more job concentrations.
Now it has one of the, if not the, poorest-patronized light-rail systems in America. So what is its solution? Build heavy rail, a technology that requires even more job concentrations.
What transit system are O’Toole and Rubin describing? Well, it sure sounds like it could be Houston’s, but it’s not. They are talking about San Jose, California’s system.
But how long do you think it will be until Houston’s light rail system is in similar shape?
What goes up, usually comes down
The BBC’s Evan Davis provides a short article on how to keep the recent spike in oil prices in perspective:
It’s clear that $100 a barrel is very high. Although it’s worth saying, it’s still not a record.
1864 was in fact the most expensive year for oil. It was over $104 in today’s money. Notwithstanding that record (and most of us in the media will ignore it when talking of record highs in the next few weeks – we’ll be using the high of $104.7 reached in 1980 after the Iranian revolution) we can at least say an impending $100 barrel is getting historically significant.
And Davis provides the following observation about the market for oil that echos that of former Exxon chairman, Lee Raymond:
But the point of volatile market is that it swings both ways.
The longer we have higher oil prices, the more we can economise on oil – by switching to smaller cars for example. And the more oil that gets produced ñ a small excess of supply over demand – and the price can plummet.
The lesson of history, is that when oil prices soar up to record levels, they usually then fall back down.
And here’s one final price of oil thought for the day, courtesy of Shai Agassi:
The cost of the average used car in Europe is now cheaper than the cost of gasoline to drive it for a year . . .
Edwards returns to demagoguery
After an effective television ad, the John Edwards campaign returns to Edwards’ usual form of demagoguery against business interests in the ad below:
By the way, one of Edwards’ proposed ways in which to force Congress to take action on his call of universal health care coverage won’t fly.
The Philly reaction to the Lidge deal
Tuck depicts the quintessential Philadelphia reaction to the Lidge deal.
Jumping to conclusions on Judge Kent
Embattled U.S. District Judge Sam Kent is an easy target these days (all previous posts here). Along those lines, Chronicle legal columnist and blogger Mary Flood makes the following statement in this blog post on the Chronicle’s latest story about the allegations against Judge Kent:
The law sees the judge as innocent until proven guilty of these allegations, though so far he faces no criminal or civil lawsuits over the matter anyway. But it is important to note that his fellow judges removed him from work (albeit with pay) for the last four months of the year and reprimanded him for sexual harassment (emphasis added).
Flood’s above assertion may be correct, but we do not know that at this time. The Judicial Council’s order certainly says no such thing. The order states that a judicial complaint alleging sexual harassment was filed against Judge Kent and that a special investigatory committee reviewed the allegations and expanded the investigation to review other allegations of “inappropriate behavior” toward other federal employees. The order goes on to state that, after completing the investigation, the investigative committee recommended a reprimand and other “remedial courses of action.” The Judicial Council accepted the committee’s recommendation of reprimanding Judge Kent and concluded the proceeding “because appropriate remedial action had been and will be taken, including but not limited to the Judge’s four-month leave of absence from the bench, reallocation ofthe Galveston/Houston docket and other measures.” The Judicial Council’s order also admonished Judge Kent “that his actions . . . violated the mandates of the Canons of the Code of Conduct for United States Judges and are deemed prejudicial to the effective and expeditious administration of the business of the courts and the administration of justice.”
Thus, here’s what we know. A judicial complaint alleging sexual harassment was filed against Judge Kent. An investigation ensued and was expanded beyond the allegations contained in the initial complaint to other “inappropriate behavior.” Judge Kent presumably defended himself in regard to the allegations, but he is precluded by applicable rules relating to such investigations from discussing the matter publicly. The Judicial Council reprimanded and admonished Judge Kent, but the findings of fact and conclusions of law upon which the council based its reprimand have not — and probably will never will be — made public.
Thus, at this point, stating that Judge Kent was “reprimanded for sexual harassment” is speculation. He may have been, but the reason could also have been inappropriate behavior not related to sexual harassment, such as a drinking problem or simply acting badly toward subordinates. Further legal proceedings appear to be likely, so I’m inclined to wait to see what information develops in a forum where he can defend himself before jumping to conclusions in the matter of Judge Kent.
Weary’s Taser lawsuit
Houston Texans offensive lineman Fred Weary — who was Tasered under dubious circumstances by a couple of HPD officers on the side of one of Houston’s busiest freeways last year around this time — has filed a civil rights lawsuit in Houston federal court against the City of Houston and the officers involved in the matter.
The misdemeanor criminal charges against Weary that supposedly justified the Tasering were dismissed in short order shortly after the arrest. A copy of Weary’s complaint is here and the case has been assigned to U.S. District Judge Gray Miller, who worked as a Houston Police officer while he went to law school at the University of Houston in the late 1970’s. Weary is represented by Joseph Walker of the Houston firm of Franklin Mosele & Walker.
As noted in the prior post and as reflected by the summary dismissal of the charges against Weary, the police conduct in stopping and then Tasering Weary doesn’t pass the smell test. My bet is that it won’t play well in court, either. Stay tuned.
Tiger v. Vijay
Although it’s off-season for golf, I’ve been meaning to pass along the video below for awhile. I’m not sure about Peter Kostis analysis, but one thing is certain — these are two very good golf swings.