Category: Orphans

Law enforcement and groups such as MADD are always on the lookout for new ways to get drunk drivers off the highway. While such efforts may be well-intentioned they often end up walking the fine line between what does and what doesn’t violate constitutional rights.

Law officers in Jefferson County (Texas), where I reside, announced yesterday that they will adopt a plan which has provided some controversy in other parts of the state. The concept is called “No Refusal Night.” The “no refusal” refers to a DWI suspect being taken to jail where a judge is on hand to sign a warrant for a blood test in the event the suspect refuses a breath test.

A 2002 Texas Court of Criminal Appeals case opened the door for “blood search warrants” in DWI cases in which suspects refused a Breathalyzer. More recently Texas counties have been trying the “no refusal” approach to varying degrees. Some areas such as in Collin County, north of Dallas, want to expand the no refusal plan to more holidays and perhaps each weekend.

What is wrong with such a program if it gets drunks out from behind the wheel? Well for one thing, it raises search and seizure issues. This is especially true when looking at who actually performs the blood test. While it might be legal for law enforcement personnel without adequate medical training to draw blood for the blood tests, the matter is far from settled. And some medical facilities have questions as to whether their medical personnel should perform the test on someone when the sample is taken without the subject’s consent. That makes sense, given one has to sign a consent form before a hospital will treat you. The one news story I saw on this announcement in Southeast Texas didn’t really make it clear who would be performing these blood tests.

And I am certainly not a lawyer nor do I play one on television. But I would have to question whether having a justice of the peace or county court-at-law judge on standby to sign a warrant willy-nilly at the police agency’s request is exactly how the whole search warrant “thing” was meant to be.

I do have to say that this is a pretty gusty move both legally and politically for Jefferson County law officers and judges given the reputation for this area being a plaintiff’s heaven or, if you are a tort-reformista, “a judicial hellhole.”

It will be interesting to see how it turns out. The best way to avoid the confrontation is to not drink and drive. Unfortunately, not everyone will choose to do that.

A nice old-fashioned snow in Southeast Texas.

My poor, cold, little Tacoma became blanketed in snow overnight. This happening in Beaumont, Texas, only 45 miles north of the Gulf of Mexico.

It doesn’t snow very often here. I heard on television that this was the first measurable snowfall in about four years. And the snow set an all-time record here for December at a whopping 2-3 inches. Nope, it doesn’t snow here very much but nonetheless, my sentiments can only be summed up on the hood of my Toyota pickemup:

The Weather Channel shows the pink of mixed frozen precipitation on its local radar inching its way into the western edge of Jefferson County, almost at the most southeastern edge of Texas. A little snow is behind it.

Nevertheless, I don’t expect to wake tomorrow to a Winter wonderland. I will be surprised if my pickup’s roof is covered with snow rather than the rain which is falling outside right now with temperatures hovering around 33 degrees.

In reality and, somewhat to my wonderment, it is not unusual for this part of eastern Texas to get a blast of cold and even snow-sleet accompanied air this time of the year even though it isn’t even officially winter on the Texas Gulf Coast.

I am sure there probably is some meteorological reason for it but spending as many years in this portion of Texas as I have — ranging from birth to my early 50s with some time off in Central and North Texas, Southern Mississippi, southern California and the Southern Pacific — I have noticed that this corner of the state quite often gets a super blast of Arctic air a week or two before Christmas.

Several times I can remember pre-Christmas snow and sleet storms where I grew up deep in the Pineywoods. Later I remember colder ‘n hell pre-Christmases in Dallas — specifically the week of Christmas 1983 and the week before or near Christmas in 1989. And there have been other instances. I don’t know why we get these chunks o’ cold at these particular times, yet, I have never seen it snow, sleet or come a talcum powder flurry on Christmas Day in my life. Not that it really matters. I have drawn some confused looks from my black friends when I told them I never saw a white Christmas. They said: “Bro, where the hell did you grow up, in Kenya?”

It is just as I mentioned in the earlier post today, the Texas Gulf Coast is hardly your typical winter wonderland. And it’s still raining outside here in Beaumont. And you know something? I like it.

This morning I wore my coat, a knit cap and bought some gloves at lunch all because it is cold. Today is the first time this fall/approaching winter that I have dressed for winter weather. It really isn’t exaggerating to say that I spend the majority of my non-working hours — at least while awake — wearing shorts. I like shorts. They are comfortable for the most part. But they also represent something within my life. Shorts say that unless I have some important task or gig to do, that I can spend a great deal of my life feeling and wearing something comfortable.

I remember having a conversation either with my former psycho girlfriend or a female friend, I cannot remember who, about shoes. Women have some sort of genetic bond with shoes and seeking shoes, at least most of the women I have known. There are exceptions of course. But women can behold shoes as an object of passion while men look at shoes like … well like an old shoe. Comfort, durability and looks. That is what I look for in shoes. And yes, I’m a flip-flopper. I bought a cool pair of flip flops at Academy sometime right after the hurricane, Ike, now about three months ago and they are beginning to fall apart. They fail the durability test. But they still look cool and are still comfortable.

Not certain where this shoe tangent is going I will just say that I like being comfortable in my own skin, sort of semi-literally. The 35 degrees outside with cold wind, rain and possibly some assorted frozen precip later on makes me uncomfortable whilst I try to gain comfort. What I like least about cold weather is it is always either too cold or too hot. I remember the last time I was in Washington, D.C., it was cold and it seemed like every place one walked in was like entering an oven. Hey, why not have it somewhat temperate so it isn’t such a shock when you either enter or leave an inside space? Novel idea, or what?

Well, it’s about time to jacket up, toboggan up, glove up, get up, truck up, grocery store up, go home up, watch Wolf Blitzer up. Up, up, up.

CHECK OUT THE CRIMINAL COMPLAINT AGAINST BLAGOJEVICH AND HIS CHIEF OF STAFF.

News of the indictment of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich proves one maxim in American politics: Never elect someone whose name you can’t pronounce.

Seriously folks, it is hardly shocking to see an arrest and/or indictment of a high official in the state of Illinois. Some politicians are morally and ethically challenged to begin with although such traits seemed to have been fine tuned over the years in Illinois and Louisiana in particular.

Hopefully this won’t have some kind of damaging link with the new president given his Illinois and Democratic connections. That is even though in just a few minutes that I could stand to listen this morning to Rush Limberger without upchucking, the conservative douche bag was already trying to convict Obama of high crimes and misdemeanors.

U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, who did such a bang-up job getting to the bottom of the CIA-Valerie Plame matter, already is rationalizing the excuse for the indictment coming out when it did. But did Fitzgerald get marching orders from the Justice Department, the White House or the RNC? That is the question.

It — that being the alleged corruption and the rush by Rush and others to tie the Democratic president-elect into it — is just politics as usual. It remains to be seen if Blagojevich and his chief of staff will be convicted of corruption in the legalistic sense. But I think the jury has already spoken as to the moral corruption of those pushing the politics of personal destruction such as Rush Limbaugh.