Obama, You Got Served

So the big news of the week has been John McCain's selection of Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate for the Presidency. Kudos. I think it was a great choice and it helped breathe new life into his campaign once again. But has anyone else noticed how the press has cranked up the ugliness in the last 72 hours?

They have literally invaded Wasilla, AK like cockroaches in a Dairy Queen. They have been talking to EVERYONE who's ever had a run-in with Palin or her family and the dirt machine is cranked up full throttle. I was watching the Today show this morning and they were literally spending the entire first hour on her daughter's pregnancy. They even dug up pictures of the baby daddy and threw them all over the air. Everytime someone from the media writes something or opens their mouth, it's like a fountain of diatribe and hearsay. Where have we seen this before? I think her name rhymes with Billary Flinton...

Now contrast this with the announcement of Joe Biden a couple weeks ago. The media was hailing him as a Hero of the Empire. He's such a good family man with such a wonderful story of overcoming the loss of his first wife and daughter and becoming a truly great American. There was no mud, no controversy, no nuthin'. The media has treated Obama with kid gloves since day one and it's been extended to whitewash Biden's record of taxes, pork, and entitlements.

For the first time since 2004, the mad liberal media is scared. They are going to pull out all the stops and do whatever they can to sink the McCain/Palin ticket. Whether it works is going to be up to the American voters, but I think if they want to turn a race where all the candidates are preaching Unity into more division, I think they've found their excuse in Gov. Palin.

Thoughts on 'Swing Vote' and 'W.'

So I went and watched 'Swing Vote' tonight. Indeed one of the funniest movies I've seen in a long time. I don't know what it is about Kevin Costner, but I just don't get bored watching his movies. 'Dances With Wolves' was agonizingly long, but it worked. This movie is two hours long and it didn't really even seem stretched. That's saying a lot for the writing. Predictable? Of course, it's a Kevin Costner film. It's good for laughs and the innocence of both central characters and the strength they find in each other is the real story of the film.

Then there was the trailer for 'W.'. I don't know who thought Josh Brolin would be a good match to play George W. Bush, maybe the same idiot who thought his Dad looked like Ronald Reagan, but it just looks plain stupid. If anything, I'm GLAD that this movie is being released this fall simply for the fact that more people will wake up and see how Hollywood and the Media are trying to rig yet another election. Michael Moore fell flat on his face four years ago, maybe Oliver Stone will this time too.

Either/OR

Vanilla or Chocolate? Chocolate
Dogs or Cats? Dogs
Coke or Pepsi? Dr. Pepper
The Beatles or The Rolling Stones? Stones!
Microsoft or Apple? Linux
Nike or Adidas? Reebok
Coffee or Tea? Coffee
Spider-Man or Batman? Wolverine
Ketchup or Mustard? Mustard
Pen or Pencil? Pen
Soup or Salad? Salad
Books or Magazines? Books
Indiana Jones or James Bond? Bond
Summer or Winter? Summer
New York City or Los Angeles? LA, specifically, Inglewood
Google or Yahoo? Google
CNN or Fox News? Fox News
Jeopardy or Wheel of Fortune? Jeopardy (the day is mine, Trebek!)
Mountains or Beach? Beach
Yoga or Pilates? Yeah, right
Star Wars or Star Trek? Trek, baby

Vacations and Breakups

So the beginning of the month started off pretty good. I started my vacation on July 3d and went to Nauvoo to visit my sister and brother-in-law. Since Jen hadn't met either of them yet, she decided to tag along. We had a wonderful trip and the weather was just absolutely gorgeous. I don't think I've ever experienced nicer weather in Nauvoo this time of year. No humidity, 75 degrees, just awesome weather. The only bummer was that the Mill and Bakery ran out of pancake mix :(

The next week, I dropped Jen off in Poplar Bluff and drove out to Branson to meet my parents for the rest of my vacation. While the place we stayed had it's "issues", overall we had a good time. It seems that Branson has been taken over by the timeshare industry. You can't go ANYWHERE without someone trying to sell you one ("No Pressure! What's there to think about?") and it's so bad that even the lounge lizards say "I promise, if you come up and leave me a tip, I won't try to sell you a timeshare!" Anyway, we went golfing, Dixie Stampede, the Branson Belle, Ride the Ducks, and capped it all off with Andy Williams and Ann Margaret on Saturday night.

I will say, without a doubt, the most moving tribute I have EVER seen for a group of veterans was with Ann Margaret. She asked if there were any veterans of foreign wars in the audience. She then talked about going to Vietnam with Bob Hope and named off all the places they went. She then said how glad she was they could all come back to see her again 40 years later at Andy Williams' theater. It was heartfelt, emotional, and real. A man wearing a USMC shirt stood up in the front row and gave her some kind of trinket and said that the last time he saw her was in Vietnam. Amazing tribute.

So moving on, I guess the next bit of news is that Jen and I have decided to go our separate ways. There really isn't any one reason why, but we are both very strong in our religious beliefs and those beliefs just aren't compatible at this time. We'll remain good friends and I'm glad that a relationship is ended on a good note for once. That's all I have to say about that.

Crave

I'm craving Chipotle so bad right now I could drive two and a half hours to St. Louis...if it weren't for the freakin' gas prices!! That six dollar burrito would wind up costing over $40 just for the fuel!

Please, PLEASE...stop speculating on oil! I need my Carnitas fix!

Fear

What are we so afraid of these days? Every time I turn on the TV or read the news on the internet, someone's always afraid of something. Now it's gasoline prices and fear of $12 a gallon gas. This is simply ridiculous. The chances of gas EVER reaching that price point are so low that it's almost not even worth writing about. However, everyone I know is freaking out about it for some reason. My legal assistant traded in a 6-month-old Expedition last week for a brand new Avalon because she was spending so much in gas. I don't even want to know the bath they took on the trade, but come on. It's going to take them YEARS to make that up in fuel economy.

Face it, there is plenty of supply in the crude oil trade to exceed our demand. We're not running out of oil--there's so much of the Earth's crust we haven't explored and we will find more. In any case, oil is the latest bubble. Industry consultants are trying to buoy their own investments, so of course they're going to keep feeding fear to the masses. This "crisis" will soon pass, probably during the Olympics when demand in China starts to fall off. In every economic model, there comes a point where supply so far exceeds demand that prices will fall dramatically and this too will come for oil. It's happened with energy, semiconductors, housing, and now oil.

Sometimes You Win

Okay, so Jen's been on my case about updating the old blog. I won my first jury trial about a week and a half ago. It was a major drug manufacturing case and it appears to have put my name on everyone's radar. I can't go into any courthouse down here without SOMEBODY (attorneys, clerks, judges, clients) mentioning it. I'm still having difficulty believing what happened and how everything just seemed to fall into place, but I guess finally seeing a light at the end of the tunnel is hard to accept sometimes. For the first time since I started law school, I feel like a real lawyer. It's a great feeling and I hope it continues.

Words of advice: If you are EVER called to testify on your own behalf, do not get up and tell the judge "Your honor, I'm going to plead the fifth", at least not in front of the jury. It's bad form to make your attorney have a stroke at 28-years-old, and they will certainly not be happy with you in the end.

Moving on, the junior attorneys in the office have had a recent spate of victories. Erika, our newest attorney, scored a good victory with her first bench trial, and David, poor Dave, the stepchild of the group, road the PA's witness like Seabiscuit to a well-earned dismissal in his first preliminary hearing this afternoon.

Months like these make the dry spells worth it in the end.