Texas Jeff

Not sure if we've covered this already, but Rudy's first witness at the Four Seasons Landscaping press conference was a convicted sex offender from New Jersey.

In the all-new Yeti 747. Smaller Yeti 737's will be available for distribution to medium sized towns. Tiny towns will be visited by the Yeti Citation. If that doesn't work ... maybe Santa? He's used to the cold and has time on his hands after the big rush in late Dec. Seriously, does anyone know why this vaccine needs to be kept that cold?

I was on their campus this morning. Unbelievable facilities. They have four on-campus turf fields. I think Austin ISD has five turf fields in the entire district right now, including three shared stadiums. Even the softball field looked great and they are building a huge robotics facility. Westlake has one or two pre-district possibly competitive games of their choice, plus Lake Travis, plus the playoffs. Everyone else is cannon fodder. They usually end up in the smaller school playoff which makes the bracket easier. I don't see how anyone in the region other than LT will ever play a competitive game.

C-SPAN is showing the Biden motorcade arriving...

Most of the LHB scholarships come from donations that LHAB members have made over the years, going back to the 60s. They literally "pass the hat" at reunions for donations. I think it's the same hat from decades ago. There are lots of little LHB/LHAB traditions and the alumni hat is one of them. The scholarships are small although they are growing. I think most of them are 100's of dollars. No one is doing it for the scholarship. LHB is an awesome place to meet people from across the university, have fun and do something a little different if music is not your major. I'm not that plugged in to alumni band, but I think LHAB is trying to give out small scholarships to many band members, so that eventually everyone gets a little bit. Standing with your friends in the middle of the band after a win, having the football team come over while celebrating, and then playing the Eyes of Texas is an awesome experience. I wish everyone could have it.

1. Issue pardons, pardons, and more pardons. 2. Give Medals of Honor out like candy to friends and family. 3. Start signing whatever happens to be around him and selling the Sharpies online.

If that post-it note is accurate and the remaining county mail-in percentages match the already counted mail-in percentages for each county, then Biden will will Georgia by 4400 votes.

270towin has a simulator that lets you see how tomorrow night might play out: https://www.270towin.com/2020-simulation/ You push "Run Simulation" and watch the results roll in by poll closing time. If your guy doesn't win, push "Run Simulation" until they do!

Under Vice President Joe Biden, face mask sales were at a record low! Now we've brought those jobs back, we're cranking 'em out! In just seven months, we've produced billions and billions of face masks. Everyone's buying them, nobody's ever seen anything like this! Nobody said we could do it but we did it, bigger than anyone's ever seen before.

My uncle, a small business owner, said that the goal of every person in corporate America was to never open the door and hear "Hello, I'm Mike Wallace with 60 Minutes, do you have time for a few questions?". He said if you hear that you're screwed. Did Trump not know that 60 Minutes has been asking tough questions since forever?

I think there is a big wave already underway in Texas and it's only showing up in the hospitalized data. The hospital numbers for both Texas and Travis County are up sharply but overall case numbers are not spiking in the same way. Pandemic fatigue has set in and people are just blowing off getting tested. Now would be a great time to deploy those 15 minute $5 tests. Where are they?

Just voted at the Austin Rec Center (near House Park). Zero line at 6pm. Walked right up. Austin ISD is hosting a football game but there is a ton of parking in the ACC garage next door.

Austin ISD spends about 11 cents building and repairing schools for 75,000 students, about 59 cents on everything else, and is forced to give about 41 cents to the State of Texas. If you are going to show Prop A as a separate bar from the City of Austin then you should make recapture separate from AISD funding. Austin ISD also does not get the benefit of a 1% sales tax. Cap Metro will get $250 million from that tax just next year, even if zero passengers board a bus.

I saw a post from a Travis County poll worker that said that the wait times are really a rough guess. If you want, you can help the poll workers and all of us by starting a stopwatch when you get in line, then telling the poll worker how long you waited in line once you get to the front. I think they can enter that info into the system rather than having to guess at the wait time. Something you can do to help others while you are waiting in line...

When there's something strange... In your briefing room... Who you gonna call? COVID BUSTERS!

Two scoops ...

So this big strong guy comes up to me ... 6'4" ... straight out of central casting, tears streaming down his face. I said "what's wrong son?" He said "Sir, I just wanted to let you know...'" I said "Son, you can tell me ... what's on your mind?" He said "Sir .... I've just been ordered to drive you around the block..."

I think they normally use Marine One to go to Walter Reed. They do it all the time to get to Air Force One and it's probably just easier and more secure to do that to set up a motorcade. I think I remember that it was a big deal last year that they took a motorcade to Walter Reed for the "first half of Trump's physical" instead of the helicopter. I've been in DC twice when Marine One flew over me near the White House. It is really cool to watch.

It's possible that they took him to the hospital yesterday because he could still walk to the helicopter, before a time when maybe he can't. Imagine the optics if they would have waited a week in the White House to see if his case stayed mild, then had to take him to the hospital. What if they would have had to wheel him out to Marine One on a stretcher with oxygen and nurses wearing hazmat suits, three weeks before an election? Not a good look. Whatever happens to Trump now will be out of sight.

Thinking positively, I think you are going to love watching high school games next year at House Park. Austin High gets clobbered by our friends to the west but also has some great games. The lack of a track puts you right on top of the action with a great view of the Capitol and downtown. Close games are a blast.

My bad, I did not include enough info on how to get your ballot... Enter your voter information at the bottom of the page and say "Look me up". If it finds you in the system, you can then click on "View my ballot". You should get a PDF that is customized for you..

Travis County folks, sample ballots are up at votetravis.com. To see the sample ballot, you have to enter your voter information at the bottom of the page and say "Look me up", then "View my ballot". You can view or print a sample ballot that will match what you see at the voting booth. Fill it in ahead of time and bring it with you to vote quickly and keep the lines moving. It is OK to bring printed materials with you into the voting booth.

The last question was the worst part of the debate for me. Wallace asked if we were going to have a free and fair election and something about not declaring victory until an independent consensus had emerged about who was the winner and Trump went on a crazy person rant. Same question to Joe Biden and Biden looked into the camera and answered "yes, go vote, you have the power to determine the outcome of this election". I thought it was a good moment for Biden and a pretty horrible preview of what November is going to be like. Biden had a genuine moment admitting that Hunter had a drug problem but said he was better now. Trump, of course, would lie about such a thing and deny it. It wasn't a policy discussion but it showed me that Biden is able to admit to misfortune and have a positive mindset that the future can be better than the present. About Tech 2008 or whatever game you thought was worse, football is a rough game with lots of emotion. And yet we have refs that throw flags and the players may say that a call is bullshit but they still abide by the ref's call. Maybe we need that in the next two debates. If you are being an asshole during the other person's time, it's a personal foul. A little yellow flag flies in and you have to move your podium back 15 yards. Using that standard, they would be fishing Trump out of Lake Erie right now.

First term presidents usually get shellacked during their first debate for a second term. Dubya did and he went on to win. Obama did and he went on to win. I think Reagan did too but came back with his "age and inexperience" quote in a later debate on his way to crushing Mondale. Trump is going to show up unprepared and try to interrupt and BS his way around the debate. Biden has to keep it short and to the point and look like a competent person that can hire well and return us to sanity.

Red shirted kid up front is Bobby Hill takin' a leak. Dang it Bobby!