Those of you who have not yet been sucked into using Twitter may not be familiar with hashtag activism. ((Do they do that on Facebook too?)) Someone has some point he wants to make, so he says something and attaches a hooky hashtag—a string of letters following a pound sign: #NotAllMen, for example, to either a) make the point that generalizations of the evils of manhood do not apply to

Ayman Jarrah runs into the kitchen of his Gaslamp gastropub, waving a Houston Press. "Oh, shit. They're saying we're racist. I need a lawyer on the fly." Tim, working the fry station, finishes a batch of onion rings, plates them next to a cheeseburger, wipes a spot of grease from the plate with a terrycloth, and puts the plate in the passthrough. He wipes the sweat from

Writing is thinking. People who know you only by your writing will judge you by your writing. If you write sloppily, people will judge you a sloppy thinker. If shallowly, shallow. If boringly, boring. You can write better. If you want to write up to your potential, read on. I’ll introduce four levels of bad writing and discuss how to diagnose them.

Free your mind from the false notion that the Texas Legislature knows what it is doing. (13) "Hoax bomb" means a device that: … (B) by its design causes … reaction of any type by an official of a public safety agency …. Yes, reaction of any type. So this device, which might by its design causes a reaction by a police officer (it's intended to do so, in fact),

In Revenge Pornography and First Amendment Exceptions, to be published in the Emory Law Journal, Northwestern law prof Andrew M. Koppelman says (PDF) what I've been saying all along: revenge-porn statutes restrict speech on the basis of its content. Content-based restrictions (unless they fall within one of the categories of unprotected speech) are invalid unless necessary to a compelling state interest. The state’s interest in prohibiting revenge pornography,

Montgomery County First Assistant DA Phil Grant is running for judge. Which means that he has to follow the Texas Code of Judicial Conduct, which says: A judge shall abstain from public comment about a pending or impending proceeding which may come before the judge's court in a manner which suggests to a reasonable person the judge's probable decision on any particular case. This prohibition applies to any candidate for

Hier stehe ich, ich kann nicht anders. Gott helfe mir. Amen. That's Martin Luther, who'd had it up to here with the Church, defaced its doors, and been declared a heretic, excommunicated, and declared an outlaw. Here I stand. I can do no other. God help me. Amen. Martin Luther had a choice, with two options: Act in accordance with his principles. Remain a member of church

Yesterday, as those of you who follow me on The Twitter Machine know, I had jury duty. I didn't get picked, of course—in fact, didn't even make it to the courtroom. But I did learn some things, about which I will blog later, and I ran into an old friend, whom I'll call "Frank." I met Frank in martial arts class. Frank, who lives in Cypress, Texas,

Black lives matter. This is not to say that other lives don't matter. It's gertruding, sorta. Saying "black lives matter" calls attention to the question of whether black lives matter like white lives matter. Responding "all lives matter" denies the importance of the question. And it is a fair question: do black lives in America matter the way white lives do? The question has been raised lately in the cases of

My oldest child and I were standing at the meat counter. I bumped him sideways with my shoulder. Not enough to knock him over, just enough for him to notice. He retaliated with a little more velocity (because teenager, plus I'm bigger than him). I sidestepped, and he overbalanced. I caught his fall, but it was still very amusing to me (almost as amusing as the time