- Everything’s bigger in Texas…except, it seems, residents’
ambitions for their criminal enterprises. It’s simply not impressive that a
Texas businessman is guilty of a paltry scam in which he used inside
information from a lottery official to win a $783,000 Wisconsin jackpot in
2007. It’s not exactly a Power Ball, nine-figure lottery scam, yet it still
landed a low-aspiring fool named Robert Rhodes in the category of convicted
criminals after he pleaded guilty to being party to a computer crime, a felony.
In what can only be called a missed opportunity, he brought with him a $250,000
check to begin paying back the Wisconsin Lottery, but sadly, it wasn’t the
prototypical oversized lottery check that winners so often receive. How good
would have been to see Rhodes toting an oversized, cardboard check into court
as he accepted a plea agreement calling for him to serve six months of home
confinement in Texas and pay $409,000 in restitution. According to
investigators, Rhodes' was friends with former Multi-State Lottery Association
information technology official Eddie Tipton, who wrote software used to
randomly pick numbers for lottery games. Tipton, who is awaiting trial in Iowa,
allegedly supplied Rhodes with the winning combination in the 2007 Megabucks game
and this dynamic duo allegedly split the $783,000 payout. Again, how did you
two not wait for a much bigger payday before attempting your ill-fated scheme?
At least then you could have spent the past decade enjoying the millions of
dollars you illegally won……..
- Being a rapper ain’t what it used to be. Gone, it seems,
are the days when the East Coast-West Coast war was claiming lives, inspiring
shootouts and generally keeping everyone wondering if their favorite rapper
would be alive by the time his next album dropped. Now, Jay Z is a mogul, Ice
Cube is more successful as an actor than he even was as a rapper and one of the
biggest current names in the game is apparently going legit - legit as in
hiring an intern, because what rapper doesn’t need an unpaid college student to
fetch them coffee and do all of the grunt work? Enter Chance The Rapper, who
has begun what’s either an elaborate promotional stunt, a shameless attempt to
secure some free labor - or possibly a combination of the two. The Chicago hip-hop
star and three-time Grammy Award winner posted a message on Twitter in which he
noted that he is “looking for an intern” and seeking “someone with experience
in putting together decks and writing proposals.” However, the post was a bit
lacking in that it didn’t provide any additional details, such as when the
internship begins, what other duties may be included and for that matter, how
interested applicants can contact him or whoever among his crew will be
handling the interviewing and screening process. But given that he’s now a
commercial pitchman for candy bars and a willing partner of Apple Music, maybe
he really does need some extra assistance on the business side of the ledger………
- Beware the ire of Mexican fishermen. It’s quite the
showdown in Mexico's Gulf of California between local fishermen and the
whale-huggers of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. Sea Shepherd has been
removing illegal and abandoned nets that endanger the vaquita, the world's
smallest porpoise and in response, dozens of fishermen have….burned a boat?
Yes, it’s a rudimentary retort as part of a threat to force out a ship operated
by the conservation group. Sea Shephard has made progress, but not enough and
illegal fishing for the totoaba, another species, has reduced the number of
vaquitas to fewer than 30. The best the angry fishermen could do in the town of
San Felipe was paint the name of the Sea Shepherd on an empty, open fishing
boat they burned and then chased with threats to remove the conservationists'
ship themselves if the government doesn't. "Just as they are judging us
fishermen, we will judge all the environmentalists," said Sunshine
Rodriguez, a leader of the local fishing cooperative in San Felipe, Baja
California. "We aren't going to just sit around." The boat burning
drew hundreds of onlookers and supporters at San Felipe's main waterfront
boulevard and those folks heard an angry spokesman for the fishermen proclaim
that they would give the government “five days to get this boat out of our
territorial waters, or we will do it ourselves.” Meanwhile, Sea Shepherd
continues to call for a boycott of Mexican shrimp, and possible plans to
permanently ban all gillnet fishing in the area. The object of their affections
is the vaquita, which gets caught in nets set for the totoaba, a fish prized in
China for its swim bladder. It’s all the poor man’s version of battles to save
endangered, most glamorous species in places like Africa, but it’s still a
heated battle for the open seas………
- How long does it take to wash off the stink of The
Process? About the length of time it takes for a fired general manager’s
non-compete clause to expire, as it turns out. Life is looking up for former
Philadelphia 76ers general manager Sam Hinkie, who is reportedly the target to
be Sacramento Kings owner Vivek Ranadive’s next failed hire of transaction.
Yes, the man who once theorized that because he coached his daughter’s youth
basketball team to amateur glory by using a strategy in which one player
cherry-picked while four teammates played defense and then threw the ball down
the floor for easy layups, the same strategy would work in the NBA in after the
man who led the 76ers’ great tanking experiment before being fired by
Philadelphia in April 2016. Hinkie is gone, the Sixers are showing signs of
progress with the blueprint he laid and now, Ranadive has reportedly expressed
exploratory interest in hiring the disgraced architect of The Process, in which
a team consistently and intentionally (allegedly) loses lots of games to secure
top draft picks, thereby building for future success. Not surprisingly for a
known lover of terrible basketball ideas, Ranadive has repordely been intrigued
with Hinkie for some time and that could spell doom for current Kings GM Vlade
Divac, who has failed to get the team moving in anything resembling an upward
direction during his short tenure. So Ranadive had good reason to seek and
receive permission directly from Sixers counterpart Josh Harris to speak with
Hinkie and when the latter’s non-compete clause with the Sixers expires at the
end of this season, Hinkie is free to unleash the process on a new fan base………
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