Horns Down: Time to shine a light on justices' finances
Texas is consistently ranked in the bottom 10 states for mental health spending per capita, but we can now add another low ranking to our list of honors: according to a report released Tuesday by the Center for Public Integrity, Texas ranks 32nd among the states and the District of Columbia for judicial disclosure rules. The rankings were based on whether state Supreme Court judges were required to disclose their investment holdings, household incomes, gifts and several other holdings and on whether those disclosures were then made available to the public. Sure, you may not care if the chief justice of the Supreme Court’s wife holds $1 in Google stock or $1 million — but it’s not hard to see that those holdings would become a problem if he were asked to judge a case involving the company. Unless, of course, you can’t see his holdings to begin with.
Horns Up: Fake restaurant blows In-n-Out out of water
Next time you’re in the mood for the “cornerstone of any nutritious breakfast,” consider stopping at the new Big Kahuna Burger on Airport Boulevard. OK, it’s not a real restaurant, it’s just the facade of a fictional one — made famous in the opening scenes of Quentin Tarantino’s 1994 film “Pulp Fiction” — over the normal front of the Stallion Grill. After Texas Monthly reported the change, Robert Rodriguez confirmed on Twitter that he is using the fake restaurant to film his upcoming TV series “From Dusk Till Dawn.” We’re way more excited about this than the new In-N-Out Burger, so please excuse us while we change into cheap suits and hang out in front of Big Kahuna talking about foot massages, TV pilots and the metric system.
Horns Down: Principal tries to ban Spanish in her school
Last month, a middle school principal in Hempstead tried to ban the use of Spanish in her school’s classrooms. According to KHOU, a news station in Houston, principal Amy Lacey handed down the order over the intercom Nov. 12. Lacey has since been placed on administrative leave and a letter sent home Monday assured parents that neither the district nor the school, 50 percent of whose students are Hispanic, had “any policy prohibiting the speaking of Spanish.” That should have resolved the matter, but students say that confusion still lingers. Considering the students were just using the language to communicate with one another, we can’t help but think this was merely a discriminatory move on the principal’s part. We hope the school districts and administrators at the middle school settle this sooner rather than later.
