Golf Carts

Let me begin by saying that I am 100% behind the use of golf carts and utility vehicles (as defined in Texas Code) in Port O Connor when operated in accordance with the restrictions placed on them by law.  That’s where the problems come in.

The definition of a utility vehicle is very specific in saying that it seats an operator and a passenger side by side – two people only.  It is also designed for utility work not recreation.  Some of the “utility vehicles” in Port O Connor seat nine people.

Golf carts (there is no golf “car” definition in State codes – this seems to be an attempt to divert legal attention from the issue of “what is a golf cart” or a marketing ploy to raise the status of a golf cart) are defined as being designed by the manufacturer primarily for use on a golf course.  Nobody would quibble the point of, is a golf cart really a golf cart without a means of securing golf bags and the bag carriers replaced by a bench seat?  Again though, these “golf carts” have grown to six plus seats and were never designed for use on a golf course.

It appears to a casual observer that someone somehow has made it known that the enforcement of golf cart and utility vehicle laws, would not be in the best interests of Calhoun County and a moratorium is in effect on such enforcement by the Calhoun County Sheriff’s Department.  Anything that is not immediately recognizable as a car or motorcycle seems to have carte blanche to do as it pleases.

Given this, I am going to buy a Suzuki Samurai, take the glass out, remove inspection and registration stickers, add straps for golf bags, and declare it a utility golf vehicle.  Why pay registration fees and insurance?  It’s not a car.

Name Withheld by Request

Great Reasons to Support “Mittens”

1. He is “purdy”. Has gracious, statesmanlike aura honed on recent overseas trip where he offended both the Brits and Palestinians.

2. Has not been caught with another woman not his spouse.

3. Refuses to release enough information to determine whether there are any scandals/skeletons in his closet.

4. Can’t speak in fake, southern, “Black Preacher Voice” when necessary. But, can tell racist “birther” jokes to his all white following and lie like a rug about his opponent.

5. Highly intelligent and educated. Used Harvard education to subvert U. S. Tax Code and thus pay lower tax rate than “those people”.

6. Does not admit to smoking, drinking, or doing drugs. Has no problem driving acquired companies into bankruptcy while raiding the employee’s retirement fund for his benefit and that of his investors.

7. Represents an America of “yesterday” when back alley abortions were common and the Gilded Age of the Robber Barons was the order of the day. This was before government regulation forced capitalism to serve “all of the people”. We long to repeal those regulations.

8. Has great family of five boys who followed Daddy’s leadership in avoiding at all costs service to country by serving in the military.

9. He’s a Mormon. Loves to hide behind church as rationale for not releasing taxes (excuse #3) and has personal penchant for equating his donations to church as somehow forgiving of his tax avoidance schemes.

10. He donated his inheritance to his alma mater, BYU, in his father’s name. He did however get his education and first home paid for by Daddy.

James Hummel, Port O’Connor

My Two Cents Worth

If the Texas Parks and Wildlife started the fire on the Island on purpose, they should be ashamed of themselves, with the wind blowing straight to POC which has a lot of old people who can’t breath the smoke without causing them health problems. That’s all I got to say about that.

G.B. Robertson

Critic’s Choice

Dear Area Theatre People,

It has been almost 20 years that the Port Lavaca Main Street Theatre has been operating.

Just returned from the Sunday afternoon performance of Ken Ludwig’s The Fox on the Fairway, directed by Kenny Barnes. It was hilarious and kept me laughing. David Griffin is the Robert Redford of the South and Lauree Aschen Barnes reminds me of Marilyn Monroe, and Ken Barnes is the Dustin Hoffman of Hollywood. All the characters were great. A lot of time was spent on the costumes and set preparing for this production. The whole cast was great.

It takes place at the 19th hole at Quail Valley Golf and Country Club. What a performance!

Please go see the performance this weekend: Sept. 14, 15, & 16; 8:00 p.m., Friday and Saturday; 2:00 p.m. Sunday.

Take a break and be entertained. You won’t regret it.

Russell Cain
President, Port Lavaca Main
Street Committee

A Protestant Christian?

This morning (9/10/12) I read the Victoria Advocate front page. I noted that “now” Obama is a Protestant Christian and yet in an interview with George Stephanopoulos he claimed to be of the Islamic faith. “I’m glad that nobody has given me trouble about my Islamic faith.” Is this a matter of convenience for election’s sake or just a matter of confusion about Biblical truth?

According to Scripture, you cannot be a Christian and a Muslim, no matter whether you’re a Catholic or Protestant.

Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life and no man comes to the Father (God) but by me.” John 14:6

Patrick Overton
Port O’Connor

Regulations

In the 1930, 40, 50, and 60s Port` O`Connor Texas was a thriving commercial fishing town; up until the early 40s we had at least 3 fisheries, run by local businessmen, Then in the early 40s some large fisheries saw the potential profit to be made on the Texas coast and moved their fisheries not only to P.O.C. but all up and down the coast. We had General Seafoods, Coulter Corp, and Western Shell move into this little town, besides the local fisheries already here. At this time Texas was furnishing most of the seafood supplied from the Gulf Coast. At this time the Texas Bay, Fish & Oyster Commission was responsible for overseeing regulations on the coast.

Then a group of people in Austin decided to give the authority to regulate the coastal fisheries to Parks and Wildlife, a group of people mostly from central or west Texas who knew absolutely nothing about the coastal fisheries. Now please understand P.& W. are all appointed, we have no say in who they are, yet a P&W game warden has more authority than any other officer In the USA; yes that includes federal officers too.

It didn’t take them long ,with the power already granted, to start applying regulations designed to eliminate commercial fisheries. In the name of conservation they started closing bays to net fishing, they put time limits on shrimping, limited net sizes, mesh size, days to shrimp in daylight hrs., limits on pounds, size limits, how large the spreading device, license for Gulf, separate license for bay, they finally imposed enough regulations to almost wipe out a thriving business on the Texas coast. The big companies moved out of Texas; we don’t even have one operating fishery, for the first time in over a hundred years in POC.

This is just a micro. of what Obama is doing with his regulations across America, when you have a bunch of people who can give themselves power, and they are NOT elected, you can`t fire them, and they will keep giving themselves more power, then you have the same thing that happened to the fisheries on the Texas coast.

May God have mercy on the U.S.A.

Howard

Coming in October: Fund Raiser planned for South Texas Baptist Youth Home. Watch this publication for details. For questions, please call Patrick Overton at 512-665-3357.

The Dolphin welcomes letters from our readers on any subject that is of general interest to our audience. Letters should be 300 words or less (with exceptions at the Dolphin’s discretion). Letters reflect the opinion of the writer, and not that of Dolphin Talk staff, and we retain the right to determine suitability for publication. It is the policy of this newspaper to promote area interests: therefore, complaints against local businesses should be directed elsewhere. Letters must be signed and include day and evening phone numbers, which will not be published. Your name will be withheld upon request, but anonymous material will not be considered for publication.

Letters to the Dolphin:
Dolphin Talk, P.O. Box 777, Port O’Connor, TX 77982
dolphin1@tisd.net

Augie

Augie is a big blonde tabby about 2 years old. He came to us declawed so he must be an inside cat. A very gentle, easy going guy, he likes a bit of playing, plentiful petting, attention and “good boy!” and lots of naps. We think Augie is just about perfect.

Daisy

Do you need a “hunk of happy” in your life? Then come meet Daisy, a boxer mix about a year old. She has a splendid brindle coat with white accents and a wonderful disposition, always eager to play. A smart gal, she’s also eager to learn commands and please her new family.

Come see her and all the other animals at the Port Lavaca Animal Shelter, 201 Stringham Drive (across from the rodeo arena), Monday through Saturday,10 to 2, or call the Calhoun County Humane Society, 553-8916.

You can also view her and other animals ready for adoption on line at www.calhouncountyhumanesociety.org

Thanks and we’ll be waiting for you!

Illinois’ Hearsay Law

We count on our law enforcement agencies and our court systems to maintain our country as a safe environment as well as to provide a legal system that is both fair and honest for all Americans.

Throughout our history we have changed laws and our viewpoints when necessary such as when Miranda rights started being used by police officers across the country after the case Miranda vs. Arizona was see in the United Sates Supreme Court.

In that case, a man by the name of Ernesto Miranda was arrested for the rape and robbery of a seventeen year old girl in the Phoenix, Arizona area in March 1963. Miranda signed a confession that night and was convicted to spend twenty plus years in prison for the crime.

Then Miranda’s legal counsel appealed to the Arizona Supreme Court on the grounds that Miranda’s confession had been coerced out of him and that Miranda was never told at any time that he had the right to remain silent nor the right to have an attorney present when being interrogated.

Arizona’s Supreme Court upheld the conviction and so then Miranda took his plea to the United States Supreme Court, which at that time included Chief Justice Earl Warren, who’s “Warren court” was making sweeping changes in law, racial progression and making the states adhere more closely to Federal law.

This time Miranda’s appeal worked and the Supreme Court overturned the decision. Although Miranda himself had another trial and served his prison time, many in law enforcement thought this would impede them from doing their jobs properly. In the end, both sides could be said to be right as it was wrong for any American being arrested to not know their rights but it was equally wrong to give criminals any more fuel to get out of going to jail.

Today, of course, we all know of Miranda rights from the time we were little kids and would play cops and robbers. Telling the crook their rights just like the police officers on television was great fun, and all was forgotten, the sun still rose and the universe moved forward.

What about those criminals the law did let go? Was taking the moral high ground the better choice? Well, today we have “Drew’s Law” to contemplate and I’m not so sure if we made the right choice on this one as a country and a nation despite outward appearances that may make it look otherwise.

Drew’s Law is a controversial law that arose out of the Drew Peterson case in Illinois, my home state. In case you were not aware Drew Peterson is a former Boilingbrook, Illinois police officer that was being investigated for the death of his third wife Kathleen Savio and the disappearance of his fourth wife, Stacy Peterson.

In the course of the investigations into the two affairs, although the investigating bodies and the general public that followed along had a good idea that Drew Peterson was in fact guilty, there was no way to prove it in a manner fit for a court of law…until Drew’s Law came into play.

Drew’s Law make hearsay evidence admissible in Illinois’ courts as long as the case meets the following conditions at a pre-trial hearing:

1) first, that the adverse party murdered the declarant and that the murder was intended to cause the unavailability of the declarant as a witness;

(2) second, that the time, content, and circumstances of the statements provide sufficient safeguards of reliability

(3) third, the interests of justice will best be served by admission of the statement into evidence.

Although it may seem from the above that this exception can only be used in certain types of cases where the court may avoid having egg on it’s face and can convict criminals that may otherwise go free, it also opens up a very creaky door we may have a hard time shutting. Once one law is adopted like this, you can almost be sure that others will eventually follow.

The situation is so odd that even one of the jury members, Ron Supalo, understood and observed how much history they had just made with a guilty verdict for Peterson: “We (the jurors) weren’t the U.S. Supreme Court. Right or wrong, this was the hearsay law, and we had to use it in this case.”

Personally I’d rather not have a law like this one on any state’s books, regardless of how much Drew Peterson deserves to hang, much like in the Casey Anthony case, sometimes our laws bind us into bad situations. However, I still will always believe our laws and our Constitution should be maintained to the standards we set when trying to make a legal system that was fair and honorable for every American.

Even if that honor means letting someone go now and again, we will always catch them in the end and they will only escape incarceration, not the punishment they will catch from God for such horrible acts.

The demand for truck drivers has intensified throughout the Golden Crescent region due to the growing activity in the Eagle Ford Shale and the expansion of the general local oil and gas industry. Not only are more drivers needed in the oil and gas industry, but because so many of the area’s current drivers are employed within this rapidly expanding industry, the demand for truck drivers has increased across all industries.

A commercial truck driving class will begin on Monday, Oct. 29 and runs Monday through Thursdays from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. This class takes approximately six to eight weeks to complete.

Students who complete the training and obtain a Commercial Driver’s License are likely to find employment immediately.

“Truck drivers are in such high demand right now,” said Sherri Pall, director of VC’s Workforce and Continuing Education Department. “We have company recruiters coming into our classes on the first day to provide information on employment opportunities. The majority of our students will have multiple job offers before they complete the course.”

Students who successfully complete VC’s Commercial Truck Driving Program are eligible to take the Commercial Driver’s License written and driving examinations at the Department of Public Safety. These exams are included as class activities.

Our program combines classroom instruction and behind-the-wheel driving range activities,” said Truck Driving Instructor Clyde Revelle. “This includes public, street and highway driving along with safety, rules, regulations and techniques.”

Admission requirements include a valid Texas driver’s license, successful completion of a Department of Transportation physical examination, and drug and alcohol screening. Tuition assistance may be available.

For more information or to enroll, please contact Pam Price at (361) 485-6830.

P.O.C. is the best place to live – it has toughtful people – it provides true friendships – it supports each other – it demonstrates Godly love through its multifaceted culture – and it also has great fishing and hunting! During this time of mourning the passing of Dad, I have found that those who live in Port O’Connor are there for you no matter what you are facing and/or feeling. Thank you sounds so trite, but it the best I can say – “Thank you!” There have been flowers, cards, phone calls, but what has meant the most are the many prayers that have filled Heaven’s skies! While Joane and I were away, you cared for “Papaw” with friendship, fellowship and food – he especially liked the food. (He greatly dislikes cooking for himself!) You watched over the parsonage and supported the Chapel and the other ministries that came to our aid. It is my sincere prayer that the Lord allows me to remain in Port O’Connor until He comes for me in the clouds of Glory or I find my place in the local cemetery. Thank you for loving me and my family!

While I was away, we appreciated those who filled the Chapel pulpit: George and Linda Kutach; Jessie and Angie Alderete; Joane McDonough; and Patrick Overton. Julian Garcia helped fill in with his musical talent. Many of the Chapel congregation helped in the other areas of ministry that needed assistance. Thank you!

Now, we are operating on “full-steam ahead”! We had great services this past weekend with several guests and are looking forward to ministering this coming weekend. At the close of Sunday evening’s service, which begins at 6:00 p.m., we will be going to the front beach to baptize those who desire to follow the Lord’s example of Water Baptism. You are invited to attend.

Friday Night Youth is going strong with great fun, good fellowship, and awesome food. All the youth from the area are invited to attend. It is each Friday, except the first Friday of each month, during the hours of 7:00 and 10:00 p.m. Parents are always welcomed and those wishing to help with food, please just bring it on by!

Fisherman’s Bible Institute (FBI) is about to begin. The Reverend Joane McDonough serves as the primary instructor for these classes. There are workbooks to complete each week in preparation for a weekly two-hour classroom experience. We ask for a $25 donation for those seeking to attend to help pay for the workbooks. This is for serious students who desire to better know God through His Word. For additional information or to sign up, please call Joane at 983-2619.

Fisherman’s Chapel is an interdenominational congregation who seeks to help friends successfully walk from here to eternity. The Lord has provided us the directions, and we are learning together how to follow them! You will always find a warm welcome at the Chapel, and are urged to, “Come, grow with us”!