El Paso Politics

For being the highest-rated television station in town, KINT doesn't get the love it should around here. They are the only local television news station that covers 100% local news. Yes I work for Entravision, but I'm not saying that to be a company man, I just dig local news and they give the most depth to local news coverage on television. We have a new reporter here named David Stout. The El Paso Times reports that he replaced long-time reporter Luis Villagrana. He actually is replacing Pedro Villagrana. Come on news partners, get the names right! Especially since Pedro has been a fixture in this town for years. The Luis that works here is our sports guy, Luis Zuniga. As far as I know he's not being replaced, especially considering how many people watch him for World Cup updates! But then again, I'm low-man on the totem pole around here so I'd be the last to know. Kidding, don't read anything in to that.

OFA Volunteers - Get Fired Up at our 4th of July Celebration at the Chamizal! Greetings! In its July/August 2010 issue, Men's Health Magazine ranked El Paso as the 99th out of 100 cities its size in its "Most Patriotic Cities" in the country. You and I know this is not an accurate description of El Paso. Volunteers like you and me have had a great time serving, engaging and changing our community. That is why we invite you to join EP OFA to celebrate our country's birthday at one of the largest community event venues this summer. Music Under the Stars at the Chamizal Memorial Park. We will have a booth where we will be able to register park attendees to vote and obtain voter pledge cards for the November elections. Our goal is to get 250 voter registrations and pledges and we think we can do it with 25 volunteers who register or pledge 10 people each. We can do it...I know we can. If you are deputized to register people to vote make sure join us. Even if yo...

Personally, I’m a little sick of Senator Shapleigh’s antics. I’ve invited him to come on my show to talk about a range of issues, but he never returned my calls. I think the Senator has been a bit of a hypocrite on several issues, but his latest crusade against Dr. Garcia of the El Paso Independent School District is in my opinion, a dangerous precedent. I listened to Shapleigh when he went on Paul’s show to hear him try to defend his attack against Garcia. I was listening to hear what his argument was going to be and I was listening to see how long it would take him to throw in a few words in Spanish. Sorry, but it’s so condescending when he does that and sounds as contrived and saccharine as a losing candidate congratulating the victor on election night. Before we go on, let me be clear about one thing. I don’t have a problem with the Senator being against the TRE. The problem I have is with a lame duck Senator saying he wouldn’t support the TRE until EPISD got rid of Garcia. What t...

A source close to the case tells me that Judge Regina Arditti herself signed a receipt for the legal file for her case from Joe Spencer more than a month ago. As reported in the El Paso Times by Diana Washington Valdez, attorneys for Arditti claim they have not received the file from Joe Spencer, Arditti's former attorney in the matter. My source says that there is a receipt that is signed by Arditti showing she took possesion of Spencer's copy of the file around a month ago. If memory serves the visiting judge District Court Judge Thomas Franklin Lee of Hondo, Texas, talked about resetting the case in order to give the defense team time to go over the case so it is unlikely that this potential revelation will have an impact on the case.

I hear people say that Theresa Caballero is such a great lawyer. They are apologists for her behavior and attempt to rationalize it by saying that they might not agree with her tactics, but she’s a good lawyer. Many would debate that. For example, as I have previously written, Theresa Caballero received a pretty good thumping from a federal court judge a while back. Well , Caballero subpoenaed around 15 people for a simple hearing in the Arditti case. The attorneys that represent each of the people subpoenaed made motions to quash. In layman’s terms, the attorneys were asking the judge to excuse their clients from the legal proceeding because they didn’t have anything to do with the case. The judge agreed and granted ALL of the motions to quash. What that means is that Theresa Caballero and Stuart Leeds lost nearly every single motion they put before the court. Apologists for Caballero and Leeds might find that one a bitter pill to swallow, but the bottom line is that they lost at ever...

I’m not a legal expert, but I have some observations from the proceeding. First, I thought the County Attorney’s lawyer (sorry, I didn’t get any names) was pretty good in court and effectively conveyed his points. He showed poise, confidence, strength, and a command of the law. The District Attorney’s lawyer… not so much. He seemed timid, soft spoken, and unsure of himself. He had the law on his side and won his points, but I thought he could’ve been stronger and more confident. I was impressed by Judge Arditti. She seemed like she’s taking an active role in her defense. By now you probably know that I pay attention to greetings, body language, and expressions. My observation was there were a couple of times in the hearing that Arditti seemed frustrated with Leeds and Caballero. What I’m interested in watching is if this case becomes about yet another one of Caballero’s crusades involving conspiracy theories, personal vendettas, smear campaigns, and sensationalism at the expense of Ard...

I have the advantage of spending a large part of my day on the internet as part of my job and that means I get to spend a lot of time on the internet. I was on the air the other day when I saw the story break on The El Paso Times regarding the summons of Mayor Cook and City Manager Joyce Wilson to the court house to testify in a court case involving a client of Theresa Caballero. I read the short blurb of the story on the El Paso Times website, but I also saw a piece on the story on ABC 7’s website as well. The story on ABC-7, written by reporter Maria Garcia, was much more developed, while the Times just had a small blurb. We are talking about two types of media, print versus television. The Times’ story won’t be printed until tomorrow, while the television stations will be able to get the report out to viewers in at least three broadcasts before the Times’ story is even seen. The Times has the advantage of being more thorough in the story because they don’t have the limitations of t...