First, bet me that the last grand jury that indicted Tom DeLay, did so on the ***SAME*** day that their term started. $100. You have previously stated this was not true so this should be a slam dunk acceptance for you... Then we can talk about other bets....

You also doubted my claims that I mistakenly voted for myself in the poll question you posed. I will gladly bet $200 that I did mistakenly vote for myself. We can let a super-mod-uber-admin verify my claims.... Assuming the have the ability to verify my claim... Otherwise it is a moot point...

Again this bet should be a slam-dunk for you to accept....
But I won't be holding my breath....

Guys, Felix wants to admit he <ahem> exaggerated. He really does. But every time he writes the phrase "I was wrong", his computer freezes up.

Or something.

QFT.

Seriously...Felix you were wrong, misheard, something. It is NOT that big of a deal, and not new thread worthy. It certainly isn't worth losing a bet over (although it looks like now you are carefully trying to cater a different bet you can win). Just say I was wrong/exaggerated/misheard/didn't remember correctly, and all parties move on.

It was my intention to clarify things but I was insisting VayConDios state his position on the 2nd issue FIRST by answering the questions I posed to him. Why he didn't spend 2-minutes doing this is a mystery to me..... He wrote at least 4+ posts in response without stating his position on my questions.....

The quote I read was from this link:
http://www.texasrainmaker.com/catego...licans/page/7/
"Even the foreman of that grand jury admitted his mind was made up before any evidence was presented.
So Ronnie Earle tried a do-over on Friday. This time, according to a written statement Earle released yesterday, he tried presenting a new money-laundering charge. This seventh grand jury to review the case promptly No-Billed it."

Re-reading it indictates it was not seven "no bills" but the 7th grand jury convened over this case. So the first 5 grand juries found nothing wrong, the 6th grand jury convicted DeLay on a law that was not enacted at the time (which this indictment has been tossed). After the 7th grand jury "no billed" him on money laundering on a Friday, the 8th jury assembled on a Monday (Oct-3-2005) indicted indicted him... on that SAME day.....they skippped the orientation. The reason why they skipped the orientation was if Earle waited until Tuesday (Oct 4-2005, the checks were cut to pols on Oct-4-2002).....the 3 year statute of limitations kicks in and DeLay walks and Earle shows the country the fool partisan hack that he truly is.... After three years of investigation, is it not a bit strange the money laundering charges are no brought up until the 11th hour? My assertion is the money laundering charges would NEVER have been brought by Earle if Tom DeLay's lawyer did not go to the press and say that he was going to have the indictment thrown out because the law did no exist in Sep-2002. If DeLay's lawyer had kept his mouth shut, until October 4th......Earle would have thought his first indictment was good, DeLay would be forced from his leadership position (per repub house rules), and he would have never thought to bring up the money laundering charges.... Earle's action are 100% consistent with this theory....

There were two assertions I made and had interest in betting on. With regard to the first assertion, if a certain poster on this forum acted honorably, he could have made an easy $200 from me on betting the first point but instead he chose to play games and publish my PMs. His deceit save me $200 and cost him $200. So he did me a favor. After re-reading the passage on the link, I had no intention on betting on the first assertion.
My second assertion was about the 8th grand jury indicting the same day and no reasonable person could claim this jury examined all the facts necessary to make this decision.... VayaConDios was disputing this as well. It was on this issue I sought to make Vaya state his position in writing via answering the questions I posed to him....

Grand Jury#6
The old adage that a DA can get a grand jury to indict a "ham sandwich". This adage was proved true with grand jury #6. They indicted Tom DeLay on an alledged crime that took place on Sep-2002. The problem was the law that Earle indicted DeLay on was not on the books until several months after this date.

You would think any DA with a brain would check this out. But Ronnie Earle is not know for having a brain. Earle is know for having political vendetas against conservatives.... And Texas is a unique state in that it elects conservative-Repubs and conservative-Democrats. One of the defending Ronnie Earle talking points was he went after Democrats. Yeah.....he went after CONSERVATIVE democrats. Most (not all) Texas democrats are more conservtive than Repubs you find in many states..... If Ronnie Earle had an honest bone in his body, he would have thrown out the first indictment since the law did not exist in Sep-2002. But he is not honest and he is a crooked partisan hack DA that abuses the power of his office.

• I've seen nothing indicating that any of these grand juries were convened for the specific purpose of hearing charges against DeLay or anyone else involved in the TRMPAC scandal. My understanding is that these were normal county grand juries that heard charges against DeLay and anyone else accused of crimes in Travis County at the time. If you have anything to the contrary, let's see it.
  
• Eight different grand juries heard various charges against TRMPAC defendants, but only three heard charges against Tom DeLay. The statement that "the first five grand juries found no wrongdoing" is incorrect. The first grand juries to hear the TRMPAC case heard charges against the various corporations involved, and indeed handed down indictments against those corporations. The first grand jury to hear charges against DeLay returned a true bill.
  
• Ronnie Earle has prosecuted 12 Democrats and 5 Republicans as DA of Travis County. I'm not going to get into a ridiculous argument over whether those 12 Democrats were "conservative."
  
• At no point have I disputed that Earle presented the final charges to a grand jury on the day that it was convened. I pointed out above that this, in my experience, is not unusual. I don't know what you think county grand juries do, but they do not sit around listening to a single case for days on end. Usually, a police officer or other witness will testify, and maybe some evidence will be presented. A grand jury is only there to determine whether there is basis for prosecution; it is not there to determine the guilt or innocence of the defendant. As I also pointed out above, defendants do not typically appear to testify before grand juries.
  
• Also, I don't doubt that the charges were presented first thing on Monday morning so that they would come in before expiration of the statute of limitations. However, this wasn't some trick in order to prejudice the defense, and if Earle had his way, I'm sure they would have presented charges against DeLay well before the deadline. Going by the timeline of indictments, it sounds like the corporations were investigated first, and the investigations eventually lead to DeLay. I'm sure that if Earle had his druthers he would have went to the grand jury earlier and with more evidence, but it didn't work out that way.
  
• My personal feeling is that DeLay will skate on the charges, since money laundering is a confusing charge, and he was probably smart enough not to handle any of the money or to leave a paper trail. However, DeLay set up TRMPAC and put - laff - Jack Abramoff in charge. He was censured buy the House Ethics Committee for his fundraising activities (the Ethics Committee members that dared to rebuke DeLay were summarily dismissed, but that is another story for another time).