I understand the motive. We have perverts and pedophiles walking the halls of our schools. Perverts and pedophiles entrusted with the care-taking of our young, impressionable chil’ins. I have to wonder though. Hasn't this always been the case or have we just degenerated into some sort of depraved fetishists that the world has never been exposed to before?...

A couple of weeks ago, I blogged about the uplifting and relaxing experience of taking my son to court for truancy. Brief recap: In Texas, if, say, your seventeen year old child, who lives independently, takes care of himself, buys his own food and gas and concert tickets, owns his own car, and demonstrates daily acts of thoughtfulness, compassion and general total-duded-ness, decides that having to attend chemistry first period is not part of his Desired Life Experience, and if, say, he does this forty-seven times in a row, there’s a very good chance that you, the parent, will find yourself in a court case titled State of Texas vs. Henry’s Mom....

In Texas, one arrest for possession of marijuana costs the taxpayer $2,000, takes the police officer off the street for about three hours, and fills a space in an already overcrowded jail system for at least one night. However, once House Bill 2391 goes into effect on September 1st, you'll no longer get immediately carted off to jail—it's now up to the officer's discretion to cite individuals found in possession of four ounces (a quarter-pound)......

As most of us know, the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) is making it harder and harder for Internet radio producers to finance their stations. Retroactive royalty fees and increased future fees are forcing webcasters into a corner: the fees increase both per-listener and per-song rates, and are based on audience size, increasing as listeners do. This proposed scheme would put public radio stations that stream their broadcasts and web-based radio programming at a great disadvantage......

SafePlace has its annual walk this Saturday. For those unaware, SafePlace is many things. It's a shelter for victims of domestic violence. It also offers counseling for victims of sexual assault. It has as a 24-hour emergency hotline. Beyond these wonderful services, SafePlace also has many community outreach programs, including school-based services and community education classes to prevent violence and promote safe and healthy relationships. Why is this so important? Well, according to their......

Martha Stewart's been a busy (and fabulous) bee in the year and a half since being released from Alderson Federal Prison. In these past few months she's: announced a lucrative partnership with Kodak, opened the first in a series of Martha Stewart-designed model townhomes, was crowned "Godmother of Princess Cruises," launched a new line of merch at Macy's ("i LOVE THE NEW CLOTHES LINE" says Maryland fan Dayneisha), published a book, and agreed to take......

As we scourged all the theatre listings this week, endlessly digging for all the dirt on all the shows in all the venues from all the companies in all of Central Texas, we realized…there is no spoon. There’s also practically nothing opening this weekend. But never fear, dear theatre goer, there’s plenty, plenty of shows that are still running from previous weeks that – if you haven’t already seen them – will forever haunt......

The Rocket's 2006 debut with the Astros yesterday ended in a 4-2 loss against the Minnesota Twins with Francisco Liriano stealing Clemens' Thunder. Nudist resorts are seeing an increase in popularity. We imagine that laser-hair-removal is really popular at some of these places. And naked karaoke? Need we say more? Saddam Hussein went on a hunger strike. The martyr ended it after missing one meal. A man in Idaho was offended that his local......

In January of 2003, Austin American-Statesman reporter Kevin Carmody published a startling exposé, revealing to an unbeknownst public that Barton Springs, Austin's natural landmark synonymous with summertime idyll, contained dangerously high levels of toxins and pollutants - of such magnitude so as to potentially cause various cancers and debilitating neurological afflictions. The media frenzy ignited by these scathing articles was swift and ferocious: the City quickly engaged in damage-control, hiring 'expert' toxicologists to dispute......

You may have seen local newscasters in full outrage mode today, while teasing their nightly broadcast that features a story about 200 sex offenders who have recieved Viagra through their Medicaid program that's paid for by us. (The taxpayers, not the Austinist.) As one official put it, "It's like handing a can of gasoline to an arsonist and providing the match to start the fire." Austinist doesn't want to make the same convoluted comparison,......