Inside the Times

Predicting USC at 2009 Brut Sun Bowl

If you take a look at the remaining schedule for the Pac 10 football teams, it's easy to see the venerable University of Southern California Trojans coming into El Paso to play in the 2009 Brut Sun Bowl. The Sun Bowl gets the third place team in the Pac 10 and more and more that's looking like USC. That would be a blockbuster for El Paso. Oregon and Stanford look like the top two teams in the Pac 10 and both should hold those positions in their final two conference games. Stanford has to get by Cal and Notre Dame, but both games are in Palo Alto and Stanford should win both. Even if Stanford loses one, they still have the tie-breaker over USC after pasting the Trojans on Saturday. Oregon is away at Arizona and home against Oregon State. Even if they drop two, which they won't, they also own the tie-breaker over USC. The Trojans will probably win their final games, both home games against UCLA and Arizona. Their only hope to finish second in the Pac 10 is to have Stanford lose their remaining two -- Cal and Notre Dame -- but that's unlikely. USC can finish in a tie for third in the Pac 10 with Oregon State, but the Trojans own the tie-breaker over the Beavers. So bring on the Trojans. We'll be waiting. Who will they face? That's a bit trickier and too early on a Sunday to figure out.

The country's first marijuana cafe

Whether the general population approves of it or not, the use of medical marijuana continues to gain steam throughout the U.S. The latest example is Portland's decision to open the country's first marijuana cafe, where people who have a medical marijuana permit can not only purchase pot but smoke it in the cafe. There's no question more and more cities and more and more states will continue to follow the trend and allow the use of medical marijuana. We reported last week that New Mexico has approved five producers to grow and dispense medical marijuana. The city of Oakland, CA this year became the first municipality to levy a tax on gross receipts of medical marijuana dispensaries in that city. Will Texas ever come around? Should Texas follow suit? The legalization of pot overall, whether for medical purposes or recreational, has been a popular topic of conversation in El Paso ever since the city council tried to create a national discussion on the subject earlier this year as a way to combat the illegal drug trade in Mexico. Weigh in and tell us what you think.

Hard-rock El Paso

I'm a child of the 1960s and the 70s, and so rock n' roll is definitely in my soul. Yet, I'm scratching my head over the idea of El Paso as a hard-rock town, which I read in today's Tiempo section as part of our cover story on the upcoming AC/DC concert. I just never would have guessed that El Paso would go bonkers for AC/DC, but apparently so given that the Sunday concert sold out in four hours. A year in, and I'm still learning a lot about what makes this city tick.

The Bolanos brothers

On Wednesday's front page of El Paso Times we will tell the story of the Bolanos brothers. It's a remarkable story of four brothers who served in Vietnam. We hope you'll take a read and tell us what you think.

Two new funnies

Growing up, we used to call the comics, "funnies." Not sure if anyone refers to the comics pages that way anymore. In any event, we added two new "funnies" to our comics pages in the print edition of El Paso Times. We've added Fort Knox and Baby Blues. We also tested the F Minus strip against Fort Knox and asked readers to sound off. In the responses we received, the readership was split pretty evenly between Fort Knox and F Minus. Given that Fort Knox is a new strip and that El Paso has a strong characteristic of a "military town," we decided to go with Fort Knox. Then we dropped in Baby Blues, which has tested very popular in newspapers that run it across the country.

Retiring in El Paso

Looks like The Paso del Norte Group is pushing on a new effort market El Paso as a retirement destination. To that end, the organization created retireelpaso.com. Check it out. The idea of marketing El Paso as a retirement community is part of the city's master plans. El Paso certainly has the land mass to continue to create this type of environment for the region, and the Public Service Board has real estate holdings to help the city create retirement resort communities.

U.S. military personnel and Juarez

One of the questions the death of Staff Sgt. David Booher raises is what instructions U.S. military personnel are under from their commanders when it comes to visiting Juarez. We'll attempt to talk to local bases about this as we work to build Friday's El Paso Times. Given that the U.S. State Department issues advisories not to travel into certain parts of Juarez and Mexico, is the Department of Defense doing the same thing for its personnel based in the border regions?

Google and the NY Times

Just passing along this item on how Google at one point considered buying the New York Times and that Google is poised to be the first $100 billion media company. What's odd about that phrase is listing Google as a media company rather than a search engine as it's traditionally been called.

Texas Tribune launching

At midnight tonight, TexasTribune.org launches and their first-day lineup includes a story on El Paso and state Sen. Eliot Shapleigh's decision not to seek re-election to his state senate district. The buzz on Shapleigh is he may seek the Lt. Gov post in Texas. We'll see. TexasTribune.org will attempt to be all things state politics, with a variety of polling, public databases, original reporting on state politics and then aggregation of state political stories from across Texas. The site is being run by former Texas Monthly Editor Evan Smith. I'm excited to see the site and its progression. A site dedicated to Texas politics is something that's been missing and it will be interesting to see how this site performs. My guess is that it will do very well and will grow a strong audience. El Paso Times will use the content created by TexasTribune.com to complement our own political reporting in Austin and around El Paso. Times reporter Zahira Torres is now based in Austin, replacing Brandi Grissom who moved over to TexasTribune.org.

The difference teachers can make

We've had two very different stories about educators over the past 72 hours that speak volumes about the positive role teachers can play in the lives of their students. On Saturday we spotlighted on the front page of El Paso Times the selection of Yushica Walker of Morehead Middle School as Texas Secondary Teacher of the Year. Read her story and you find a teacher who is making a major difference in the classroom and is well-received by her students. Then on Sunday we reported on the sudden death of Josh Coleman, the band director of Andress High School. The heart-pouring of emotions over his death from current and former band students underscores the important role he played at the school and with the students. While his death is sad, it's a tribute to teachers like him and Walker that they make such a big difference in the lives of their students.