On Fox News Sunday:

If you need a smile today, go to the excellent site Popehat, and read this amusing post by Ken White, my pro bono lawyer (along with Ron Coleman) and a very funny guy. Ken likes to return emails to the spammers who often contact us bloggers, hoping to place their marketing pieces on our sites. He is a sort of legal David Thorne in this respect. In this post, someone promoting the Florida town of Destin wrote Ken asking if he would like an article about Destin for his site. Ken asked the spammer, a lady named Dorothy, whether there were any ponies in Destin — emphasizing that it was an unwaivable condition to his placing the article that there be no ponies in Destin. Dorothy responded that Ken had nothing to worry about, and Ken replied:

Dorothy:

I am thrilled, relieved, and more than a little inappropriately agitated to hear it.

Would a guest post extol the virtues of Destin as a recreational locale? That might make a very pleasant change of pace. We write about grim things, Dorothy. Ours is not a place of carefree beach frolic. No, we write about injustice and censorship and brutality and violence and ponies and racism and corruption. Beware, this is a place for tears, as Scarpia says to Cavaradossi in the course of the latter’s regrettable encounter with the Italian court system. So: a post about happy people doing happy things in a happy place would be like a refreshing zephyr, with adjacent condominiums and entertainment venues.

However, my concern is that a guest post about Destin would be a little too cheerful, a little too bright. The transition from one of my posts about wrongful convictions or one of Clark’s posts about the impending overthrow of the United States government into a post about sunny Destin might be abrupt and jarring for our readers. So I was thinking: could your top-notch writer start the guest post with something ugly and sordid and low about Destin, and then ease in to the nice things?

He goes on to suggest a specific sordid and low scenario involving a dead podiatrist. Truly, the whole thing is a masterpiece, although I end up feeling a little sorry for poor Dorothy.

Just a little.

This is no laughing matter, people:

Angered that her boyfriend would not stop singing that catchy “Thrift Shop” song by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, a Colorado woman allegedly choked and pushed her beau during a confrontation late Saturday.

After Malson briefly left the residence, she returned and “began to listen to Macklemore’s song ‘Thrift Shop,’ which Hansen was singing while laying on the couch.” Malson, pictured in the above mug shot, told cops that Hansen sang the lyrics “over and over,” and that she asked him to stop “25 times” before the fracas began.

“He just annoyed me,” Malson told police.

The defense is expected to argue that the attack was justified, and to present a single exhibit: the following video. [Content warning: video has profanity and also may enrage viewers, especially upon repeated viewings.]

From a local news station: “Sources tell CBS 11 that Former Justice of the Peace Eric Williams will be charged with capital murder in the deaths of Mike and Cynthia McLelland, and Mark Hasse.” It’s not a white supremacist gang member or Mexican cartel thug, but just some guy they prosecuted for a relatively minor crime:

His arrest came after federal, state, and local investigators executed a search warrant at his house and his in-laws house Friday afternoon and night as they investigate the murders of former Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McLelland, his wife Cynthia, and assistant DA Mark Hasse.

. . . .

Earlier this month, the CBS 11 I-Team reported Williams had a history with both Mike McLelland and Mark Hasse. The two prosecuted and secured a conviction against him back in 2012 for Burglary and Theft By A Public Servant. Surveillance cameras caught Williams taking computer equipment from a county building. As part of his appeal, Williams claimed McClelland and Hasse didn’t like him.

Anonymous sources say capital murder charges are likely. They have not publicly revealed what evidence they have to support these charges.

We’ll stay on top of the story. Thanks to SarahW.