A Personal Note as Obama Speaks on Death of Boy

WASHINGTON — President Obama did not mention race even as he addressed it on Friday, instead letting his person and his words say it all: “If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon.”

Weighing in for the first time on the death of Trayvon Martin, the unarmed black teenager shot and killed a month ago in Florida by a neighborhood watch volunteer, Mr. Obama in powerfully personal terms deplored the “tragedy” and, as a parent, expressed sympathy for the boy’s mother and father.

“I can only imagine what these parents are going through. And when I think about this boy, I think about my own kids,” Mr. Obama said. “Every parent in America,” he added, “should be able to understand why it is absolutely imperative that we investigate every aspect of this and that everybody pulls together — federal, state and local — to figure out exactly how this tragedy happened.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/24/us/politics/obama-talks-of-tragedy-not...      

George Michael Zimmerman, the man at the center of the racially- charged killing of an unarmed black teenager, is a former altar boy, insurance salesman and college student.

And another label has also stuck in the public's perception: frustrated cop wannabe.

Over the years, his scores of calls to police showed he pursued shoplifters and errant drivers with zeal, reporting pit bulls, potholes, children playing in the street, open garage doors and "suspicious" youths - usually black males - loitering in the street

Florida’s Disastrous Self-Defense Law
By JOHN F. TIMONEY

THE very public controversy surrounding the killing on Feb. 26 of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed 17-year-old, by a crime watch volunteer, George Zimmerman, was predictable.

In fact, I, along with other Florida chiefs of police, said so in a letter to the Legislature in 2005 when we opposed the passage of a law that not only enshrined the doctrine of “your home is your castle” but took this doctrine into the public square and added a new concept called “stand your ground.”

Use-of-force issues arose often during my 41-year policing career. In fact, officer-involved shootings were the No. 1 problem when I became Miami’s police chief in January 2003. But after we put in place new policies and training, officers went 20 months without discharging a single bullet at a person, while arrests increased over 30 percent.

Trying to control shootings by members of a well-trained and disciplined police department is a daunting enough task. Laws like “stand your ground” give citizens unfettered power and discretion with no accountability. It is a recipe for disaster.

At the time the Florida law was working its way through the Legislature, proponents argued that a homeowner should have the absolute right to defend himself and his home against an intruder and should not have to worry about the legal consequences if he killed someone. Proponents also maintained that there should be no judicial review of such a shooting.

But I pointed out at the time that even a police officer is held to account for every single bullet he or she discharges, so why should a private citizen be given more rights when it came to using deadly physical force? I also asked the bill’s sponsor, State Representative Dennis K. Baxley, to point to any case in Florida where a homeowner had been indicted or arrested as a result of “defending his castle.” He could not come up with a single one.

The only thing that is worse than a bad law is an unnecessary law. Clearly, this was the case here.

  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/24/opinion/floridas-disastrous-self-defen...    

As the rain trickled down on Freedom Plaza on Saturday afternoon, young men pulled their hoodies up to cover their heads.

“I am Trayvon Martin,” the young men chanted.

They gathered in memory of Martin, whose death at the hands of a neighborhood watch volunteer has stirred the passions of the nation, launched federal and state investigations and fueled calls for justice in rallies across the country.

They were young men like Darryl Jackson, 15, of Largo, who said after the event that he came with his mother, Elisa, because “it could have been me.”

Martin, a black Florida teenager, was fatally shot last month as he walked back from a convenience store toward a home in a gated community while wearing a hoodie to cover his head from the rain.

“We’re standing up today because we are all Trayvon Martin,” said the Rev. Graylan Hagler of Plymouth Congregational Church of Christ in the District.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/demonstrators-at-freedom-plaza-rally-in-memory-of-trayvon-martin/2012/03/24/gIQAjUbbYS_print.html

What is it that prompts Republicans to try so hard to alienate women, blacks, Hispanics, independents and all those millions and millions to the left of the Tea Party they’ll need to beat Obama? Maybe they feel it’s their last throw. All the demographics look unfavourable for any future Republican majority. So there is a desperate effort to get everything they can right now. Conning working-class whites with racism, sexism, anti-gay/anti-immigrant rhetoric, etc has worked so well since Nixon that it's become an addiction.  

Read more: http://www.theweek.co.uk/us/trayvon-martin/46098/trayvon-martin-republicans-shoot-themselves-foot-again#ixzz1qfdI6794

When Billy Kuch knocked on the wrong door, he had a cigarette in one hand and a shirt in the other. The homeowner, Gregory Stewart, stepped outside, stood his ground, fired a round from his semiautomatic into Kuch’s chest, and in the eyes of the state of Florida, committed no crime.

Three years after that shooting, in a Land O’ Lakes subdivision called Stagecoach Village, Kuch is alive but damaged by his injuries and the shock of being shot at point-blank range. Stewart is free but lying low, still sought out by neighbors and others who want him to account for his actions.

“I have no problem with people owning guns to protect themselves,” says Bill Kuch, Billy’s father. “But somehow, we’ve reached the point where the shooter’s word is the law. The victim doesn’t even get his day in court. I don’t think most Americans realize it, but that’s where we are.”

In Florida and across the country, “Stand Your Ground” laws — the same kind of legislation that authorities cited for not arresting a neighborhood-watch volunteer after 17-year-old Trayvon Martin was killed in Florida in February — have coincided with a sharp increase in justifiable-homicide cases.

Prosecutors still reject many claims of self-defense under the new law, and no long-term studies definitively tie the rise in justifiable killings to the passage of laws that relieve citizens of the responsibility to back away from threats. But the Martin case has focused a spotlight on incidents in which the mere statement that people feel endangered allows them to — depending on your sense of what’s right — defend themselves against thugs or act like vigilantes.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/stand-your-ground-laws-coincide-with-jump-in-justifiable-homicide-cases/2012/04/07/gIQAS2v51S_print.html

The neighbourhood watch volunteer who shot dead an unarmed black teen in Florida in February has been charged with second-degree murder.

The decision to charge 28-year-old George Zimmerman, currently in police custody, over the death of of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin has rested with special prosecutor Angela Corey.

"Today, we filed an information charging George Zimmerman with murder in the second degree," Ms Corey said.

"I will confirm that Mr Zimmerman is indeed in custody."

"I can tell you, we did not come to this decision lightly," she added after a weeks-long investigation into Mr Martin's death.

Ms Corey said Zimmerman was being held in Florida, but did not say where.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-04-12/shooter-charged-in-death-of-us-teen/3944864

We live in a land of rapid cultural shifts. After Obama announced his support of gay marriage, 53 percent of Americans said they were with him. Just six years earlier, only 36 percent of Americans said they supported gay marriage. This has been a cultural upheaval, no doubt abetted by television (“Will & Grace,” “Modern Family,” “Smash”) but also by a general liberalization of society — more of everything except marriages. Soon, only gays will marry.

It’s hard to know how deep these cultural changes go. The question has real relevance when it comes to the Middle East. Do revolutions powered by Facebook and Twitter mean that minds, as well as political structures, have been reordered? Does the wearing of Western clothes mean the adoption of Western cultural norms? Maybe a bit. Maybe not at all. We shall see.

The same holds for America. How deep are our own cultural changes? Some insist that not much has changed. They cite a persistent American racism. There are many such examples — not all that many, actually — but they are newsworthy because they are exceptions to the rule, not what we expect. Once, though, we expected that a black man would be harassed into quitting the Naval Academy on account of race — that this racism was ordinary, normal and in no way a violation of the rules of the place. (Jimmy Carter, a midshipman at the time, was one of the few to offer support to Brown.)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-united-states-has-come-far-in-ending-bigotry/2012/05/28/gJQA6vRTxU_print.html

Meanwhile in Indonesia...

The show won’t go on. Lady Gaga this weekend announced that she is canceling a sold-out concert in Jakarta because of threats of violence from religious hard-liners. The gig, scheduled for June 3, was staunchly opposed by conservative Muslim groups, including the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI), that earlier this month vowed to stop the “satanic” singer from setting foot on Indonesian soil. Some threatened to buy tickets and wreak havoc in the stadium. The police tried to derail the event by denying a crucial permit but quickly reversed its decision and promised to push ahead. Gaga’s camp backed out on Sunday, saying it couldn’t keep the singer or her fans safe. Salim Alatas of the FPI called it a victory for Indonesian Muslims: “Thanks to God for protecting us from a kind of devil.”

Read more: http://globalspin.blogs.time.com/2012/05/28/lady-gaga-deemed-satanic-by-conservative-groups-is-bullied-out-of-indonesia/#ixzz1wFwL1G3A

The death of Trayvon Martin was all part of “God’s Plan,” according to the man charged with his murder, who still has “no regrets” over his actions on the night he shot and killed the unarmed teenager.

George Zimmerman, the neighbourhood vigilante at the centre the high-profile case, used his first public interview to say that he is nonetheless “sorry” that events conspired to: “put me in the position where I had to take his life.”

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/george-zimmerman-says-trayvon-martins-death-was-all-part-of-gods-plan-7959407.html

When "god" enters the defence of the morons who goofed big time, you know they are either lying or are even more moronic than you ever imagined — or both... Blimey...

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