The Heart of the Matter

I don’t think anyone will ever be able to connect  the racism dots when it comes to George Zimmerman and Trayvon Martin. The really creepy part about the two names is that they will forever be interconnected, like Abraham Lincoln and John Wilkes Booth. While not of the same magnitude as a presidential assassination, a life is still a life is still a life, and none is more valuable than another, whether red, yellow, black, white or any shade in between. We’re not talking red state/blue state; we’re talking about life and death, and it’s not a game.

Let’s take a quick look at the sad case of 45-year-old Michael Dunn. News reports say he “allegedly” fired 8-9 shots into an SUV parked at a convenience store on Friday night. I say there’s nothing alleged about it. He did it. The question is why. He said he didn’t mean to kill anyone. 8 or 9 bullets and he didn’t mean to what? The fact that he fired at all is a tragedy.

From all accounts, Dunn and his girlfriend had just left his son’s wedding reception and stopped at the Gate Food Post convenience store at 8251 Southside Blvd. in Jacksonville on the way back to their hotel room. He pulled up next to the SUV that had music booming LOUDLY. When he got out of his vehicle, he confronted the four occupants and complained. TURN IT DOWN, he screamed. An argument ensued and Dunn pulled out his gun. Some of the shots struck and killed 17-year-old high school student Jordan Davis, who was sitting in the backseat. No one in the SUV was armed, according to initial reports. Lt. Rob Schoonover with the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office said, “They were listening to a little music. It was loud, they admitted that, but, I mean, that’s not reason for someone to open fire on them.” (See: Many unanswered questions in loud music killing)

I hate to drag Florida through the coals again because shootings happen all over the world. Texas is a great state for shooting from the hip, so we are far from alone. Taken at face value, this seems to be your typical white-on-black shooting, and in some circles, the killer would be considered justified because of two simple “reasons” — the shooter owned his gun legally and the victim was black. Or African-American, if we need to be politically correct. Need more ‘splainin’? Talk to the hand. Yet it seems that the mere fact of being white and owning a gun somehow legitimizes a killing, but only if the victim is of color. God forbid that two white boys with concealed carry permits gun each other down. That would never make the news because there’s no worthy angle, and angles are the nature of news; black/white or white/black. Just like Hispanic/Hispanic doesn’t go far. There’s no racial edge.

We may question the motives of an angry white man leaving his son’s wedding reception where, I’m sure, alcohol flowed freely. We don’t know if Dunn even had a drop to drink, but we do know that a defenseless 17-year-old boy is dead. What sort of threat could any of the young men have been to the gunman? Why, if the shooter was so innocent, did he leave the scene and return to his hotel, only to drive home to Brevard County in the morning, where he was found and arrested? No one EVER shoots up a vehicle and leaves the scene unless they hope there are no witnesses.

Dunn entered a not guilty plea on Monday to charges of second-degree murder and attempted murder. His attorney said he acted responsibly and in self-defense. Shades of stand your ground! I can see it coming! At the precise second Dunn pulled out his gun, he felt threatened.

I feel that people like George Zimmerman and Michael Dunn make a mockery of the stand your ground law, but some dynamics are at work. While its intent may be all well and good, there are idiots who interpret SYG as a license to kill. They take more than the law into their own hands because, in both situations here, the shooter was the instigator, the judge, the jury and the executioner. It seems as if people like them believe they are wearing SYG armor and are impervious to prosecution. It’s called an arrogant sense of entitlement. Go figure.

Mark my words, Dunn’s defense team will subpoena Jordan Davis’s cell phone records. If the boy owned a smart phone, the defense will collect information from it; who he talked to, sent text messages to, and where he visited online. Rest assured, if he listened to Hip Hop music, used Hip Hop text language and visited gangsta sites, like all of today’s youth, he will be painted as a no good degenerate, just like the picture Mark O’Mara will try to portray of Trayvon Martin. It’s called character assassination. This leads me to an obvious segue. Please allow me to ‘splain. Yo, Yo, Yo…

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Word on the street (and in the Orlando Sentinel) is that law enforcement has failed to download all of the data from Trayvon Martin’s cell phone, particularly what’s stored on the chip residing inside the phone. Why? Because the phone is still password protected. Tracy Martin, Trayvon’s father, knows the PIN, but he has yet to turn it over to authorities. There may be a few reasons for withholding that number, too, but what’s important to note first is that the defense does have information regarding the last few calls, according to Mark O’Mara. We’ll get back to that.

The gist of the matter is rather plain and easy to understand, but first the problem about perception. If Tracy Martin is keeping the PIN away from law enforcement, he must be hiding something, right? I mean, what else could the reason be? This would prove the kid was up to no good and deserved to be shot. George’s mission from God that night was to take out a boy who was clearly on a path of evil and destruction. Who knows how many people he would have harmed had he not been stopped right then and there; the night of February 26?

Yeah, right. How delusional.

If the Sanford police came to my door, showed me a photograph of my dead son and said he was killed in self-defense, only to find out later that the circumstances might not have been as law enforcement presented them; that my son was actually the victim instead, would I be inclined to trust them with any evidence at all? Remember, it was the Sanford police that insisted the screams for help came from Zimmerman, and when pumped for an answer to that very question at a most inopportune moment, Tracy said he didn’t think it was Trayvon’s voice. Is it? Is it? Well, is it? The man was in agony and denial at the time. What would anyone expect from a grieving father after recently finding out his son was killed and never coming back?

As time went on, it became apparent to Trayvon’s parents that the police were doing nothing to seek the truth regarding the death of their son. Things had deteriorated to the point that, on March 5, Sgt. Joe Santiago asked Tracy for the PIN, and his response was, at best, less than obligatory. He told the sergeant he’d check with his attorney. Three days later, during a March 8 news conference, Martin told the media he would not help the police because they were of no help to him. “My son left Sanford, Florida, in a body bag while George Zimmerman went to sleep in his own bed.”

What we must remember is that, while the PIN has been elusive, gaining important information from the phone has not. It was eventually sent to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, where crime lab specialist Stephen Brenton was able to analyze the contents of the SIM and SD cards. Without the PIN, the data on the phone’s internal chip remains a mystery, but the two cards were revealing enough. From the Orlando Sentinel:

The information downloaded by Brenton at the FDLE lab “tells me the last few phone calls, but that’s about it,” [Zimmerman defense attorney] O’Mara said. “It looks like there is other information that I should have.”

This leads me right back to the heart of the matter. What difference does it make to anyone about the phone calls, text messages and Website visits Trayvon made days and weeks leading up to his death? O’Mara has records leading up to the shooting. What more does he need? Well, just like what I expect any criminal defense team to do, O’Mara’s goal will be to assassinate the character of Trayvon Martin. To what other end would it serve? That would mean Trayvon would die twice — once in real life and once in the courtroom — and if I were his parents, I’d do nothing to help the defense team. Absolutely nothing. Because everything will be taken out of context in a world where half-full becomes half-empty, and innocent texts between Trayvon and his mother could readily turn into a new and freakier Casey Anthony sideshow; where simple words become innuendo, perversions, and complete distortions of the truth. That would truly be heartbreaking.

Cross posted on the Daily Kos

Anatomy of a Filicide

Tony Pipitone from WKMG just reported that a search for “foolproof suffication” was performed on the Anthony family computer on June 16, 2008, the day Caylee Anthony died. Jose Baez claims that George did it, but Pipitone says that, according to the timeline, it couldn’t have been him. He was already at work. At the time, Casey’s cell phone was pinging in the immediate area of the house. 

Baez wrote about this in his book. He waited for the information to be admitted during the trial, but the procecution never produced it. While it’s true the defense was part of the dicovery process, this was evidence each side had the opportunity to examine. It was not something Baez had to share since the State could have readily concluded the same thing. Unfortunately, OCSO missed it. Had it been introduced, the prosecution would have argued that the death could not have been an accidental drowning and it may have impacted the jury. Sadly, there’s nothing that can be done. Double jeopardy, you know. To most of us, this just adds to what we’ve believed for a long time — that Casey Anthony murdered her daughter and she’s still the most hated woman in America, if not the entire world.

This is a story I wrote and published on March 27, 2009, over three years before the trial. Take from it what you will. Originally, I put a disclaimer at the bottom, calling it a work of fiction. Today, I’m not so sure…

CAUTION! CONTAINS LANGUAGE NOT SUITABLE FOR ALL AGES

It’s a perfect day for a murder

Dear Diary,

Last night I had a terrible fight with my mother. I hate her guts. It’s the worst fight we’ve ever had. Sometimes, I can’t decide who I hate the most, her or Dad, but I am so pissed off, I wish she was dead. Him too. Why, oh why, does she think I am a bad person when it is her? She sucks. I want her out of my life. I need to get away from this house and these people forever.

If Tony would only take me away. He must. He’s got to help me. Why do I feel my life is such a mess? If only I didn’t have the brat. She is nothing more than a pain in my ass. Today, I will start my life all over again. With Tony. Or Ricardo. Or… OK, Jesse. If not Jesse… and SHE will never be with us, whoever I’m with. Jesse? If only you didn’t love her so much, we might still be together. Maybe not.

Mom? You think you can take her away from me, but I will never let you. She would make you so happy because she could be the daughter you’ve always wanted. It was never me. You never loved me. What do you think I should do with her? It’s too late. You can’t have her and I don’t want her. I’ve made my mind up and today is it. That little shit will never, ever ruin my life again. She is dead. Screw you all and you will never find out about her. You think I’m crazy, do you? I’ll show you what crazy is all about. You got it. I’ll get even with you. You won’t ever be able to spoil her again.

Dad? Eff you, you weak son of a bitch. You are such a pussy. You let Mom run all over you. I’ve had enough of you and you think you were such a hotshot cop. Oh yeah? You are nothing and you will never figure out what I did with her because I am way smarter than you. You can rot in Hell. Besides, you always loved Lee more than me. You both did.

Lee? Just go on living in your simple little world. God, if you only knew how much I’ve used you over the years, you’d realize just how stupid you are. So’s your girlfriend. Too bad you’re not here to say good bye.

Brat? Today is the day. You will never see me again. Better yet, I will never see you again. Even better still, your grandmother is going to really, really suffer and in the end, I will laugh at you all. Sleep late. I don’t want you seeing Ci Ci before she goes to work. That’s why our door is shut. OK, here, take Mommy’s nanny Zani pill.

I’ve been planning this day for a long time. It didn’t have to be today, but after last night, this is it. It had to come sometime, because I was going nuts. Today, I feel liberated. My mind is made up. What? You wonder why Mommy is in such a good mood? Quick, go see Grandpa Jo Jo before we go. I need to get ready.

OK, Baby, let’s get going. I’ll see you later, Dad. I’ve got some errands to run. C’mon, let’s go. Say good bye to Jo Jo. Tell him you love him. Yes, we’ll see you later. Wave to him as we drive away. Go ahead, Sweetheart.

12:40 pm

She didn’t really need to go anywhere early that afternoon. She just wanted to get out of that house, away from the pain of the night before, so she drove around, chatting endlessly on her cell phone with her boyfriend, Tony, her ex-boyfriend Jesse, and her then-best friend, Amy, never paying any attention to her daughter. She headed down Chickasaw Trail to Lee Vista Boulevard, where she killed some time, about a half hour, at the shopping plaza; then she took off up Narcoossee to Goldenrod. From there, she headed north to Curry Ford and turned into the Winn Dixie shopping center just to kill more time until her father left and the coast was clear. OK, let’s go home for a minute. Mommy forgot something. It was easy to tell her toddler that they needed to go back home. Besides, the little girl always felt safe and secure in that house. Maybe, she messed her pants and Mom forgot the pull-up diapers and the pack of Nice’n Toddler wipes and that angered her. Oh, Come on. You’re too old for this. Whatever, this was the day she had been planning for a long time. She was starting to feel happy again, something she hadn’t been since before the day her daughter was born. She started the car and drove east on Curry Ford until she turned south on Chickasaw to return to the neighborhood where she grew up.

3:00 pm

When they got back to the house, they went into the bathroom where she cleaned the little girl and dried her off . Then, she led her into the bedroom. Mommy will be right back.  She went out to the garage to get the duct tape and a couple of trash bags. Then, she walked back in, took the bags into the bedroom and began peeling a swath of tape off the roll. Here, Mommy wants to play a little game. Come on, you little brat. She started to stick the tape around her head, from the left side of her face and far into her hair.

Mommy, what are you doing? the little girl wondered, unable to really speak like an adult and too tired too fight. Mommy, Mommy, Murfurlbalbl… The tape was now wrapped around the toddlers head and Mommy tore it off the roll, making sure it was stuck firmly to her mouth. She picked the small child up, who was lightly kicking and breathing through her nostrils, wimpering like crazy, as if begging for her life, but the pill had begun to take its toll.

Stop kicking, you little shit! Tears of fear were rolling off the little girl’s face as she struggled to free herself, but she was no match for her mother, as slight of build as she was. Finally, the Xanax she had given her earlier kicked in and the precious bundle of joy gave up. She set her daughter down and hurried into the bathroom to grab a bottle from under the sink. She poured the homemade chloroform onto a wad of folded up toilet paper, returned and held it against her daughter’s nose, just to make sure. All of the faith and trust this girl had in her mother was as weak as her now shallow breaths. What was so different this time as her mother picked her up, was how much heavier she seemed. I guess she never knew much about dead weight. Well, she was never as bright as she thought she was.

She carried her out into the back yard and walked up to the above ground swimming pool. The body made a light splash as it was dropped in. She held her under water until the bubbles stopped. It didn’t take long. The child-like breaths that once smelled like a field of fresh flowers on a breezy Spring day were forever silenced. The life she brought into this world was now dead by her own hands. To her, it was the most exhilarating, the most liberating feeling in a long, long time - until she tried to lift the child out of the water. Wow! This kid is heavy. She hadn’t thought about how much the water would log her down. She propped her little body against the edge of the pool, pulling her arms out and over the side. That gave her a chance to go get the pool ladder that would act as leverage as she struggled to pull the girl out of the water.

One of the things she’s known for is that she doesn’t like to follow directions. She’s never been good at finishing jobs, either. If her mother hadn’t been around to lecture and complain, her bedroom would have been a mess. When she pressed the ladder against the swimming pool, she never attached it firmly. That’s why the ladder was left next to the pool and it explains why she never closed the gate behind her. She never followed up on anything unless someone like her mother was behind her every step of the way and that angered her so.

3:30 pm

Fortunately for her, the pet dogs were napping when she re-entered the house. Casey always demanded that her parents stay out of her room. They always granted her wish for privacy. She was, after all, an adult woman and she needed her space. She walked into the bedroom, dropped her daughter onto the floor and put her soiled clothes into one of the bags. She dried the body and opened the other bag to put her little girl inside. Then, she pushed her under the bed, grabbed the bag of clothes and walked out of the room, shutting the door firmly behind her. She had to be very careful about making sure the door was properly closed. For one night, her bedroom was to be Caylee’s mausoleum. When she walked out the front door with bag in hand, she took one more brief look inside the house before locking the door. Good bye, she thought. Eff this house. No more fights. No more nagging. I am free, but she knew she had to come back tomorrow. This was enough work for one day.

Please Discuss the Case Nicely

I woke up this morning with a fever. My Bones are aching like crazy, which comes with thromboctyopenia and chronic anemia. I have a fever that’s 4.5 degrees above normal. That’s AFTER taking Tramadol for pain. I am going to rest all day and try to stay warm. This hits me periodically, and I just have to wait it out.  Ironically, I see my endocrinologist tomorrow for blood work.

LLMPapa's Video Depiction Could Cook Up A Zimmerman Conviction

LLMPapa has made quite a name for himself, particularly in video production, since the Trayvon Martin tragedy began making headlines. He’s got such a sharp eye and uniquely analytical mind that complement each other so well, nothing seems to escape him. His work is a gourmet blend of just the right ingredients.

While I fancy myself more of a writer than a videographer, I did manage to get my hands on footage from inside The Retreat at Twin Lakes the other day. I think most of you have probably seen it by now. If not, you can view it on YouTube, where I’ve uploaded some 40 videos. LLMPapa, on the other hand, has produced and uploaded nearly 300. In his latest video, he, once again, pokes holes in one of Zimmerman’s stories now reaching the size of a city block made of Swiss cheese. That would be row after row of thinly sliced fromage piled as high as the Orlando skyline.

The video I put together begins where Zimmerman allegedly parked his vehicle the night of February 26, got out and walked in search of a street name. Or was it a house number? Or was he pursuing Trayvon? I use the word “allegedly” lightly because you can’t trust one word that comes out of his mouth. Did he actually park his SUV where he said he did? Was he really looking for an address when he acknowledged following Trayvon after the dispatcher asked and scolded him for doing so? Something he later denied? That the dispatcher asked for an address that was, in fact, never asked for? You get the picture.

Anyway, LLMPapa, affectionately known as Papa, is like a five-star chef. He has a blank check when it comes to my grocery store of video vittles. He is free to mince, dice, chop and slice any and all elements in order to cook up a crowd pleasing platter of truth when it comes to the rotting lies of George Zimmerman. Low and behold, he did just that! For sure, you can always count on a real treat because he really knows how to dish it. Feed your eyes and ears on this. It’s a veritable mind feast…

To be fair, I think it’s only right to acknowledge a separate video put together by Trent Sawyer, under his pseudonym of stateoftheinternet, that also used part of my footage from The Retreat at Twin Lakes complex.

Finally, I want to thank Frederick Leatherman for posting and promoting my video on his blog, and Xena for helping to put it all together. This is truly a concerted effort. We are seeking nothing more than justice — without skipping dessert or running from the truth.

Retreat at Twin Lakes Walk Through

Just like the title says, this is a video shot at the Retreat at Twin Lakes, including some bonus footage. The video is a little pixellated. I think the camera and video editing resolutions and frame rates are different. I may try to fix it and upload it again… 

After viewing the video, simple questions arose. The evening of February 26, 2012 was cold, rainy and wet. It was a dreary night. Why would anyone get out of their vehicle to search for an address that no one asked for? Why get out of the vehicle at all? Addresses were quite visible all around. Wouldn’t driving to the other side have been much more convenient? And drier? In my opinion, this only leads to one thing — searching for a suspect on foot. George Zimmerman never looked for an address. He was stalking his victim.

Cross posted on the Daily Kos

Call Me A "Gagnostic"

 As a writer and journalist, I don’t particularly believe in gag orders, so when the second gag order motion was filed by the State on October 18, I had a feeling it, too, would be turned down, just like the first one on April 30. Sure, the first one was denied by a different judge, but the law is pretty clear about what a gag order is, and George Zimmerman’s defense team has not reached the brink of breaching the legal levee to a point of overflowing; when the public is flooded with pre-trial information that may possibly prejudice a jury down the road. Of course, this is assuming that the State passes its first hurdle — the ‘not yet filed’ defense motion for immunity. We won’t go there. Not now, anyway.

The definition of a gag order is quite simple. Law.com describes it as “a judge’s order prohibiting the attorneys and the parties to a pending lawsuit or criminal prosecution from talking to the media or the public about the case.” The description further states that a gag order “has the secondary purpose of preventing the lawyers from trying the case in the press and on television, and thus creating a public mood (which could get ugly) in favor of one party or the other.” A gag order would apply toward law enforcement officials and include all witnesses.

The second part of the description is intriguing because attorneys have been trying cases in the media since the first stone tablet announced something of legal merit thousands of years ago. Before then, it was grunt of mouth that spread the news, and I’m sure that, back then, there were lawyers that hung their slate shingles over cave entrances advertising their services. In those days, they probably wore custom-tailored saber-toothed fur ensembles to court instead of more mundane beaver skins.

Back to the present. The only thing that’s new about the George Zimmerman/Trayvon Martin case is that the Internet has evolved over the years. We didn’t see it during the O.J. Simpson era of the mid-90s because, unlike today, there wasn’t really a huge need for it. Cell phones were the size of bricks, they were very expensive, and most people were still content with their beepers, fax machines and copiers. I went online sometime in the mid-to-late-90s, but I was in information superhighway diapers until the early 2000s. That’s the way it is in the courtroom now because most laws regarding trial publicity were written prior to the massive explosion of the digital age. If we only go back four years, we witnessed it with the bombastic blast of information regarding the Casey Anthony case, the likes of which we’ve never seen. Thousands of documents were released to the public due to Florida’s liberal Sunshine Law. It wasn’t without problems, though. Case in point: If two different sized tires were found in the woods where Caylee was found, you’d better bet the public retreaded them and overinflated their minds to believe that Casey threw those tires there for a reason. They dissected everything. Why were those tires there? What was Casey hiding? Who helped her? Roy Kronk? God forbid that they might have been there since 2003. Yes, they became Casey’s tires, yet they never swayed the jury one way or the other. There’s a reason for that. They weren’t hers and they were never introduced as evidence at trial. Those woods had been used as a dumping ground for years. That’s the problem with evidence. It’s not always evidence.

Granted, the Zimmerman defense had been publishing all sorts of information on its site, the gzlegalcase, about their client and some of the evidence that’s been released to date, but it was nothing more than what’s been released to the public, anyway. The defense has merely been offering their own interpretations, and some conflicts with the way the State thinks. While the State has been very tight-lipped, that doesn’t mean the defense must play the same game. Most certainly, it doesn’t mean that we have to believe what anyone says, either.

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During the gag order aspect of the hearing on October 26, Bernie de la Rionda rambled on. At times, I found him to be inconsistent and somewhat disheveled, wordwise. He asserted that the defense Website had been somewhat unethical. Zimmerman & Company called witnesses liars and tried to bypass the media by offering their own version of the case instead of how the media might interpret it. I disagree. We are given the same information in discovery. We can write our own commentary. For instance, Zimmerman’s medical records indicate he may have sustained a broken nose during the fight with Trayvon the night of February 26. O’Mara clearly said it’s a fact and undisputed that his client’s nose was broken. I don’t have to believe O’Mara and neither do you, and that’s the whole point.

Discovery impacts potential jurors a heck of a lot more than anything the defense throws out, in my opinion, and no proof exists either way. His nose was broken, his nose wasn’t broken. You decide. Ostensibly, both sides will offer tons of rhetoric at trial. It’s the name of the game. There is one point where I may agree with de la Rionda. It’s when he commented about the defense site’s quote asking for donations from those who would do the same thing if they were in Zimmerman’s shoes. That’s pretty tasteless and crass, not to mention cold-hearted and grossly opinionated. SEND MONEY IF YOU THINK TRAYVON DESERVED TO DIE. Never mind that O’Mara’s job is to defend his client, not bark for money. If O’Mara has a fault, it’s that he can be overtly insensitive at times.

When O’Mara got up to explain why he had done nothing wrong to warrant the gag, I agreed with him until he asserted that the attorneys for Trayvon’s parents were using the race card. Yes, early on, it turned ugly in a racial kind of way, but O’Mara practically accused Benjamin Crump of inciting a race war. That’s just not true. I attended the National Rally for Justice on Behalf of Trayvon Martin in Sanford on March 22, and all I heard from the speakers, including Rev. Al Sharpton, was nothing but justice, justice, justice. Take it through the court system! That’s all they have been seeking. Not retribution. O’Mara claimed that Crump called Zimmerman a racist murderer and, I’m sorry, but I never heard that. If you can show me where Crump did, in fact, say it, I’ll eat my hat.

He also accused Crump and Natalie Jackson of being surrogates for the State. That’s not true, either, any more than saying that Robert Zimmerman is working for the defense. O’Mara claims that, as a surrogate for the State, Crump must be as bound to Florida Rule 4-3.6 as the immediate attorneys involved in the case. I disagree. Crump does not represent the State. His represents Trayvon’s family. Period. Even if a gag order were in place, it would have no bearing on him. I feel that the intent of this sort of strategy in the courtroom was to throw the judge off course. “They went thataway!” It didn’t work because Judge Nelson didn’t blink. She would not budge, and she often had to remind the defense and prosecution to stay on the road.

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I was fairly certain before the hearing began that Judge Nelson was going to rule against the gag order motion. While I had some problems with the defense, did anything ever rise to the level that I would consider iffy? No, but I can understand some of the issues at hand. For instance, what separates bloggers from mainstream media? The Huffington Post is a blog, but it’s the media. Daily Kos is as much a part of the media as the New York Times Website. So is NewsBusters. Then there’s Marinade Dave. We won’t go there, but my point is clear. There’s no single distinguishing line that separates media outlets, so why can’t the defense have a blog?

When O’Mara slightly belittled de la Rionda by reminding him this is 2012 and that law books are no longer on shelves, it reminded me of the final presidential debate on foreign policy, when Obama ridiculed Romney about the armed forces no longer fighting with bayonets. While I understood the president’s point, I knew he was wrong. Marines still carry bayonets. In that vein, not all attorneys are Internet savvy. The last time I checked, Office Depot and Staples still sell legal pads and writing instruments with ink, not just digital tablets and capacitative touch screen pens.

But now that we are in the midst of a technology frenzy that continues to skyrocket into the future, at a time when my six month old 3rd generation iPad is already obsolete, I question what good a gag order would do in today’s world. Just how would it impact a jury seven months into the future when we live in an age of lightning LTE speed? The old saying, today’s news is at the bottom of tomorrow’s birdcage, no longer applies because you can’t clean up birdpoop with the Orlando Sentinel dot com. This morning’s news is already old and who can remember what happened yesterday? Other than something that impacts us tremendously, like Superstorm Sandy, who cares? By the time George Zimmerman goes to trial, no one will remember O’Mara’s ramblings from last month, let alone care. Trust me on that one (but I do find it peculiar that nothing new has been posted on the gzlegalcase site [as of this writing] since October 23.)

Ultimately, Judge Nelson denied the motion because alternatives are available to the court to “ensure that an impartial jury can be selected. Those tools include a change of venue, a larger than normal jury venire, individualized voir dire, and stern instructions to the jurors as to their sworn duty to decide the issues based only upon the evidence.” I fully concur, but I think the best news to come out of her order was one simple, yet important, thing. Had a gag order been placed, other than Benjamin Crump, the media would have had no one else to talk to but Robert Zimmerman, Jr, and no one but the media and his own family care about him. And he only matters when there’s nothing better to report. Count your blessings. It’s good to be a gagnostic.

[Prior to the start of the hearing, I wasn’t sure I could get an Internet connection on my iPad. I did, but in the meantime, I asked Rene Stutzman, senior reporter at the Orlando Sentinel, if she had any paper to spare. She gave me her legal pad without hesitation. That was very kind and generous of her. Of course, I gave it back.]

Cross posted on the Daily Kos

Sandy

This is a song from Bruce Springsteen. You can’t get any more New Jersey than The Boss. New Jersey is my home state and I am very proud of it.

The name of this song is 4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy) and it’s from the 1973 album The Wild, The Innocent and The E Street Shuffle. It was released when I was in the prime of my life and very much in love with my NJ girl. We spent our summers on Long Beach Island, down the shore. Sandy has been one of my favorites since it hit the airwaves. It’s a very melodic tune. For nearly forty years, it’s conjured up wonderful memories of times spent along the Jersey shore. Sadly, I must add something painful to those memories in the aftermath of the hurricane with the same name that devastated my state. My heart aches tremendously.

This particular video showcases Danny Federici on the accordion. Danny died of melanoma on April 17, 2008. It was his final performance, when he briefly appeared with his E Street Band band mates onstage at Conseco Fieldhouse in Indianapolis on March 20. Danny was from my hometown of Flemington and we both graduated from Hunterdon Central High School.

Here’s to all my friends and relatives in New Jersey, whom I love very much. I have family and friends in New York City and Westchester County, New York. I have a very special friend in Pennsylvania. Most are still without power. My thoughts and prayers are with each and every one of you.

Cross posted on the Daily Kos