Update: You can read the bail order here. My analysis is below.

The Judge has set George Zimmerman's bail at $1 million. He has to post 10%, will not be allowed to open a bank account, and must be on GPS. Order to follow. Feel free to discuss here or at TalkLeft Forums.

The Court on page 5 confirms "the State failed to prove that the Defendant may be held without bond." On page 4, he repeats his finding the evidence is "strong", and says that the June 29 hearing was not an Arthur hearing, so the evidence on self-defense presented by the defense is mostly irrelevant. He lists a number of short-comings in the defense presentation at both the April 20 and June 29 bail hearing. [More...]

President Obama, as is his custom, spent July 4th with military families, at a White House backyard barbecue, but he began the day presiding over a citizenship ceremony for 25 new citizens.

“Just as we remain a nation of laws, we have to remain a nation of immigrants,” Mr. Obama said. “And that’s why, as another step forward, we’re lifting the shadow of deportation from deserving young people who were brought to this country as children. It’s why we still need a Dream Act — to keep talented young people who want to contribute to our society and serve our country.

Immigration is another issue that sets him apart from Mitt Romney. I wonder how that issue polls in the swing-states that everyone says will determine the election in November. It's likely to help him in Colorado and Nevada, but what about the others? [More...]

The Declaration of Independence:

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

[More...]

TalkLeft's webmaster Colin and I have spent the last five days re-constructing the old TalkLeft Duke Lacrosse Forums from 2006 and creating new TalkLeft Forums for the George Zimmerman case.

While I will continue to report here on major Zimmerman case news when it occurs, most of the case discussion from now on will be on the Forums, so that TalkLeft can get back to other topics. For more about the new forums, see our announcement here.

The Duke La Crosse Forums, which had 75,000 comments as of 2009, have been restored through mid-2009 and moved here. (In 2010, when we moved servers, the content after October, 2006 got lost and it took until this weekend to find and restore it. The restoration is for historical purposes only, the Duke Forums are closed.) [More...]

Update: Judge Lester said today he'll rule on bond Thursday. He has started drafting the order.

As he waits for a ruling on bond, which may come today, Mark O'Mara, attorney for George Zimmerman, has posted the exhibits from Friday's hearing on bond at his case website.

At the June 29 Bond Hearing, the defense submitted a number of exhibits into evidence in an effort to demonstrate the weaknesses of the State’s case against George Zimmerman and illustrate the strength of Mr. Zimmerman’s claim of self defense. As evidence submitted by the defense is to be made public record, we feel it is appropriate to provide it here.

The medical records are here.

TalkLeft readers and commenters: Keep reading below, we have an announcement: [More..]

DougJ asks:

If a Republican Congress had [passed] the [ACA] bill, and a Republican president had signed it, how would the vote have gone, in your opinion? I’d especially like to hear from the lawyers.

There would have been no case and no vote. The constitutional argument was manufactured by Randy Barnett and only became respectable because GOP pols signed on to it.

Next question.

Marc Ambinder's new article suggesting Obama will shift his position on the War on Drugs if he gets re-elected doesn't offer much.

Since the United Ststes isn't about to legalize or regulate the illegal narcotics markets, the best thing a president can do may be what Obama winds up doing if he gets re-elected: using the bully pulpit to draw attention to the issue. But he won't do so before November.

The article is more a review of the documentary The House I Live In, which I wrote about in January here than it is about Obama.

I have no expectations Obama will ease up on the War on Drugs. But since we know that Republicans will keep escalating it, as they will our over-reliance on incarceration, the choice in November on this issue is clear: Obama.

The final season of Weeds begins tonight. Here's what I thought would happen when the last season ended.

The Prime Minister of New Zealand has rejected calls for an inquiry into the Kim DotCom raids.

The New York Times reports young voters "are looking past" Obama. But when you read the article, the stats show he still has a lead among them and there's little reason to think they'd vote for Romney.

Exit polls show Pena Nieto has won the Mexico election. We'll see what he does with U.S. drug policy, but it's doubtful much will change. Still, Washington is nervous.

Another open thread, all topics welcome.

The polls are open in Mexico as the country votes for its new President. Enrique Pena Nieto of the PRI is expected to win.

Heat waves and power outages on the East coast, fires burning in Colorado and the West.

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

Thanks to DiwataMan2 for his You Tube posting of a very clear audio of the 2 and 1/2 hour bond hearing yesterday in the George Zimmerman case. It begins with the media arguments. The bond hearing begins at 11:18. O'Mara's closing arguments begin at 2:03.

In between, are the witnesses who were the subject of much discussion yesterday and don't need rehashing, and O'Mara's introduction of evidence: All 11 of George Zimmerman's statements and interviews, and all of the recordings and written statements of Witnesses 6, 11, and 20, all of whom help Zimmerman. The state introduced no witnesses or evidence.

While I linked to the video of the final hour yesterday, the audio in it wasn't clear. DiwataMan2's version is crystal clear, including the Judge's brief comments. [More...]

Tour de France has commenced today.

Open Thread.

The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts has released its annual report on the use of federal and state wiretaps and electronic surveillance. The summary is here, and the page with all the appendixes and charts is here. Some highlights:

• 85% of the federal wiretaps were in drug cases.
• The average cost for a federal wiretap was $71,748, a 13 percent increase from 2010.
• Telephone wiretaps accounted for 96 percent (2,092 cases) of the intercepts installed in 2011, the majority of them involving cellular telephones.
• During 2011, a total of 4,006 arrests, 2,700 convictions, and additional costs of $51,874,823 arose from and were reported for wiretaps completed in previous years.

[More....]