How wonderful that you all can share in your son's major accomplishment; my brother has learning disabilities and school was 12 years of constant struggle for him and for my parents.  Looking back, I'm not sure how we all got through it.

I hate both political parties and I have nothing but contempt for the current occupant of the White House just as I had nothing but contempt for Bush Jr.

While I have some respect for you as a human being as I've seen many of your posts over the years, I think it takes tremendous chutzpah for you to complain about Romney lying when all you can do is "hold your nose" and support one liar over another. You'll note that I'm not even denying your accusations about Romney, I'm taking them at face value.

As for me, I'll be voting third party or Paul this election no matter how "futile" that vote is. Much more of this crap and partisans who never hold their party to account for anything and soon my futile gesture won't be futile any longer.

One can only hope.

That being said, I wonder about the designation of "hispanics" as a minority group for the long term.  I mean 100 years ago, were Jews considered "white"?  In a generation or two, will we still consider white hispanics "non-white" if they barely speak spanish and look white?  I'm not sure.

The autopsy report on Trayvon Martin shows he died from a single gunshot wound to the chest fired from "intermediate range," NBC News is reporting.

NBC, which says it reviewed the report by the medical examiner in Volusia County, Fla., does not define "intermediate range."

The autopsy also found one other fresh injury on 17-year-old Trayvon- an abrasion, no more than a quarter-inch in size, on his left ring finger below the knuckle.

So, no definition of "intermediate range," and only one fresh injury on Martin's hands.

Also, the NYT reports on the investigation into the shooting and finds:

¶ On the night of the shooting, door-to-door canvassing was not exhaustive enough, said a law enforcement official familiar with the investigation. If officers had been more thorough, they might have determined that Mr. Martin, 17, was a guest -- as opposed to an intruder -- at a gated community called the Retreat at Twin Lakes. That would have been an important part of the subjective analysis that night by officers sizing up Mr. Zimmerman's story. Investigators found no witnesses who saw the fight start. Others saw parts of a struggle they could not clearly observe or hear. One witness, though, provided information to the police that corroborated Mr. Zimmerman's account of the struggle, according to a law enforcement official.

¶ The police took only one photo at the scene of any of Mr. Zimmerman's injuries -- a full-face picture of him that showed a bloodied nose -- before paramedics tended to him. It was shot on a department cellphone camera and was not downloaded for a few days, an oversight by the officer who took it.

¶ The vehicle that Mr. Zimmerman was driving when he first spotted Mr. Martin was mistakenly not secured by officers as part of the crime scene. The vehicle was an important link in the fatal encounter because it was where Mr. Zimmerman called the police to report a suspicious teenager in a hooded sweatshirt roaming through the Retreat. Mr. Zimmerman also said he was walking back to the vehicle when he was confronted by Mr. Martin, who was unarmed, before shooting him.

¶ The police were not able to cover the crime scene to shield evidence from the rain, and any blood from cuts that Mr. Zimmerman suffered when he said Mr. Martin pounded his head into a sidewalk may have been washed away.

¶ The police did not test Mr. Zimmerman for alcohol or drug use that night, and one witness said the lead investigator quickly jumped to a conclusion that it was Mr. Zimmerman, and not Mr. Martin, who cried for help during the struggle.

Some Sanford officers were skeptical from the beginning about certain details of Mr. Zimmerman's account. For instance, he told the police that Mr. Martin had punched him over and over again, but they questioned whether his injuries were consistent with the number of blows he claimed he received. They also suspected that some of the threatening and dramatic language that Mr. Zimmerman said Mr. Martin uttered during the struggle -- like "You are going to die tonight" -- sounded contrived.

Now, I don't claim to be any sort of expert on police protocol, far from it, but I do have police members, criminal attorneys, & emt's in my family. And, I have a lot of close police officer friends.

So, from a layman's perspective, and with a lot of anecdotal involvement, I believe I can add some "off the record" experience.

I'll write my opinions as we go along on this case, but for tonight, I'll start with this: The "Blue Line" is real, pervasive, and total. If GZ was considered "one of our own" you can throw out virtually anything they claim to have done as per the shooting. In fact, using lawyer parlance, they should be considered "hostile" investigators.

One last thing: Anything I write is my opinion only. I will try to qualify my comments based on how strongly I feel about a situation, and how much is based on actual empirical knowledge.