From David Dayen:

In the House appropriations bill for Commerce, Justice and Science that will get preliminary votes today, Progressive Caucus co-chairs Keith Ellison and Raul Grijalva will introduce a "Stop Shoot First Laws" amendment, a direct reaction to the death of Trayvon Martin, whose death and ensuing trial may turn on Florida's "Stand Your Ground" law.

The full text of the amendment is below:

Page 44, line 6, insert before the semicolon the following: "Provided, That upon a determination by the Attorney General that a State has in effect a law allowing an armed person to confront an unarmed person in public and shoot to kill even if the confrontation could have been safely avoided, the Attorney General shall withhold 20 percent of the amount that would otherwise be allocated to that State under section 505 of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 (42 U.S.C. 3755)."

Basically, this would impact Byrne Justice Assistance Grant (JAG) funding, a crime prevention program partnership between states and the Justice Department. Any state with a Stand Your Ground-type law would lose 20% of that JAG funding, under the amendment. This would encourage states to repeal those laws, according to Ellison and Grijalva.

[snip]

In a statement, Ellison and Grijalva said, "Shoot first laws have already cost too many lives. In Florida alone, deaths due to self-defense have tripled since the law was enacted. Federal money shouldn't be spent supporting states with laws that endanger their own people. This is no different than withholding transportation funds from states that don't enforce seatbelt laws."

I agree with dday that this amendment will likely never see the light of day, and maybe, given its wording, it shouldn't.

I could be reading it too closely, but "laws that allow an armed person to confront an unarmed person...and shoot to kill" doesn't seem like a correct interpretation of what SYG laws actually say.  

That being said, I do think there is merit in the statement issued by Grijalva and Ellison; laws that result in more deaths don't make any sense, and should be discouraged.

One says will he do anything to change the laws and he says no.

This is nothing more than a last minute campaign tactic. Let's take advantage of it and see if he will do anything about it before election day - any bets???

Elsewhere it looks like the anti-gay marriage con amendment passed in NC, despite the good efforts of Bill Clinton to defeat it.  The Billy Graham bigots won today, not so surprisingly.  

"I think that one of the greatest mistakes America made was to allow women the opportunity to vote. We should've never turned this over to women. And these women are voting in the wrong people. They're voting in people who are evil who agrees with them who're gonna take us down this pathway of destruction. And this probably was the reason they didn't allow women to vote when men were men. Because men in the good old days understood the nature of the woman. They were not afraid to deal with it. And they understood that, you let them take over, this is what would happen."
- Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson, Fox News Contributor (March 5, 2012)

The records don't show end times. They show start times and lengths of calls. At 6:49 there is a four minute call, at 7:04 a one minute call, and at 7:12 another four minute call. Am I reading this wrong?

I'm not seeing a plausible scenario in which Zimmerman takes five and a half minutes to call the police after first spotting Martin. Zimmerman probably didn't see Martin talking on the phone before making his own call. There goes that explanation for Zimmerman suspecting Martin was 'on drugs'.

I'm also having a problem with Martin complaining to Dee Dee that 'a man was watching him', after Zimmerman had already chased Martin.

Crump's version of Dee Dee's story raises more issues.

And she talks about how he kind of slows down and he's trying to look in the car like, I think this dude is following me. And she tells him, baby, be careful, just run home.

And you remember from the 911 tape, Zimmerman tells the police, oh, he's coming at me, he's looking at me, he's checking me out.

So he starts to run and then what do we know from Zimmerman's 911 call that you heard the recording, Zimmerman gets out of his car and pursues him.

I don't think an 'all white' jury will be tolerated. If need be, some way around it will be found.

On Capitol Hill, Mr. Katzenbach, a devoted Democrat, cultivated the good will of Republican senators in 1964 to help pass the landmark 1964 Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which he also helped draft, ending a century of discrimination at the polls. In an interview with The New York Times for this obituary in 2006, Mr. Katzenbach contrasted his style as attorney general with that of the sometimes brutal straightforwardness of his predecessor, Robert Kennedy. He said his own way was to be "less than direct."

More than 40percent  of Democrats voting chose to cast their ballot for Keith Russell Judd, an inmate at the Beaumont Federal Correctional Institution in Beaumont, Texas, where he's doing time for extortion and threats made at the University of New Mexico in 1999.

Judd scored 42.28 percent of the vote -- or 49,490 votes -- compared with President Obama with 57.72 percent, or 67,562, according to unofficial state results.

Not the Best Navigator (none / 0) (#209)
by nomatter0nevermind on Wed May 09, 2012 at 07:47:15 PM EST

sorry, I can't seem to make the wordpress links work for me.  `

http://tinyurl.com/86ecjya

that should be the post

regarding where GZ was when he lost sight of TM who was headed down the cut thru path:

I was likely not considering my answer as clearly as I should have:  I think GZ could see TM at first when he exited his car, but had lost sight for certain when he says "he ran" in past tense.  But he may have lost sight of him as early as "f-ing goons/c**ns/punks/cold"  - this may be a remark of consternation about losing sight, not just general frustration at having to get out of his car to keep him in sight.  

If it is the early mark it may not yet be the moment that TM rounds the corner south to the dogwalk area.  

I'm not sure it is possible to accurately speculate where GZ is by this point.  But from where he may have parked, on K17-21 he would lose sight of TM before TM rounded the corner, due to the angle he's sighting from - the front of the townhouse blocks his view.  

As to the lighting, you can see the shadows of street lamps on the aerial photos, but this only helps show how the street was lit, not the cut thru or the dog walk.  

I you look at the local tv news video taken on the night, you will see that police cars parked at either end of the cut thru, some on the grass even and shined headlights into the area to try and have some light to work by.  We also heard 911 callers describing first responders as carrying flashlights.  Somewhere I read that GZ himself had two flashlights in his possession - sorry I don't have a link - one wa sonhis keychain so it was likely small.  In any case, it seems like the primary lighting in the cut thru and dog walk areas was the small back porch incandescents, (ie, household bulbs with tungsten filaments) and whatever spill was coming from the townhouse interiors out the windows.  

http://tinyurl.com/6r4434m

here is a screen shot of a frame grab from local TV video camera,  greatly lightened in adobe photoshop to the point that colors are skewed and grain is shown.  If you had excellent night vision, it's still probobly better than the human eye cou/d see. Note that this shot includes illumination from police car headlights.  In general I'd say it's dark back there.  

All this circumstantial evidence leads me to believe that it was possible that GZ lost sight of TM before TM turned south into the dogwalk area.  

The location of the body is what leads me to think that GZ missed seeing TM as he headed east towards Retreat View, since he was on the phone and TM was in the "shadow" of the townhouse he died behind.  Once GZ was at the T intersection at I/J 28, he would have had to look behind himself to see Trayvon.  
This is just a guess however.  We don't know where GZ went, really.  We just know where he ended up and where he said he was going to get there.  

I do agree that moving would make TM more visible to GZ.  That's one reason I am inclined to think he rounded the corner as quickly as he could and found a dark or secluded spot, answered his phone and didn't move for the next 2 minutes or so.  

You speculate this:

If Zimmerman reached the T not knowing which way Martin went, I think he would stop there to look around. But his running seems to take him another fifty feet past that point, in whichever direction.

But this where we may disagree - but maybe not. We jsut can't know how fast GZ jogged.    It's entirely possible GZ finished his call here, at the T, scoping about to try to see the youth.  I just think he continued east eventually, since it seems improbable that it took him two minutes to find TM if they were both pretty much in the same vicinity and GZ was actively looking there.  I'm only guessing at this point - we don't have much to go on.  I'm guessing that his reluctance to give his full name and street address is related to his being near where he saw the teen last, and I put that point at somewhere WEST of the T, or at the T itself, for reasons given above.  But he could be past the T if he assumes TM did not turn south and GZ is continuing east from the T himself.  So I'm going with the general idea that he is somewhere on the cut thru - let's say J25-31 to be on the generous side.  

But it makes more sense to me to guess that GZ looked south on the sidewalk, didn't see the running kid, and so continued east to retreat view.  But again, I'm only guessing - partly because the timing of his return and the angle at which he would be facing when he comes back, "returning to his vehicle" as he claimed.  Now he's able to see TM, hiding near the spot where he was shot.  

This is just the simplest route I can come up with.  

You make some good points in the rest of your post, but in the end it comes down to "who left their innocent path and moved to intercept the innocent path of the other?"  And the location of the body seems to suggest that person was George Zimmerman.  If, two minutes or so after hanging up the phone he had not yet returned to his truck, what was he doing all that time?  He seems to be saying (after the fact) he was "looking for a street sign."   Instead, it seems rather obvious that he wasn't going to find a street sign or house number between the townhouses.  I simply don't find his excuse credible.  But I do find it a good indication that he went all the way east to Retreat View, or at least claims he did.  

We just don't have enough information yet to determine for certain what happened.  The timing and location of the alleged foot chase will be key, and the prosecution seems to be vey interested in this bit of testimony.  They also seem to think they a can prove Murder 2.    

I agree that GZ was foolish to say anything to the police without a lawyer present.  But he did, and it seems he said plenty.  He may have believed he was justified at the time in claiming self defense.  Then they started asking him questions like, "what were you doing out of your car in the first place?"  So he came up with the idea that he was innocently looking for a street sign and not looking to keep eyes on the teen.  He had the TRUE element of returning TOWARDS his vehicle to weave into the fabric of his lie.  And no living witness that he knew about to refute him.  Looking for a street sign is implausible, but who can truly prove him wrong if he sticks to his story?  

this is the link to the grid referenced above:

http://tinyurl.com/cmcra5e

there are more general reference pics in this flickr set

---------------------------------
1:03 now he's coming towards me

1:37 these assholes always get away ---  34 seconds of Trayvon walking to pass GZ vehicle

slow motion car-to-foot chase here

2:08  (7:11:41 EST)  
 he's running   - --   T.M starts to run having walked an additional 31 seconds

209-219 GZ  (7:11:41 - 7:11: (parks) exits car, secures weapon, keys, etc

2:20 GZ runs

2:23 fucking c/goons  --- T M runs for 15 seconds, GZ has been running for only 3

T.M runs for 15 seconds at minimum

239   he ran  -  T M runs for 31 seconds in sight of GZ

T.M  runs in sight of GZ for 31 seconds maximum

246 GZ stops running - GZ has run for 26 seconds and cannot see T.M.

339 doesn't want to give out his address, GZ has walked for 53 seconds at most after running for 26

---------

TM walks south from the mailboxes and passes GZ in 34 seconds.  He then continues to walk for 31 more seconds until he is said to be running.  This means he could cover 16-18 grid squares more or less, and if this is accurate, places him at the second corner on Twin Trees in the vicinity of J22.  GZ has followed in his  car and is somewhere near K 18,19,20.  If TM runs for 15 seconds and covers at least half the distance he's able to walk in the same time, he's out of sight of GZ when GZ says "f*ing punks" or whatever it is that he did say at that moment.  GZ has gotten out of his car and in ten seconds has secured his keys, door, weapon, flashlight? etc and has only jogged for 3 seconds at this point, if the wind noise is any indicator of his speed.  He's not far enough north to look all the way down the cut thru path - the front of the townhouse obscures his view.  

I think TM may have run for as little as 15 seconds to get out of GZ's sight.  At most, however, he ran for 31 seconds with GZ jogging behind for 19 seconds, with the same head start.  But even then, he disappeared from GZ's sight at the same time that GZ says "f-ing punks/goons/etc"   and was gone again when GZ says "he ran."

I suppose it is possible that GZ caught sight of him again as they ran someplace, but what we know is that he took two more minutes at least from the end of his call to get into a struggle.  So it's doubtful.

This seems to mean to me that GZ never saw Trayvon turn south between the townhouses.  He just didn't have the right angle, and he wasn't close enough.