The Martin-Zimmerman Wildcard

When viewed in hindsight, mistakes made in botched investigations seem rather obviously dumb. But the handling of the phone call between Martin and his girlfriend that took place in the moments before the shooting is particularly bizarre. Several weeks after the shooting, when the firestorm of protest was in full swing, Martin-family attorney Benjamin Crump announced that he had an affidavit from Martin's girlfriend detailing Trayvon's actions before the shooting, and insisted he would not hand it over to the police, but only to federal investigators. The Sanford Police responded that they had asked for anyone with information to come forward, but the young lady never came forth. The whole thing sounded fishy, and led me to wonder if the phone call even took place at all.

Now if indeed such a phone call had occurred, this would have been immediately obvious to the Sanford Police, who were in possession of Martin's phone. Why would they have needed someone to "come forward" when they could have just called the person up or tracked them down through phone records (a warrant for such an investigation would surely have been a snap to secure)? This would seem to constitute particularly incompetent police work. But we do know that even though they had the deceased teen's phone, they did not follow up on his identity and instead waited for Mr. Martin to call to report his son missing the next morning.

At any rate, because there was no immediate contact with the young lady, there have now been many weeks to prepare her testimony. The trial then will likely come down to her word* against Zimmerman's. And while Zimmerman gave several statements in the incident's immediate aftermath from which the prosecution can pick apart any inconsistencies, since the young lady was not interviewed early on in the investigation, her testimony will likely be well tuned. Thus, despite what appears to be a very weak case against him at this point, I believe Zimmerman's goose may be cooked once he gets to trial.

* Of course I'm assuming this aspect of the case is anything like it's being portrayed. In the Duke Lacross hoax, we were also told that the other stripper would corroborate the accuser's story, but that of course never panned out. It would not shock me if this entire aspect of the case ends up falling apart, but at this point I have to assume that the phone records do indeed show a phone call between Trayvon and this girl at the suggested time.

U.S. Marshals seize Madoff home, boats in Florida

Reuters: U.S. Marshals on Wednesday seized a $9.4 million luxury home in Florida belonging to disgraced Wall Street financier Bernard Madoff and his wife after earlier confiscating two of their leisure boats.

Yes! That's what I want to see - capped off with a life sentence - though I won't be satisfied until that bitch wife of his is cleaning toilets.

And that's what we need to do, but on a much grander scale. The Feds should have a very hefty database of names of people involved in the great scams of the last decade - mortgage brokers, mortgage company executives, CDO bundlers, over-the-counter CDS underwriters, mutual-fund managers with loose tongues, CEO's pumping their stocks - and all their likely possessions. Such a list should be very simple for the USG to compile, using available public records.

Just using existing laws, RICO for instance, we could just start confiscating these properties en masse. If the seriousness of our current financial situation combined with the enormity of the crimes not be sufficient to dissuade the judiciary from interfering, Congress could easily pass a law more explicitly authorizing this action. Given the shenanigans that went on, it's hard to imagine we couldn't successfully prosecute most of these cases, time being the only limitation. We can offer plea deals where the defendants agree to give up claims to the confiscated property should the prosecutorial load be too onerous.

If I were president, of course, I would direct every lawyer working for the government to be assigned to prosecution of the crooks involved in the Great Looting and securing their ill gotten gains. Maybe now that Obama is feeling a little intoxicated from the rush of firing the CEO of GM, he might find this kind of thing fun and give it a try. I would be most cathartic for the nation.

Advice for Men

Men, never get yourself involved in any kind of relationship - casual, platonic, or heaven forbid intimate - no matter how desperate you may be for social contact - with a woman who looks like this:

Advice for Women

For the women out there, a bit of friendly advice: Do not, under any circumstances, have any contact whatsoever with any man who looks like this: