In his first public response to the Trayvon Martin shooting, President Obama famously said in March, "If I had a son, he'd look like Trayvon."

CNN legal analyst Mark NeJame, after uncovering a picture of George Zimmerman's relatives during his investigation of this matter, told Piers Morgan Thursday, "If President Obama has indicated that his son would have looked like Trayvon Martin, then most respectfully, if you look at these pictures, his grandparents and great-grandparents would have looked a lot like George Zimmerman's grandparents and great-grandparents

MARK NEJAME, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: When I first heard about this tragedy I jumped to the conclusion that I think many did that there was some racial aspect to this shooting, that Trayvon Martin was shot and killed by George Zimmerman in part based upon bigotry and racial profiling. And I just presumed that from all the press reports that came out and from what I heard.

Well, as I started getting into a role as an analyst and such, I started asking questions. I’ve been a defense lawyer for over 30 years, and I have come to realize that much of what you hear is simply not factual. So we’ve got the picture there, and you can see. I had a family member give it to a friend who gave it to me and we gave it to you earlier today. And as you see there, the man in the middle is apparently George Zimmerman's great-grandfather. The woman above him is in fact his grandmother who is half black, and the little child in the gentleman's lap is his mother.

So we see that he really has significant multiracial, multicultural roots, and as I’ve come to realize and find out through my investigation, he was raised in a multicultural, integrated family in large part by his grandmother who is half black.

And I’ve made the analogy, and it seems appropriate, that if President Obama has indicated that his son would have looked like Trayvon Martin, then most respectfully, if you look at these pictures, his grandparents and great-grandparents would have looked a lot like George Zimmerman's grandparents and great-grandparents.

So, it seems to me in light of this, other things that we have found out about him mentoring African-American children quietly with nobody knowing about it for a couple of years, driving Orlando, excuse me Sanford to Orlando regularly, and talking to people that know him, I have changed my position. People can come up with whatever conclusions they want, but from looking at the facts, looking at the evidence, I don’t think there’s a racial motive in this.

Now, we have NRA issues, we have stand your ground issues, we have all sorts of other significant issues – self-defense or not self-defense. We’ll get to those at a later time. But race, was that a factor in this shooting? From what I see, from what I have now learned, I don’t think so.

Needless to say, it's going to be fascinating to see how much coverage this picture gets in the coming days.

After all, virtually the entire media have depicted Zimmerman as a racist.

Now that we actually have a picture of his great-grandparents and his grandmother, will the press be willing to share it with the public and discuss the ramifications as NeJame did with Morgan Thursday evening?

Stay tuned.

Appearing as a guest on Thursday's Piers Morgan Tonight on CNN, the news network's founder, Ted Turner, complained that a double standard exists between the U.S. and Israel being allowed to possess nuclear weapons while Iran is expected to be nuclear-free, as he suggested that all countries dispose of their nuclear weapons to persuade Iran not to build such weapons.

After host Piers Morgan asked Turner what he would do about Iran if he were President, the CNN founder absurdly complained that Iran was being held to a different standard than Israel, without either he or Morgan noting Iran's support of terrorism against both Israel and the U.S. Turner:

Well, first of all, I believe in total nuclear disarmament. That's the only way we're ever going to get there.  We all got to play by the same set of rules. We have 2,000 or several thousand nuclear weapons. Iran has none at the current time. It's okay for Israel to have 100, but it's not okay for  Iran to have two. That's, that's, you're not treating everybody equally.

He soon recommended all countries get rid of their nuclear weapons to prevent Iran from going nuclear:

I think we've already voted at the U.N. and the Security Council to get rid of nuclear weapons. Let's get rid of them. Let's get rid of ours, and then Iran will stop, I believe, and everybody else will because if everybody doesn't have them, then we're safe – at least safe from a nuclear attack.

Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the Thursday, May 3, Piers Morgan Tonight on CNN:

PIERS MORGAN: What would you do about Iran if you were the American President?

TED TURNER: Well, first of all, I believe in total nuclear disarmament. That's the only way we're ever going to get there.  We all got to play by the same set of rules. We have 2,000 or several thousand nuclear weapons. Iran has none at the current time. It's okay for Israel to have 100, but it's not okay for  Iran to have two. That's, that's, you're not treating everybody equally.

You have no strong position except force. Only by force can it be done. I think we've already voted at the U.N. and the Security Council to get rid of nuclear weapons. Let's get rid of them. Let's get rid of ours, and then Iran will stop, I believe, and everybody else will because if everybody doesn't have them, then we're safe – at least safe from a nuclear attack.

I mean, if we have full-scale nuclear exchange, it's going to destroy life on Earth, all life. Maybe there will be a few cockroaches left, but that's all, and I find that crazy. This is such a nice world, and most of the people are really nice here. But, you know, and if you treat people with dignity, respect, and friendliness like I did with the Russians and the Soviets before them with the Goodwill Games, if you try and make friends, you can make friends and you can do that even with former enemies. Japan bombed us at Pearl Harbor, and now we're good friends with the japanese. We fought China in the Cold War, but now we're good friends with the Chinese, most of us are.
 

Less than two weeks after his suspension for previous intemperate tweets was lifted, Roland Martin was engaging in personally insulting "mis-tweetment" again this afternoon with PJ Media's David Steinberg.

In a series of tweets at around 5 p.m. tonight seen after the jump, Steinberg criticized Martin for spending so much time on the press's Trayvon Martin obsession — where one person tragically died — while ignoring the impact and meaning of the documents leaked by an unnamed Department of Justice official relating to the Fast and Furious "gunwalking" scandal — as a result of which "at least 300 Mexicans, plus at least two American law enforcement agents" have been killed. Martin's responses were immature, insulting, condescending — and all too typical of a press corps which, now that it is seeing poll results it doesn't like, has in certain cases taken to calling voters stupid.

From Martin's Twitter feed (reads from the bottom up; most offensive tweets by Martin are in orange boxes):

There's also this, from Steinberg:

Roland Martin apparently isn't interested in learning anything. His interest, that of his network, and that of the preponderance of the national press would appear to be advancing anything which might be perceived as helping the reelection prospects of Barack Obama, and deliberately suppressing genuine news which might hurt him. Legitimate journalistic considerations seem to pale in comparison.

Though tempting, it might not be a good idea to lobby CNN to suspend Martin again. I sort of like how he’s showing the world who he really is, and what his continued employment says about the network which employes him.

Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.

ngbaAppearing on CNN, senior Romney adviser Eric Fehrnstrom spoke of this fall’s general election and Romney’s challenge in going up against President Obama:

“Well, I think you hit a reset button for the fall campaign,” Fehrnstrom said. “Everything changes. It’s almost like an Etch A Sketch. You can kind of shake it up and restart all over again.”

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CNN's Erin Burnett on Monday did a segment correctly castigating Congress for not passing a budget in over 1000 days.

The only problem was that while she did this, pictures of House Republicans were shown on the screen despite the blame resting solely with Senate Democrats (video follows with transcript and commentary):

ERIN BURNETT, HOST: Today's Congress, the least productive and least popular in recent history. What will it take to turn it around? Well you know what there's an idea out there, what about if they don't get anything done, they don't get paid. Well see this would really be a problem, I think, because it's been more than 1,000 days since the last joint budget resolution, so if you said you don't get paid until you get a budget, that's a heck of a lot of days with no pay.

All right, this is one of the potential reforms though that's going to be receiving a Senate hearing this Wednesday that might really turn the tide in terms of Congress getting things done and being liked perhaps a little bit while they're doing it.

John Avlon is going to be at that hearing and he has a preview for us tonight. All right John, so more than 1,000 days since the last joint budget resolution, no budget, no pay. Maybe they'll get one done.

JOHN AVLON, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Maybe they would. So here's the idea. Basically it's basic. You don't pass a budget on time; you don't get paid on time. And so that's the idea of applying the kind of incentive that it might take the focus the mind of Congress to start doing their job, so that's one of the proposals that's going to be forwarded at this — the Senate hearing on Wednesday that's going to start trying to take on some congressional forums to maybe change this dysfunctional culture that we've seen in Congress.

BURNETT: And the average salary on Capitol Hill, $174,000 –

AVLON: That's right –

BURNETT: — right, so it's not — this is a lot of money.

AVLON: Absolutely and you know you need to change the incentive structure. The incentive system in Congress is all screwed up. This is one way to get it right.

BURNETT: All right, so I would love — that's a really great idea, a really great idea, OK.

You know what else is really great idea? Cable news anchors and their contributors knowing what they're talking about.

Since Barack Obama's first budget was passed in April 2009, the Senate, which has been controlled by Democrats since January 2007, has not offered one single budget.

By contrast, after taking over the House in January 2011, the GOP proposed and passed a budget on April 15. It was defeated by Senate Democrats on May 26.

As such, the entire cause of the absence of a budget resolution since April 2009 is Democrat obstruction.

To show House Speaker John Boehner (R-Oh.) and Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) on screen during this segment was a pathetic deception.

Sadly, that's par for the course at CNN.

CNN is usually friendly ground for Obama propagandists, but the cable channel’s British replacement for Larry King, Piers Morgan, who has conducted many a slanted, unfair interview of Republicans and conservatives, couldn’t give the maker of “The Road We’ve Traveled” a pass last week.

“What are the negatives in your movie about Barack Obama,” Morgan asked Guggenheim, pointing out that documentary filmmakers usually seek balance. “The negative for me,” Guggenheim replied, “was there were too many accomplishments. I had 17 minutes to put them all in there.”

by OutloudOpinion.com For more Podcasts visit www.outloudopinion.com

Those who have seen HBO’s Game Change come away with a more sympathetic view of Sarah Palin, Time magazine’s Mark Halperin, co-author of the book on which HBO based its production set to air Saturday night, contended Wednesday night on CNN. Erin Burnett interviewed Halperin and co-author John Heilemann and Halperin told Burnett:

We’ve seen a few screenings with people and uniformly – every screening we’ve attended – people who came in, didn’t like Sarah Palin, weren’t fans of Sarah Palin, almost every one of them has said to us afterwards, “you know what, I now understand what she went through more, I have more sympathy for her, I have more appreciation for what she accomplished.”

Has anyone who admires Palin gotten into one of these screenings?

Halperin insisted: “It’s factually accurate and I think a lot of people who watch it who are favorably disposed to Governor Palin are going to find it to be a pretty favorable portrait, a fair portrait of what she went through.”

Earlier: “Leno Says Game Change ‘Humanizes’ Palin; York: Could’ve Focused on Democrats Trying to Block Black Man”

From the pre-recorded segment on the Wednesday, March 7 Erin Burnett OutFront on CNN:

ERIN BURNETT: There’s some controversy that it’s too harsh. She’s called it Fact Change instead of Game Change. But you obviously have seen the movie, you consulted on the movie. Is it a fair representation of what was in the book, of what your reporting was?

MARK HALPERIN: It is. We’d urge anybody who’s not seen it – airs on HBO on Saturday 9 o’clock – to watch it. It’s factually accurate and I think a lot of people who watch it who are favorably disposed to Governor Palin are going to find it to be a pretty favorable portrait, a fair portrait of what she went through, all the things she accomplished in those 60 days on the ticket; the challenges as well. We’ve seen a few screenings with people and uniformly – every screening we’ve attended – people who came in, didn’t like Sarah Palin, weren’t fans of Sarah Palin, almost every one of them has said to us afterwards, ‘you know what, I now understand what she went through more, I have more sympathy for her, I have more appreciation for what she accomplished.’

BURNETT: That’s interesting. So a little more empathy.

People laugh when politicians talk about their drug use. The audience laughed during a 2003 CNN Democratic presidential primary debate when John Kerry, John Edwards and Howard Dean admitted smoking weed.

Yet those same politicians oversee a cruel system that now stages SWAT raids on people’s homes more than 100 times a day. People die in these raids—some weren’t even the intended targets of the police.

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