Updated: September 12, 2011, 11:09 PM ET

Bryan Stow's medical bills to top $50M

Associated Press

LOS ANGELES -- Medical care for the San Francisco Giants fan who was brutally beaten outside Dodger Stadium is expected to cost more than $50 million, according to his lawyers.
The figure was part of a damage estimate included in papers filed Friday in Los Angeles Superior Court, according to City News Service.
The filings come in a lawsuit Bryan Stow and his children have brought against Dodgers owner Frank McCourt and 13 others in the baseball team's organization.
Stow, a paramedic from Santa Cruz, suffered a traumatic brain injury when he was attacked March 31 following the Dodgers' home opener against the Giants in Los Angeles.
Stow's health has been up and down in the months since the near-fatal beating. His doctor, San Francisco General Hospital neurosurgery chief Geoff Manley, has said it's unclear how long his recovery will take.
After the attack, Stow underwent a life-saving procedure in Los Angeles and was put in a coma for several weeks before being transported to San Francisco to be closer to his family in May.
Two months ago doctors performed emergency surgery on the father of two to remove fluid buildup in his head that caused a seizure.
Last month, Stow's family said on their website that he is responding with slight movements to some directions, for example raising his left arm when asked if someone could hold his hand.
Manley also said then that Stow was awake and breathing on his own.
After hours calls to Stow's lawyers were not returned Monday.
Two men have been charged in the attack, and both pleaded not guilty last month.

Republicans object to Obama's plan to pay for jobs package

He would cover the $447-billion cost by ending tax loopholes and deductions for wealthier families and certain industries.

President Obama, with Vice President Joe Biden, left, appears in the White House Rose Garden to challenge Republicans to pass his jobs plan. (Mandel Ngan, AFP/Getty Images / September 13, 2011)

• Related
• Bill in hand, Obama presses Congress on jobs plan
• Obama suggests changing unemployment system
• Obama's proposed tax cut a quandary for GOP

By Peter Nicholas and Lisa Mascaro, Washington Bureau

5:48 p.m. PDT, September 12, 2011

Reporting from Washington—

President Obama would pay for his $447-billion jobs package by closing tax loopholes and wiping out deductions for wealthier families and specific industries, White House officials said, drawing immediate blowback from Republican leaders.

The exchange Monday echoed the bitter debt ceiling debate that brought the country to the brink of default. Obama largely resurrected ideas that he failed to achieve over the summer when he sought to cut the nation's deficit through a "grand bargain.'' Republicans insisted they would not support what they characterized as tax increases.

Because little has happened to alter the political dynamics in Washington since those negotiations, Obama appears to be following a political strategy that does not rely on Republicans having a change of heart. Rather, the idea is to portray GOP leaders as facing a choice in an election season: Pass a plan that boosts the economy and promotes job growth, or protect oil companies, hedge fund managers and the most well-off households.

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Yet the quest for new revenue also shows the White House has few other options to pay for its jobs package, particularly amid repeated calls from Republicans in Congress to reduce the size of government. Economists have warned that abruptly cutting spending could stall the fragile economy, and they instead prefer a mix of short-term stimulus paired with longer-term deficit reduction.

Obama supports that approach and believes a majority of Americans agree, and he has launched a road show to sell his plan to the public and enlist its help in persuading Republicans to give in on new revenue. Obama is asking taxpayers make their views known in calls and emails to Congress.

"Use one of those airplane skywriters. Dust off the fax machine. Or you can just, like, write a letter," Obama said in a Rose Garden appearance.

"The bottom line is, when it comes to strengthening the economy and balancing our books, we've got to decide what our priorities are. Do we keep tax loopholes for oil companies — or do we put teachers back to work?''

Since Obama rolled out his jobs package Thursday, Republicans have suggested that they are open to compromise. But as the White House revealed more specifics about how it would attack the 9.1% unemployment rate, Republican objections bubbled up, even as they chose their words carefully to avoid the public perception that they are blocking Obama's every move.

Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.), the majority leader who skirmished with the president during the debt ceiling fight, told reporters Monday that House Republicans stand ready to work with Obama.

"Why don't we just sit down and talk?" Cantor said. "We've had enough of this posturing."

But in the same breath, Cantor dismissed key elements of Obama's proposal.

Neither side shows any sign of moving off its positions. The two parties may find common ground on ideas such as cuts to payroll taxes — popular among politicians and consumers alike. But Republicans are wary of other key components of Obama's program.

Obama's proposal for putting Americans back to work rebuilding roads and bridges is a non-starter to Republicans: Cantor called it another round of "stimulus" spending. GOP leaders also want no part of Obama's proposal to raise taxes on the wealthy.

House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) remains "eager" to work with the president, but "this proposal doesn't appear to have been offered in that bipartisan spirit," said Boehner spokesman Michael Steel.

Another sign of a bruising fight ahead is the legislative path forward. The president has prodded Congress to "pass this bill" and called for a quick up-or-down vote. Boehner suggested it would be better to take a piecemeal approach.

"[We] assume that your ideas were not presented as an all-or-nothing proposition, but rather in anticipation that the Congress may also have equally as effective proposals to offer for consideration," Boehner wrote in a letter to Obama.

What seems probable is that the Senate will take up the bill in the weeks ahead. But it is unlikely to garner the 60-vote super-majority needed for passage and, at that point, it would be carved into smaller pieces.

Obama would pay for his plan by limiting deductions and some exemptions for families earning more than $250,000 a year and individuals making at least $200,000 — raising $400 billion over the next decade.

He also would end tax breaks for oil and gas companies, raising $40 billion. Investment fund managers would face a higher tax rate on interest earned, bringing in $18 billion. Eliminating a tax break for corporate jet owners would net $3 billion.

Taken together, the proposals would more than cover the cost of the jobs package, White House officials said.

In the debt ceiling talks, Obama was often stuck in closed-door negotiations with Republican leaders, a forum that did not play to his strengths. This time, he's making full use of the bully pulpit, visiting key swing states to encourage grass-roots pressure on GOP lawmakers. He'll visit Columbus, Ohio, on Tuesday, and Raleigh, N.C., on Wednesday.

By focusing solely on tax increases to pay for the jobs package, Obama signaled a change in strategy that should hearten Democrats who have clamored for the president to be a tougher negotiator. They want to establish clear lines between Democrats and Republicans, believing Americans will be on their side.

To pay for his jobs package, the president declined to propose revenue that could be gained by making changes to Medicare and Medicaid, programs that are dear to Democrats.

Instead, the White House indicated that changes to those entitlement programs will be part of the debt reduction package Obama will put forward later this month as he makes his recommendations to the new congressional "super-committee." The committee is charged with recommending how to trim $1.5 trillion from the nation's deficits over the next 10 years.

Another change in tactics is Obama's decision to send Congress the proposed bill. On past issues, he has been criticized for letting Congress shape legislation while he stood back and offered guidance. At his Rose Garden appearance, he held up a copy of the American Jobs Act' for all to see.

Polls show that Americans are largely on Obama's side in asking upper-income households to pay more. The higher-income families that would be snared in the tax increases account for fewer than 2% of all taxpayers, or roughly 3 million households.

September 12, 2011

For Debate Partners, an Unusual Pairing

By JEREMY W. PETERS and BRIAN STELTER

TAMPA, Fla. — In the pantheon of strange political bedfellows, CNN and the Tea Party could go down as one of the oddest pairings since James Carville and Mary Matalin.
CNN, the 24/7 cable news pioneer long derided by conservatives as a mouthpiece of the political left, and Tea Party activists, who pride themselves on bucking the establishment, came together here Monday evening for a presidential debate — an unusual display of cooperation between the news media and some of its most hostile critics.
Each stands to benefit from reaching the other’s following, raising questions about whether the arrangement was a shrewd political transaction masquerading as public service.
Sal Russo, a co-founder of the Tea Party Express, said he expected the partnership to help dispel misperceptions about the Tea Party as a fringe movement.
“The fact that they’re broadcasting and partnering with us shows that they understand it’s a broad-based political movement and that it isn’t fractured and narrow,” Mr. Russo said.
CNN, which has sought to establish itself as an island of cable news centrism between MSNBC on the left and Fox News on the right, went to great lengths to make the event as authentically Tea Party as possible. The network planned the debate for Sept. 12, a symbolic date for Tea Party activists.
The venue CNN selected, the Florida State Fairgrounds, was chosen for its grass-roots appeal and its ability to easily accommodate thousands of Tea Party spectators. And the partner it sought out, the Tea Party Express, used its ties to hundreds of Tea Party groups across the country to recruit attendees.
“After the 2010 elections, it was undeniable that the Tea Party movement within the Republican Party was a force, and that it was likely to help determine the outcome of the nomination,” said Sam Feist, CNN’s Washington bureau chief. “We decided that it makes sense for one of the debates to have a Tea Party connection, and that we were the right network to do it.”
Networks regularly partner with established political organizations to host debates during primary season. Fox News, CNBC and ABC News, for example, are all sponsoring debates later this year with state Republican groups in several states.
Alex Conant, a spokesman for the Tim Pawlenty presidential campaign until Mr. Pawlenty dropped out last month, said news organizations partnered with political entities to make sure that candidates showed up for debates — and to make sure that viewers tuned in.
“There are so many debates; the networks look for ways to partner with groups that would help the debate stand out,” Mr. Conant said.
But the CNN debate on Monday was the first event hosted jointly by a major news organization and a Tea Party group. And their partnership left some questioning whether the network had gone too far in reaching for centrist credibility.
“Is there really a need for another national cable news channel devoted to promoting far-right elements within the Republican Party?” the liberal media watchdog group FAIR said Monday in an e-mail alert to its members in which it labeled the Tea Party “a controversial political group.”
CNN, which said it maintained complete control over what would be asked during the debate and which candidates could participate, coordinated with Tea Party activists from across the country to solicit questions. It arranged for live satellite feeds for Tea Party activists to ask questions from gatherings in Arizona, Virginia and Ohio. And the Tea Party Express identified almost 1,000 people from 31 states and the District of Columbia to sit in the audience.
Even the graphics on the video screens behind the stage flashed flags that are often seen at Tea Party rallies.
Here in Tampa, there were signs the network was sensitive to perceptions that it was being too cozy with Tea Party activists. During a tour of the debate hall, Mr. Feist referred to the gatherings in Arizona, Virginia and Ohio, saying, “We’ll have watch parties.” He was swiftly corrected by CNN’s special events producer, Kate Lunger, who interjected, “Well, we won’t have watch parties.”
CNN is not the first network to be associated with the Tea Party. Rick Santelli, a reporter for CNBC, is credited with galvanizing the movement in early 2009 with his “Chicago Tea Party” rant that attacked government bailouts. Fox News swiftly gravitated to the Tea Party movement, broadcasting whole shows from several rallies and even taking out an advertisement lambasting its competitors for missing one such event that year. (The competitors had, in fact, covered it.)
When CNN has covered Tea Party rallies in the past, it was met more than once by hostile crowds. During a Capitol Hill demonstration in September 2009, protesters shouted “Tell the Truth!” at the correspondent Lisa Desjardins before breaking into a chant for Glenn Beck, the former Fox News host.
Since then, CNN has moved aggressively to cover the Tea Party as a political phenomenon; last year it showed an hourlong documentary about the movement, and earlier this year it hired a Tea Party leader and radio host as a contributor.

Jeremy W. Peters reported from Tampa, and Brian Stelter from New York.

September 10, 2011

Court Case Asks if ‘Big Brother’ Is Spelled GPS

By ADAM LIPTAK

WASHINGTON — The precedent is novel. More precisely, the precedent is a novel.
In a series of rulings on the use of satellites and cellphones to track criminal suspects, judges around the country have been citing George Orwell’s “1984” to sound an alarm. They say the Fourth Amendment’s promise of protection from government invasion of privacy is in danger of being replaced by the futuristic surveillance state Orwell described.
In April, Judge Diane P. Wood of the federal appeals court in Chicago wrote that surveillance using global positioning system devices would “make the system that George Orwell depicted in his famous novel, ‘1984,’ seem clumsy.” In a similar case last year, Chief Judge Alex Kozinski of the federal appeals court in San Francisco wrote that “1984 may have come a bit later than predicted, but it’s here at last.”
Last month, Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis of the Federal District Court in Brooklyn turned down a government request for 113 days of location data from cellphone towers, citing “Orwellian intrusion” and saying the courts must “begin to address whether revolutionary changes in technology require changes to existing Fourth Amendment doctrine.”
The Supreme Court is about to do just that. In November, it will hear arguments in United States v. Jones, No. 10-1259, the most important Fourth Amendment case in a decade. The justices will address a question that has divided the lower courts: Do the police need a warrant to attach a GPS device to a suspect’s car and track its movements for weeks at a time?
Their answer will bring Fourth Amendment law into the digital age, addressing how its 18th-century prohibition of “unreasonable searches and seizures” applies to a world in which people’s movements are continuously recorded by devices in their cars, pockets and purses, by toll plazas and by transit systems.
The Jones case will address not only whether the placement of a space-age tracking device on the outside of a vehicle without a warrant qualifies as a search, but also whether the intensive monitoring it allows is different in kind from conventional surveillance by police officers who stake out suspects and tail their cars.
“The Jones case requires the Supreme Court to decide whether modern technology has turned law enforcement into Big Brother, able to monitor and record every move we make outside our homes,” said Susan Freiwald, a law professor at the University of San Francisco.
The case is an appeal from a unanimous decision of a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which said last year that the government was simply seeking too much information.
“Repeated visits to a church, a gym, a bar or a bookie tell a story not told by any single visit, as does one’s not visiting any of those places in the course of a month,” wrote Judge Douglas H. Ginsburg.
He added: “A person who knows all of another’s travel can deduce whether he is a weekly churchgoer, a heavy drinker, a regular at the gym, an unfaithful husband, an outpatient receiving medical treatment, an associate of particular individuals or political groups — and not just one such fact about a person, but all such facts.”
Federal appeals courts in Chicago and San Francisco, on the other hand, have allowed the police to use GPS tracking devices without a warrant. The police are already allowed to tail cars and observe their movements without warrants, those courts said, and the devices merely allow them to do so more efficiently.
Judge Richard A. Posner, writing for a unanimous three-judge panel in the Chicago case, did caution that institutionalized mass surveillance might present a different issue.
Some judges say that world is fast approaching.
“Technology has progressed to the point where a person who wishes to partake in the social, cultural and political affairs of our society has no realistic choice but to expose to others, if not to the public as a whole, a broad range of conduct and communications that would previously have been deemed unquestionably private,” Magistrate Judge James Orenstein of the Federal District Court in Brooklyn wrote last year.
The case to be heard by the Supreme Court arose from the investigation of the owner of a Washington nightclub, Antoine Jones, who was suspected of being part of a cocaine-selling operation. Apparently out of caution, given the unsettled state of the law, prosecutors obtained a warrant allowing the police to place a tracking device on Mr. Jones’s Jeep Grand Cherokee. The warrant required them to do so within 10 days and within the District of Columbia. The police did not install the device until 11 days later, and they did it in Maryland. Now contending that no warrant was required, the authorities tracked Mr. Jones’s travels for a month and used the evidence they gathered to convict him of conspiring to sell cocaine. He was sentenced to life in prison.
The main Supreme Court precedent in the area, United States v. Knotts, is almost 30 years old. It allowed the use of a much more primitive technology, a beeper that sent a signal that grew stronger as the police drew closer and so helped them follow a car over a single 100-mile trip from Minnesota to Wisconsin.
The Supreme Court ruled that no warrant was required but warned that “twenty-four hour surveillance of any citizen of the country” using “dragnet-type law enforcement practices” may violate the Fourth Amendment.
Much of the argument in the Jones case concerns what that passage meant. Did it indicate discomfort with intense and extended scrutiny of a single suspect’s every move? Or did it apply only to mass surveillance?
In the Jones case, the government argued in a brief to the Supreme Court that the Knotts case disapproved of only “widespread searches or seizures that are conducted without individualized suspicion.”
The brief added: “Law enforcement has not abused GPS technology. No evidence exists of widespread, suspicionless GPS monitoring.” On the other hand, the brief said, requiring a warrant to attach a GPS device to a suspect’s car “would seriously impede the government’s ability to investigate leads and tips on drug trafficking, terrorism and other crimes.”
A decade ago, the Supreme Court ruled that the police needed a warrant to use thermal imaging technology to measure heat emanating from a home. The sanctity of the home is at the core of what the Fourth Amendment protects, Justice Antonin Scalia explained, and the technology was not in widespread use.
In general, though, Justice Scalia observed, “it would be foolish to contend that the degree of privacy secured to citizens by the Fourth Amendment has been entirely unaffected by the advance of technology.”

kathygriffin Kathy Griffin

Well I lost to "Deadliest Catch"...which is another name for my vagina.

 

Naked Man Escapes from Hospital, Leads Police on Pursuit

KTLA

7:22 p.m. PDT, September 10, 2011

MARINA DEL REY (KTLA) -- Police chased a naked man through the docks of Marina del Rey for several hours Saturday after he managed to escape from a hospital - with a bit of equipment in tow.

The naked man, who was not identified, escaped from a nearby hospital Saturday afternoon while he was being evaluated for mental illness, according to Sgt. Jeffrey Olander of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.

Then, while still attached to a catheter and an I.V. tube, he led sheriff's deputies and LAPD officers down Lincoln Boulevard to Admiralty Way, where he jumped a fence behind a restaurant and into the bay.
 

After trying to coax the man out from between the boats, he eventually became cold and tired and turned himself in to authorities, according.

He is currently in police custody after undergoing an evaluation by paramedics.

McCainBlogette Meghan McCain

"You know, I'm just doing the lords work in the city of satan." #mostaccuratedescriptionofworkinginpolitics

Drought blamed for donkey abandonment in Texas

Updated at 05:20 PM today

  

SAN ANTONIO, TX -- Donkeys in Texas are being turned loose in growing numbers because the state's worst drought since the 1950s has made them too costly to keep and their owners can't sell them, according to sheriffs' departments and animal rescue operations.

The San Antonio Express-News reported Saturday that cash-strapped owners are freeing them on the sides of roads and leaving the animals' fate up to law enforcement agencies and a determined group of donkey rescue operations.
"Donkey rescues have gone through the roof," said Mark Meyers, executive director of Peaceful Valley Donkey Rescue, a California-based nonprofit with a 260-acre rescue ranch near San Angelo. The ranch is now housing about 500 donkeys, its largest number ever.
Texas alone has brought 500 donkeys into the group's care since March, Meyers said. That's 100 more donkeys than the organization rescued nationally last year.
"There are so many coming in, we're having a hard time keeping up," Meyers said.
Donkeys probably are being abandoned at a faster rate than horses, but rising feed costs associated with the drought are behind both trends, said Darla Cherry, president of Meadow Haven Horse Rescue in Nixon, near San Antonio.
"You can't sell them or give them away, and you can't feed them, so you're stuck," Meyers said. "They're just releasing them on someone else's property."
Sheriffs' departments in Texas are responsible for picking up abandoned livestock and trying to reunite the animals with their owners. Charles Paul, a Navarro County deputy sheriff who handles abandoned animals, said horse owners at times reclaim their animals but donkey owners rarely do.
Instead of euthanizing the animals, departments have looked to groups such as Peaceful Valley to care for the donkeys.
Meyers said long-term care of each donkey runs about $1,000, so his group's resources are being stretched thin. The group puts rescued donkeys up for adoption, but in Texas, few people have been interested, he said.
Both Meyers and Cherry said they need donations to keep up with the growing problem. Peaceful Valley receives less than 5 percent of its donations from Texas, while 95 percent of its rescue budget is being applied to Texas this year, Meyers said.

Firearm transportation in a vehicle on school property

Friday, September 9, 2011

Firearm transportation in a vehicle on school property

One of the seemingly more confusing areas of Florida firearm laws is whether you can transport a firearm in a vehicle on school property -- from a standpoint of picking up a student -- or campus parking.  Federal law is also involved in this situation.  Here's how it works:

1.   Florida law does not allow anyone to display a firearm or weapon in a rude, angry, careless, or threatening manner within 1000 feet of any school property from elementary thru and including high school, public and private during school hours.  Likewise -- can't display on a school bus, school bus stop, or school sponsored event.  The exception is when you're on private property with permission, license, or invitation of the owner -- within 1000 feet of school grounds.  F.S. 790.115(1).  That covers "display" under Florida law.  Federal law adds you can't even possess within 1000 feet of a school  -- unless you have a valid CWP, or the firearm is unloaded and in a locked container or rack on the vehicle.  18 USC 922(q).  (A few other exceptions apply that I have omitted for clarity sake)(read the book for that).

2.  Florida law generally does not allow anyone to even POSSESS a firearm or weapon (except a common pocketknife) "on" school property, a school bus, school bus stop, or school sponsored event -- and adds to the definition of "school" -- "post secondary" schools -- meaning colleges, universities, and career centers.

However . . .  despite the overall prohibition on "possession" -- you may lawfully possess in your vehicle, per F.S. 790.25(5) -- so long as the firearm is "securely encased".

But,  what  if a "school district" adopts a written and published policy that waives this exception for "purposes of student and campus parking privileges"?   Well then,  according to the subsection in 790.115 we're talking about  -- you no longer can possess in your vehicle -- even securely encased -- where it involves "campus parking privileges".

Now -- whoever wrote this last subsection of the statute -- should be shot, horse-whipped, and drawn-and- quartered.  It's God-awful drafting, confusing, and stupid, besides!  But -- it's there.  What does it mean?

Well -- it means that nobody is really sure what it means!

For instance:    does "purposes of student and campus parking privileges" only apply to students, faculty, administration, and other school employees who "regularly" park there -- or -- does it apply to everyone, all the time, even for a one shot,  five minute or one hour stop at the school?  That  first one seems the most probable interpretation as far as I'm concerned -- and the one I vote for.  But, truthfully -- I could be wrong. It's just too vaguely written to really know.

So -- the next question would be:  Does it also apply to even moms and dads picking up their kid while passing just a few minutes waiting in the parking lot, or even going thru the drive-thru for your kid?  What about parking the car for a few minutes while you're still in the driver's seat with the motor running?  What about parking the car for a few minutes -- still behind the drivers seat -- but this time with the engine turned off?  What if you get out of the car?

In other words -- where is the line between "parking" and "just waiting" . . .  or is there a difference, at all?

Well -- the way it's worded -- and assuming it's constitutional  --   my guess is that if the school district writes and publishes such a policy that forbids parking  -- it  should certainly be effective to forbid any such parking by students, faculty, administration, and school employees -- because that logically is a "campus parking privilege issue".  Why that makes any sense to require -- is beyond me -- but that seems an obvious interpretation of this the law!  Likewise,  you should be aware that the law only allows a  "school district" to pass this absurd prohibition.  It can't be the principal of the school, or anyone else.  It's actually gotta be the entire School Board that votes on it,  passes it,  and has it published.

Of course  -- still  just plain stupid!   But, back to the important question:  Does it apply to everyone else?

Again  -- my response is that that's a total grey area!  Nobody really knows -- and probably never will until there's a "test case" where an appellate court issues an opinion we can all then rely upon.

But there is one ray of hope in the "possession" area.  The ray of hope is that -- assuming there's really such a written and published prohibition by the school district  --  unless you know about the regulation, and deliberately ignore it (ie:  "knowingly and willfully") -- you haven't violated the statute for having a firearm securely encased in your vehicle on school grounds.  F.S. 790.115(2)(b) & (c).   That should mean that  unless such a prohibition is clearly posted as you drive on campus -- or you are stupid enough to admit you know about a published rule that forbids your parking -- you have a very good defense under the statute.   Plus,  if there's no "written and published policy" forbidding it -- then obviously,  it's totally legal for anyone 18 years of age or older to possess securely encased in a vehicle while on school grounds, per 790.25(5).

Still -- you may have a problem with federal law -- because that says if you're within 1000 feet of a school zone (that includes the school grounds) and you know or should know you're within a 1000 feet of such -- you either must have a CWP, or have the firearm unloaded, and in a locked container or rack.  So -- like I tell everyone -- better get that CWP!!!

Of course -- any of that can be an issue of proof at a trial if someone finds out you have a firearm, and the school police officer decides he or she is gonna arrest you no matter what you say  -- but, it is a very good defense.  Still -- it's a felony charge under both Florida and federal law -- although the feds could care less unless you're a terrorist, or selling drugs.

What about colleges and universities?   Can they waive the exception, and prohibit parking for guests and parents the same as a "school district"?  (federal law does not apply here - it only applies thru high school).

Well -- when you get to colleges and universities -- there's a case that says they probably can't -- because they're not considered part of a "school district".  If they're not part of  a "school district" -- there's no way to legally pass such a prohibition.    But, unfortunately,  that portion of the case opinion is not binding law because it's something called "dicta".  So -- it's still a grey area on colleges and universities as to "guest" parking -- and even grayer as to students, faculty, etc.   Plus -- my guess is that if a college student has a firearm in their vehicle parked on campus -- and the administration finds out about it -- and such is forbidden by a student manual or rule -- you're still gonna have big problems with the school, and possible expulsion,  even if you have a valid defense to a criminal case.  And -- the parking lot law doesn't help you or anyone else on that issue because schools are exempted from the parking lot law.

So -- what's the answer?

Well . . .  obviously:    Tell your legislators you want the stupid provision in F.S. 790.115(2)(a)(3), that allows a "school district" to prohibit parking on campus -- to be modified and deleted.  Or . . .  maybe,  just prohibit it to "students" at secondary schools,  and those under 18 years of age?   (a "secondary school" is 6th grade thru 12th grade).

And yeah . . .  I understand your frustration on trying to understand this ridiculous stuff  . . . because now you may be more confused than when you started.  You're certainly gonna have to read this a few times to understand it.  Plus,  you don't want to disobey the law -- but you don't want to leave your firearm at home, and be unprotected -- either.    A truly rotten choice -- and you gotta wonder how the Legislature figures the Second Amendment and your Florida constitutional right to self defense can allow that?   Me, too!   That's exactly why we need to trash this stupid law!

Whatever -- hope I've helped you more than confused you!

copyright 2011 by jon gutmacher