Ta-Nehisi Coates

It seems obvious that any serious reader will have learned long ago how much time to give a book before choosing to shut it. It's only the young, still attached to that sense of achievement inculcated by anxious parents, who hang on doggedly when there is no enjoyment. "I'm a teenager," remarks one sad contributor to a book review website. "I read this whole book [it would be unfair to say which] from first page to last hoping it would be as good as the reviews said. It wasn't. I enjoy reading and finish nearly all the novels I start and it was my determination never to give up that made me finish this one, but I really wish I hadn't." One can only encourage a reader like this to learn not to attach self esteem to the mere finishing of a book, if only because the more bad books you finish, the fewer good ones you'll have time to start.

The Knicks have lost 8 of their last 11 games, leaving them in a dogfight for the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. And Lin is no longer the dominant force who carried them in February. His production over the last nine games -- 14.4 points and 7.3 assists -- was solid, but he shot 37.7 percent and averaged 4.2 turnovers over that stretch. 

In his first game under Woodson on Wednesday, Lin had 6 points, 6 assists and 6 turnovers. That he struggled so badly in a 121-79 victory seemed like a bad sign. Woodson, according to his former associate, will not tolerate many six-turnover games from his point guard. 

This is where D'Antoni was so critical to Lin's success. D'Antoni not only provided the platform, but he also gave Lin the freedom to explore, to create and to make mistakes, to make the aggressive pass and to take the open shot, without fear of reprisal.

Now I am old and much difficulted. My remembering is shallowed and my words fall upon themselves, like rebels, ere lusty, now routed in war.

Lest anyone try to change his mind, Grant made clear that "no passes will be given these people to visit headquarters for the purpose of making personal application for trade permits." 

Americans today are often surprised to learn that Ulysses S. Grant once expelled "Jews as a class" from his war zone. It seems incredible that he could blame Jews for the sins of smugglers and traders--most of whom were not actually Jewish at all--and expel them from the entire territory under his command. Some Jews at the time wondered whether their new homeland was coming to resemble anti-Semitic Europe at its worst.

Eager to prove that he was above prejudice, Grant appointed more Jews to public office than any of his predecessors, and, in the name of human rights, extended unprecedented support to persecuted Jews in Russia and Romania. Time and again, partly as a result of his enlarged vision of what it meant to be an American and partly in order to live down General Orders No. 11, Grant consciously worked to assist Jews and secure them equality. 

Nevertheless, the memory of what his wife, Julia, called "that obnoxious order" continued to haunt Grant to his death in 1885. Especially when he was in the company of Jews, the sense that in expelling them he had failed to live up to his own high standards of behavior, and to the Constitution that he had sworn to uphold, gnawed at him. 

He apologized for the order publicly and repented of it privately. He consciously excluded any mention of it from his acclaimed Memoirs. He gloried in the fact that, on his deathbed, Jews numbered among those who visited with him and prayed for his recovery. Jews also participated wholeheartedly in the national mourning that followed his death in 1885, and later in the dedication of his tomb. They did so in spite of General Orders No. 11, recognizing, as the Reform Jewish leader Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise noted at the time, that Grant had "often repented" of his order, and "that the wise also fail."

At any rate, I felt like the series really started to breath with Scott's character gone. I haven't much enjoyed James Spader's Robert California, but he's such a distant presence that I haven't felt like he impeded the show. The recently concluded Saber arc was, for me, the high-point of the season. Catherine Tate (who I didn't know before now) has just been stellar.

Much of that tension stems from Sanford's long history as an agricultural community that attracted laborers, many of them black, to work in the fields, farms and railroads, historians say. They formed Seminole County's historic black communities of Georgetown, Goldsboro and Midway. 

Founded by laborers in the late 19th century, Goldsboro was once an active center of black life and became the second town in Florida incorporated by blacks. But in 1911, Sanford stripped Goldsboro of its charter and took it over. The streets, named after its black pioneers, were quickly renamed. 

"Ever since Goldsboro was taken over by Sanford, there has been tension," said Sanford Mayor Jeff Triplett.

Shortly after 2 a.m., three vehicles were headed south on East Lake Road -- one driven by Brandon Baker, the second by Seth Browning, and the third by Brandon's twin, Christopher Baker. Browning told deputies that he had become concerned about Brandon Baker's driving. In an attempt to get his tag number, Browning followed him onto the frontage road. The third car followed the other two. 

The vehicles came to a stop, and Brandon Baker got out of his Chevy pickup and aggressively approached Browning's car, deputies said. Browning responded by using pepper spray on Baker and his brother, who was also approaching Browning's car. Deputies say Brandon Baker reached into Browning's vehicle and punched him, and he in turn pulled out his gun and shot Brandon Baker. Browning called 911 and stayed at the scene until sheriff's deputies arrived. 

He wasn't on duty at the time, but he is authorized to carry a gun through his employer, the Sheriff's Office said. Christopher Baker was not injured. A passenger in his car -- Amy Marcellus, Brandon Baker's girlfriend -- also was not injured. She remained inside the car during the incident, deputies said.

"Investigators questioned the accused gunman at length Tuesday but did not press criminal charges against him. He told deputies that he acted in self-defense."

Orlando Magic center Dwight Howard has told the team he is ready to sign away the early termination option on his contract and remain through 2012-13, ESPN The Magazine's Chris Broussard confirmed...

Magic spokesman George Galante confirmed the conference call to The Associated Press on Wednesday night after ESPN.com, citing sources with knowledge of the call, reported that Howard and agent Dan Fegan clarified their position with Magic CEO Alex Martins, owner Rich DeVos and other members of the DeVos family on the line. 

But Howard told RealGM.com that he's having a hard time leaving Orlando, the only NBA city he's called home since entering the league out of high school. "Man, listen, you know my heart, my soul and everything I have is in Orlando. ... I just can't leave it behind," Howard told RealGM.com.

"The cries stopped as soon as the gun went off, so I know it was the little boy," Cutcher said. Cutcher said a cry for help got her attention on the day Trayvon Martin was shot and killed in her backyard by Zimmerman, who was a neighborhood vigilante. Cutcher said that until now, she ignored repeated attempts by national and local media to share what she saw, partially out of fear. 

"We said, 'Is everything OK? And he just looked at us. Selma [another witness] asked him again, 'What's up, what's going on, everything OK? And he just said, 'Call the police,' kind of nonchalantly, kind of like, 'Leave me alone,'" Cutcher said. 

According to a partial police report, Cutcher is one of six witnesses that Sanford police took a statement from. Cutcher said it was short, and police never questioned her in detail until after she repeatedly reached out to them. 

"Blew us off, and I called him back again and I said, "I know this was not self-defense. There was no punching, no hitting going on at the time, no wrestling,'" Cutcher said. Cutcher said she believes whatever confrontation there was, it ended before they got to her backyard.

More »

In a letter sent to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, the NAACP expressed doubt in the Sanford Police Department and asked the Department of Justice to review the case. 

"The NAACP has no confidence that, absent federal oversight, the Sanford Police Department will devote the necessary degree of care to its investigation. We therefore call upon you to detail personnel to Sanford immediately to review the facts, ensure that the Sanford Police Department conducts an impartial, thorough and prompt investigation of the circumstances involving the death of this unarmed teen, and ensure that the responsible person is held accountable if a crime was committed," the letter said.

Zimmerman has a single arrest. When he was a 21 and a UCF student, one of his friends was being arrested by state alcohol agents for serving underage drinkers, according to his arrest report. Zimmerman began talking to the suspect, and when agents ordered him to stop and tried to escort him away, he became profane and pushed the agent's hands, the report said. 

"After a short struggle," the report said, Zimmerman was handcuffed and arrested. Prosecutors charged him with resisting arrest without violence, and he entered a pretrial-diversion program, something common for first-time nonviolent offenders, who then wind up with no conviction on their records.

The Voice has obtained that 95-page report, and it shows that the NYPD confirmed Schoolcraft's allegations. In other words, at the same time that police officials were attacking Schoolcraft's credibility, refusing to pay him, and serving him with administrative charges, the NYPD was sitting on a document that thoroughly vindicated his claims. 

Investigators went beyond Schoolcraft's specific claims and found many other instances in the 81st Precinct where crime reports were missing, had been misclassified, altered, rejected, or not even entered into the computer system that tracks crime reports. 

These weren't minor incidents. The victims included a Chinese-food delivery man robbed and beaten bloody, a man robbed at gunpoint, a cab driver robbed at gunpoint, a woman assaulted and beaten black and blue, a woman beaten by her spouse, and a woman burgled by men who forced their way into her apartment. 

"When viewed in their totality, a disturbing pattern is prevalent and gives credence to the allegation that crimes are being improperly reported in order to avoid index-crime classifications," investigators concluded. "This trend is indicative of a concerted effort to deliberately underreport crime in the 81st Precinct."

In all, five precinct officers, two sergeants, and Mauriello were either disciplined or charged with department infractions. Most of the command structure in the 81st was transferred. Kelly appointed one of the city's few female African American commanders to replace Mauriello. 

Deputy Chief Michael Marino, the man who ordered Schoolcraft to be committed, was also transferred. Probers referred two of Schoolcraft's allegations to Internal Affairs: one involving the arrests of people on minor infractions held unnecessarily in the command and released, and the other, three arrests of people who tried to turn guns in to the station house. 

 Schoolcraft remains under a kind of indefinite suspension without pay and lives upstate with his father. His federal lawsuit is moving along in a preliminary phase.

Management, the coaching staff and the players know Anthony is hurting the offense and in turn, the defensive morale, according to the sources. While D'Antoni's offense calls for Anthony to plant himself on the wing at the 3-point line, he often creeps in to his favorite spot in the floor -- the area between the elbow, the arc and the post. 

That kills the Knicks' ability to run the high pick-and-roll and ruins the spacing that is so critical to D'Antoni's offense. "That's at the very core of our problem," one person close to the situation said. "That messes up the fluidity of the offense. Melo could do it, but he's got to trust the offense." 

When Anthony first returned -- and it still appears to be the case -- Lin would bring the ball upcourt and try to run D'Antoni's system. When Anthony would abandon the offense, Lin would not pass him the ball, which irritated Anthony, sources said. So when Lin tried to talk to Anthony on the court, Anthony would turn his back to the point guard and tune him out. 

"He didn't like that he had a gay roommate. He was going to use it to his advantage, to expose to other people Tyler's sexual orientation, to allow him to be shown to be different," Ms. McClure said. "And the one thing that you don't want to be in your first three weeks of college is different."  

She concluded, "The defendant's actions were mean-spirited, they were malicious, they were criminal."

The teenager went out to get some Skittles and a can of ice tea. On his way back into the gated suburban Orlando community, Martin, wearing a hood, was spotted by Zimmerman, 26. According to law enforcement sources who heard Zimmerman's call to a non-emergency police number, he told a dispatcher "these a..holes always get away."

Zimmerman described Martin as suspicious because he was wearing a hooded sweatshirt and walking slowly in the rain, police later told residents at a town hall. A dispatcher told him to wait for a police cruiser, and not leave his vehicle. 

But about a minute later, Zimmerman left his car wearing a red sweatshirt and pursued Martin on foot between two rows of townhouses, about 70 yards from where the teen was going. Lee said Zimmerman's pursuit of Martin did not of itself constitute a crime.

Witnesses told ABC News a fist fight broke out and at one point Zimmerman, who outweighed Martin by more than 100 pounds, was on the ground and that Martin was on top. Austin Brown, 13, was walking his dog during the time of the altercation and saw both men on the ground but separated. 

Brown along with several other residents heard someone cry for help, just before hearing a gunshot. Police arrived 60 seconds later and the teen was quickly pronounced dead. According to the police report, Zimmerman, who was armed with a handgun, was found bleeding from the nose and the back of the head, standing over Martin, who was unresponsive after being shot. 

An officer at the scene overheard Zimmerman saying, "I was yelling for someone to help me but no one would help me," the report said. Witnesses told ABC News they heard Zimmerman pronounce aloud to the breathless residents watching the violence unfold "it was self-defense," and place the gun on the ground.