I’m not really all that into blogging about the Zimmerman/Martin shooting.  From what I can tell, what happened was that there was an confrontation that might have very well been avoidable; it ended with a genuinely tragic ending; and that there were actually pretty much no wider partisan implications at all, despite the attempts of the Online Left to fit a Latino Democrat onto the Procrustean bed of WASP Tea Partier.  All of which is contemptible of the Online Left, by the way.  Expected, but contemptible.

Still, the news that the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) has decided to stop working on criminal bill advocacy because of liberal push back on ALEC’s work on stand-your-ground laws is of interest.  Said laws, for those unaware of them, essentially confirm the right of a citizen to defend themselves if attacked; and (as Clayton Cramer and Glenn Reynolds note) such laws are very important from a feminist perspective.  Particularly when we’re talking about, say, battered women.  Amazing how quickly people on the Left stop caring about that sort of thing when it gets into the way of going after perceived Righty groups, right? Again: expected, and contemptible.

The problem that may arise for the Democrats in the future here is that while Lefty groups like Common Cause and ColorofChange are eager to go after ALEC (mostly because of ALEC’s work on fighting voter registration fraud), those groups are probably going to be a bit quieter about this:

…of the 15 states that have passed variations of the law since 2005, the year Florida’s model legislation became law, eight — a majority — had Democratic governors when the laws were enacted. None issued a veto...

[snip]

Democratic governors who signed “stand your ground” bills, or otherwise permitted them to become law, include Kathleen Blanco of Louisiana, Jennifer Granholm of Michigan, Brian Schweitzer of  Montana, John Lynch of New Hampshire, Brad Henry of Oklahoma, Phil Bredesen of Tennessee, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Janet Napolitano of Arizona – now the U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security.

This is particularly interesting because former Governor Granholm is now screaming about stand-your-ground laws, despite the fact that she signed one into law in 2006.  But if we want to talk about relevant Democrats, well, Secretary Napolitano bragged about passing Arizona’s law.  And then there’s California: turns out that stand-your-ground has been the standard rule of thumb there for over a century.  But - oddly enough – a mention of any of these particular inconvenient truths is not immediately apparent on the websites of either ColorofChange or Common Cause.  Which is hardly surprising: neither organization is particularly interested in offending its Democratic masters.

Yes.  I chose that word deliberately.

Moe Lane (crosspost)