(guy vo) we got a subaru to take us new places. (girl) yeah, it's a hot spring. (guy) we should do that. (guy vo) it did. (man) how's that feel? (guy) fine. (girl) we shouldn't have done that. (guy) no. (announcer) love. it's what makes a subaru, a subaru. on "the cycle" today, complete coverage of the aftermath of the verdict in the george zimmerman trial with all the social and legal implications. >> we will also take an in-depth look with our panel of lawyers on why the prosecution lost. we begin with reaction to the verdict. protesters across the nation back for a second day following the not guilty verdict. the demonstrations are emotional, but mostly nonviolent. the protesters insisting the verdict is a miscarriage of justice, and they are out in the streets from l.a. to chicago to new york to atlanta to miami, milwaukee, philadelphia, d.c.,

the list goes on and on. we start with nbc's kerry sanders in sanford, florida, where local churches held community prayer services today. kerry, what's the mood down there? >> reporter: well, the pastors opened the church today and invited the community to join them along with the mayor, the police chief, the city manager, and to talk about what has happened here with this not guilty verdict. this is the way the system works. it was a demand by the community to have a thorough investigation to lead to a trial, if there were charges. there were charges. and then to accept the jury verdict. there are those who say they find it hard to accept the jury's verdict because they feel they watched much of this trial and heard something different. so in the effort to make sure that there was communication so that there is not a violent protest of people frustrated, they're opening the lines of dialogue, making sure that people are listening and that the mayor and the police chief and others are addressing

concerns that they hear. this as the backdrop as we take you across the country and you look at some of the violence that we have had in our country and some of the more peaceful protests at the same time. first of all, the l.a. highway that was shut down, the 10 freeway that was shut down, it was sort of a spontaneous thing organized on twitter by some people who were upset. they got out of their cars and shut it down for about 20 minutes, causing chaos. meantime, in new york at times square, another protest, again organized on the internet, rather spontaneous, people taking to the streets there suggesting this is not something they are willing to accept. they're not willing to accept that the jury of six came to a conclusion of not guilty, fearing that they say that somehow the system didn't work the way it should have. meantime in oakland, one of the few places where there was not only a protest, but there was also some violence. police moved in. we understand that there were no arrests, mostly some trash cans

set on fire. nonetheless, some problems there in oakland. then, of course, in chicago and other cities where there have been, again, mostly peaceful gatherings of people rallying to say that something different needs to happen. people putting some pressure, and it already exists, of course, from the department of justice to consider an ongoing investigation and possibly to bring civil rights violation charges in this case. a very high hurdle as the experts say. meantime here in sanford, the plan is to continue every week opening up a different church, sharing that back and forth dialogue as they anticipate an upcoming rally here and across the country that now looks like it's going to be scheduled for this coming saturday. >> all right. kerry sanders, thanks again for all your work down there. reaction is also coming in from d.c. and various political leaders. shortly after the verdict, president obama released this statement. we are a nation of laws and a jury has spoken. i now ask every american to

respect the call for calm reflection from two parents who lost their young son. we should ask ourselves if we're doing all we can to stem the tide of gun violence that claims too many lives across this country on a daily basis. that's the way to honor trayvon martin. the justice department soon followed saying, experienced federal prosecutors will determine whether the evidence reveals a prosecutable violation of any of the limited federal criminal civil rights statutes within our jurisdiction. most legal experts think that's not going to happen. here in new york, mayor bloomberg released this quote. shoot first laws like those in florida can inspire dangerous vigilanteism and protect those who act recklessly with guns. our legal team that has been with you through this whole thing, msnbc lisa bloom, former congressman and prosecutor patrick murphy, seema ayer, and prosecutor paul henderson.

they've been rolling with us throughout this whole thing. lisa bloom, your reaction to this verdict. >> well, i think when both sides of the case are arguing reasonable doubt, there's only one possible outcome. that's something i said many times before the verdict. i was really surprised at all the prosecution missteps in this case. having said that and seeing the reaction around the country, and i saw with my own two eyes the demonstration here in new york city yesterday, i think it's important that we all talk to one another. i just got off the phone with a friend who has a conservative christian radio show in birmingh birmingham, alabama. he and i could not be more different in terms of politics or religion, but we had a respectful conversation about our differences of opinion about this case. i think it's so important that we all do that today, that we have those civil conversations that we hear each other out. that's the way i think that we need to move forward. >> indeed. patrick, your reactions? >> yeah, i have to be honest with you, i'm just disappointed. here you have a 17-year-old kid who was killed through no fault of his own. so it's just a real

disappointment. i actually agree with mayor bloomberg when he calls for, you know, we have to get rid of these shoot-first laws. if you were the aggressor like the evidence showed in that trial, that george zimmerman was, if you're the aggressor, you shouldn't be able to claim self-defense and stand your ground. there's got to be a mix. this is really a policy change that needs to happen across america, in washington, and in states and local communities. >> seema? >> everyone at this table knows how i feel. that is, i am saddened, but i am not surprised. i think when the prosecution entered george zimmerman's statements where he consistently kept on message that he wasn't guilty, that trayvon martin attacked him, the case was lost at that point. they should have forced his hand. they should have made him testify. they should have made him be confronted with all his lies. >> paul? >> i, too, am saddened on behalf of the family and also on behalf of the disenfranchised communities that feel like this sends out an echo of injustice

with the system. but i'm encouraged when i see the peaceful protests and see people that are demanding conversations about inclusion in this process moving forward. so i'm cautiously optimistic but disappointed on behalf of the family for the result for their loss. >> lisa bloom, we were talking before and sort of saying that throughout this whole thing, i wasn't sure if it was going to be manslaughter or an acquittal. in retrospect, an almost all-white jury in the south, what was i thinking that there could have been anything but an acquittal? >> well, first of all, it is a problem that we had underrepresentation of african-americans on that jury. the sixth woman was either black or hispanic. you know, we've never known that for sure. or both, i might add. there's no question that there was an underrepresentation of african-americans. not only on that jury, but on many juries in america. that's largely because of felony laws that prohibit people who have a felony conviction, in

most cases, from ever, for the rest of their lives serving on a jury. that means that 30% of african-american men nationwide cannot serve on a jury for the rest of their lives, even if the conviction is 30 or 40 years in the past. so african-americans who are more likely to be defendants, are less likely to have a jury of their peers. it's also important in cases like this where an african-american is the victim because there's a lot of racial disparity in cases with african-american victims. that's one of the underlying causes i think we all need to look hard at in the wake of this verdict. >> yeah, i think lisa makes a very important point there. it's one that goes to the baseline. the problem with looking at any trial in isolation is people have very different baselines for what they think the rules are and what's fair. lisa is speaking to the fact that the baseline might be a jury of my peers and that sounds good, but we have all sorts of laws which reflect decisions about who's on that jury. we can change those laws. that's a state law in florida. it's a state question. you can change those laws.

patrick is also hitting on the point about how do we define self-defense? i think we have to go beyond civility and look to the larger questions, not relitigating something where we should respect the jury's decision. that's important. i think we've seen a lot of people talk about that. that's not just a cliche. that's not just rhetoric. we have to respect that in the rule of law. but if there are things in the law that seem unfair, that shock our conscious or in the case of, i think, for many people, the stand your ground laws, which change the underlying rules of self-defense. if you look at that and think, that sounds wrong, then the next conversation is an important policy one, which is what do we do about that? >> well, and i think, and this is what patrick was getting at, it's not just the stand your ground. it's stand your ground, it's self-defense. again, what lisa just brought up, these parameters we have on the six-person jury in places like florida. to be clear, in florida if it is a capital case, there are 12-person juries. most states when it's a felony, whether it's a robbery or

burgla burglary, it is a 12-person jury. still, because of the boundaries put on who gets in your jury pool, that jury is never representative of your client, right? >> that is true. at the end of the day, you have to have say to yourself, there are 30,000 trayvon martins in america every single year. the number one cause of african-american males age 15 to 19 like trayvon was is gun violence. it is an epidemic. until our leaders get serious about solving this in washington and our states, there's going to be more and more every year. >> it's not that our leaders aren't serious. it's that a smaller part of the populous and a smaller part of washington is blocking it. we have a system where the minority can block progress. >> listen, you don't have to tell me. i was a guy that represented bucks county, pennsylvania. only the second democrat in 220 years. i got an "f" from the nra. i said, listen, election day is

important, but more important than election day is judgment day. >> paul, what did you think of the president's statement there while very carefully talking about respecting the jury, he made a direct reference to gun violence. >> he made a direct reference to gun violence. i think that's particularly important in this case because the conversation we were just having talking about race and talking about african-americans and other people of color sitting on a jury, you know, it leads us to a conversation about race and exclusion and inclusion in the criminal justice system. one of the things, and i think lisa was alluding to this, was the issue of disproportionality of race in the criminal justice system. and it's in victims of crime. that's where we have the highest measurement of minority representation, in victims. i think a case like this opens the door for a broader discussion about what does that mean in the criminal justice system? how are we going to address

that, and how are we going to impart a sense of justice to these communities that are absolutely impacted by gun violence, are absolutely impacted by the criminal justice system and want to have a broader voice at the table and want to be more included in these discussions, trial, and verdicts. >> all right. stay with us as we get more granular about this trial. next up, why the prosecution lost. oh, he's a fighter alright. since aflac is helping with his expenses while he can't work, he can focus on his recovery. he doesn't have to worry so much about his mortgage, groceries, or even gas bills. kick! kick... feel it! feel it! feel it! nice work! ♪ you got it! you got it! yes! aflac's gonna help take care of his expenses. and us...we're gonna get him back in fighting shape. ♪ [ male announcer ] see what's happening behind the scenes at aflac.com. to prove to you that aleve is the better choice for him, he's agreed to give it up. that's today?

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now, why the prosecution in the george zimmerman trial lost. there are three factors that we want to highlight right now. first, the dueling expert witnesses. the state called the medical

examiner who performed the autopsy on trayvon martin's body. his testimony was clinical, as he shuffled through notes and looked at the details. it's a sharp contrast to how the forensic pathologist played when he looked at the gunshot wound under the defense's theory. his testimony was in layman's terms, much easier for the jury to understand. number two, the testimony from the mothers, both zimmerman's and martin's mothers took the stand in this case. they seemed to effectively cancel each other out, both saying the voice screaming for help on that famous 911 tape was their own son. third and finally, how the shooting happened. after initially trying to disprove it, the prosecution adopted a form of the defense narrative that it was trayvon martin on top of zimmerman, even going as far as straddling the mannequin like the defense and hovering over zimmerman, as everyone remembers from that chilling scene. now, let's bring back our panel. seema, i want to start with you and ask the basic question here

of whether the prosecution simply overcharged. >> no, they did not overcharge. i am tired of this question and defending prosecutors. this is what you're supposed to do. number one, you're trying to get a plea deal. if you charge murder two, you're more likely to plea bargain down. the second reason is you have to show alliance with your victim, that you believe that george zimmerman had the ill will, the evil intent, that hatred and that's why he did this. >> on the plea bargain, on that one point before we leave from it, patrick, you can charge to try to get a deal, which is different than charging what you know you can prove in court, isn't it? >> right. they focus a lot on the intent during the trial, which maybe they should have focused more on the self-defense aspect. as we both know, the defense of self-defense, or stand your ground, is applicable to

second-degree murder or manslaughter. it doesn't make a difference at the end of the day. we can try and sharp shoot here, but at the end of the day, they were really pushing for manslaughter, which we've been saying that's really our hopes. >> we were expecting manslaughter. >> some of us were. not everybody here. >> okay. but during the closing arguments, the prevalent notion is that no one was talking enough about manslaughter. the attorneys were focusing all their arguments, both sides, on murder two. >> lisa bloom, is this really the key argument, or the fact that you've said over and over that the state did not have a theory, they did not advance a clear theory of the case. >> you know, i was so surprised watching this entire trial to see the evidence diverge so sharply from what the prosecution was doing. culminating in a closing argument where the prosecutor just asked a lot of questions, essentially raised reasonable doubt for the jury, leaving the door wide open for the defense to say, look, they're asking questions. they don't have a theory of the case. in closing argument, especially,

it's time to pull it all together, to talk about the inferences, the reasonable inferences that can be drawn from the evidence. i have never seen a prosecutor in a murder trial, and i've analyzed hundred of them, including many high-profile murder trials, fail to do that. that was not done here. i think part of the tremendous sadness that so many people feel after the verdict is the disappointment that the evidence wasn't argued to the jury in the way that it could have been. if this had been a self-defense case, i was prepared to say that. in fact, some of you might remember in the early days of the trial with the early prosecution witnesses that were turned towards the defense, i was pointing that out a lot. but by the end when the evidence was there and the prosecution wasn't arguing it, you know, you have to scratch your head and ask why that happened. >> paul, what do you think? >> look, i think the prosecution was on the defense from the very beginning of this case when they started putting in both the argument and the evidence. i would have liked to have seen more demonstrative evidence. i would have liked to have seen

more answers or theories given to the jury addressing the self-defense and the failure of the self-defense. because i think the jury saw a version from the defense that seemed credible to them and that was never really addressed or countered with the prosecution. >> paul, let me jump in and ask you to explain that. why exactly did that happen? >> it's not clear to me why the prosecution, even when they were handling the mannequin and the dummy, were just presuming and taking on and believing that trayvon martin was on top. there was never a moment where they were even addressing and presenting to a jury, look, there's a fight and this is all in controversy, but zimmerman was on top at some point, or there was never really a fight that occurred exactly like this version that zimmerman keeps saying again and again and again that was different each time he told the story. i would have liked to have seen that. when the defense attorneys came in with that big block of concrete to show the jury, that was really powerful. i would have loved to have seen

the prosecution come back with some artificial grass and say, no, this is what it was. this is where it took place. feel this. i'm going to pass this out, publish this to the jury. i want to introduce this. i want people to know and understand we are contesting every single thing that the defense is saying because it is not true. that is not how it happened that night. you cannot believe his interpretation because he's biased, he's lying to you. at the end of the day, you can't not hold him accountable for killing that teenage son. >> patrick, is this a situation where there is so little direct evidence that most prosecutors in the country, no matter how good they are, now matter what, that there's so little direct evidence that most prosecutors in the country would have a hard time making this case? >> absolutely. >> don't say no. >> listen, you have to play with the hand that you're dealt. this was a tougher case. it goes into lisa's point earlier, you have to have a theme and a theory of the case.

you have to hammer that home every single time. >> but if you have a weak hand -- >> if you're given a weak hand, there's only so much you can do. at the end of the day when you're john guy and on top of that mannequin, you have to say, time out, this isn't our theory of the case, but this is where they are lying to you, jury. this is because even if he was on top, he couldn't get to the gun that was all the way in the back. so this is a bunch of bs. that's what they should have done if they had a consistent theme and theory and drove that home every single time. >> it wasn't a weak hand. they had a strong case. they had a nation behind them. they had evidence. they had his statements. they could have made him testify. i completely disagree. prosecutors do this all the time. i've gotten hundreds of phone calls from prosecutors. when you lose, you say you didn't have the evidence. >> we're going to stay on the evidence. next up, we're going to focus on the defense and how they won. stay with us. "i'm part of an american success story," "that starts with one of the world's most advanced distribution systems," "and one of the most efficient trucking networks,"

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okay. we covered why the prosecution

lost. now let's look at how the defense won. two major areas to focus on. first, tone is king. that's what my mom told me throughout growing up. throughout the trial and especially during closing, we heard a dramatic difference between defense attorney mark o'mara and prosecutor bernie de la rionda. we're not the only ones who noticed it. even o'mara pointed it out in his closing. >> does it really help you decide this case when somebody who is not george zimmerman's voice screams at you or yells at you and curses at you? no, i would contend. >> interesting point. john guy's close a little different. second, there were also the props. so we know the value of a good show. the defense had life-size cut-outs of zimmerman and martin and a concrete block they called a weapon because they say martin slammed zimmerman's head against it. the prosecution had a powerpoint slide show circa 1990. no bells, no whistles.

lisa bloom, that was not the best thing. but they also had to deal with an extraordinarily -- the prosecution had to deal with an extraordinarily high burden, right, to prove. in stand your ground states, it's an even higher burden. mark o'mara had an interesting comment post-trial. he said he didn't want to go through the stand your ground pretrial hearing because that would have shown his defense. that would have previewed his strategy to the state. i thought that was a really interesting gamble and strategy on his part. >> yeah, although he could have won the whole case at that hearing and there wouldn't have been a trial. he knew he wasn't going to win that hearing. this was not a stand your ground case. stand your ground means if you're assaulted and you have the opportunity to escape, you don't have to try to escape in stand your ground states. otherwise you have to before you try to take a life. zimmerman's story is he was pinned down, being attacked. stand your ground didn't really apply. that's why mark o'mara didn't argue with it. with regard to the difference in the tone, i think that's a really interesting point. you know t after the closing

arguments, i said i thought the defense clearly had a much better closing argument because they addressed the issue. they addressed the toughest part of the case, which was self-defense. i felt like the prosecution didn't want to go there. the prosecution wanted to stay on its easiest arguments, that trayvon martin was followed. of course he was followed. that george zimmerman said terrible things about him, made assumptio assumptions, profiled him. of course that was true. i don't think that was much in dispute by the end of the trial. the prosecution didn't get to chapter two, the fight. that was the essence of it. they sort of shied away from the strongest part of the defense case. i think there were terrific arguments to be made about george zimmerman's story, about the lies he told, about how the gun was positioned, which was the essence of the story. i prosecution didn't want to go there. i just have to say about the women on the jury and how they're all mothers and therefore they're all going to be, you know, weeping over trayvon martin as if it's their son. that obviously turned out to be untrue. they decided the case, i would say, based on the evidence,

based on the closing arguments. maybe we can put to rest all that sexist commentary about the jurors now that the case is over. >> interesting. paul, you were out of this group the most emotionally open about how you were rooting for the prosecution. did the defense in the end win you over and make it so that even if you were a juror on this, you would have had to vote for acquittal? >> you know, not necessarily, but that wasn't my lens. that wasn't my approach. as a prosecutor, i immediately identified and was following the perspective of the victims and their family. so i was concerned about what that portrayal was looking like and how that evidence was coming in. those were the challenges i saw. those were the frustrations i saw given the things we just talked about and the things lisa raised. in having a heightened expectation from the prosecution to address those issues in ways that would have been meaningful and just in talking about what i think the defense did well, was raise these red flags and

distractions about painting trayvon martin in a very negative way that was not addressed well, that was not refuted, that was not challenged, in my opinion, in terms of what i saw throughout the trial. but that's what i was speaking to when i was talking about my challenges and my rooting for that family was just that. i understand their loss, and i understand their frustration and i was encouraged by the fact they're relying on the criminal justice system to serve them and address their needs. i just feel that conversation could have been broader and could have included more tools from the prosecution that i didn't see being used effectively. >> seema and then patrick. you know, i've noticed it seemed mark o'mara and to a lesser extent don west were doing this media tour, which sometimes felt like a sort of touchdown dance. is that appropriate? is that inappropriate? is that normal? is that actually looking ahead to the civil case that might be coming? >> i think there are two types of attorneys. either ones that gravitate

towards the press and take those kind of cases or ones that stay away. now, here o'mara and west essentially tried the case for no money because they ran out of money. so what else is there? let's get some attention. let's get my face in the media. they essentially have gone on a press junket after the case was concluded. >> patrick, final word to you on the defense. there is a very old saying in criminal law and often in jury instructions that you can have a reasonable doubt based on the evidence, based on conflicting evidence, or based on no evidence at all. that is the advantage that's built into the system for defense. how much of this for you looking at why the defense won as a legal matter comes down to that evidence? >> i think it's pretty simple. the jury, if they were to follow the law, were going to find an acquittal. if the jury ruled with their emotions, they were going to get manslaughter. so they followed the law as per the judge's instructions, and i

think that was the result you had. i think it didn't help the fact that the defense, they won because o'mara had a theme and a theory, and he hammered it and hammered it and hammered it. he did not want this to be emotional. he wanted this to be very by the book and that's why we got the result we did. >> lisa, patrick, seema, paul, thank you so much for being here with us throughout our trial coverage. you guys have been awesome. we've been proud to have all of you breaking this down for us. this whole issue of violence in america, guns, race, and what tim russert wrote on that board, florida, florida, florida. when we come back, the politics of the day.

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it is time now for your monday news cycle. today, asiana airlines announced it will sue a local tv station in san francisco after it

released a list of racial names of the pilots. the agency has since apologized and the intern no longer works there. the airline may bring a lawsuit against the ntsb as well. now, this hoax overshadowed some of the latest developments we want to tell you about in the crash. the death of a third victim, a child, who died on friday. and confirmation that a 16-year-old was run over by a responding rescuer. an autopsy is being performed today on the body of "glee" star cory monteith, who flayed finn on the fox show. he was found dead in a vancouver hotel room on saturday. he was just 31 years old. and this afternoon, president george h.w. bush was back at the white house. the former president joined by president obama, the first lady

and former first lady barbara bush honored the points of light foundation and marked the 5,000th daily point of light award. president bush created that award two decades ago to honor volunteer service. >> first, of course, thank the president and mrs. obama for thr wonderful hospitality. it's like coming home for barbara and me. >> very nice. the obamas and the bushes had lunch together after that ceremony. now, while we have been concentrating on this george zimmerman trial, a lot has been happening in the political world. we want to get to it. let's bring in our washington insider perry bacon. how you doing? >> good to see you. >> let's start with some of the reporting you've been doing on that very careful statement that the president put out. everyone understands it's somewhat unusual for the president to talk about a specific verdict. you were talking to someone at the white house about that. what did you learn? >> this is a 166-word statement that was very carefully vetted.

166 was the words, but it was very reviewed by a lot of officials. the president dictated it himself to the speech writers. this is something he thought a lot about beforehand. they feel like they had to plan this out for two reasons. the first being the president really feels. horribly for the martin family and wanted to speak to them in a personal way. the second thing is they wanted to make sure the president really spoke directly and encouraged people to remain calm and not have any kind of violent rioting. they felt it was very important to have it come out in the president's words in the first 24 hours. i asked him about any kind of broader action about this. they said this was part of a broader push on gun control, but the white house officials i talked to said there's probably not going to be any kind of broader race speech or broader racial initiative from this case that the president would lead. although, i would say that eric holder today spoke at a group of the deltas, the african-american women fraternity and sorority.

he mentioned specifically he thinks there should be a broader discussion about race because of this case. holder, who in the past has talked about race and more in a personal way than the president has at times. >> something we know about both of them as senior african-american federal officials is eric holder has always had more of an interest in that discussion piece of this. being the president of the whole country and often talking about this case as some sort of teachable moment but not a moment for organizing around policy. one other civil rights issue i wanted to get you on this week on wednesday, the senate judiciary committee will begin the first voting rights hearing since that shelby decision when the supreme court basically knocked down a key section of the voting rights act. the most interesting part for those of us who have been following the story is that you have a republican congressman testifying what does that mean here, perry? >> important thing, he used to be the head of the house judiciary committee. he's a republican from

wisconsin. he twice led the republicans in their effort to support the reauthorization of the voting rights act. he's in the past been an ally with democrats on this issue. so it's important to have him on the hearing because the civil rights groups have told me their strategy to get a new section 4 is to build this block by block, republican by republican. rather than trying to, you know, get president obama to put out a bill and need senate democrats to pass one. it would be dead on arrival in it the house. they want to build a bipartisan bill with a john lewis, maybe with an eric cantor involved even to get a bipartisan bill in the house that can get support in the senate as well. it's also in the broader house. >> perry, speaking of doa in the house, the senate passed an immigration reform bill, and it looks like it's not going to do so well in the house. one of the reasons for that may be the racial makeup of districts in the house. republican districts tend to be far less black, brown, and asian

than the national average and where are white where democratic districts tend to be much more people of color than the national average. is that a big part in this, that a lot of republicans in the house do not feel that they have to go home and speak to the hispanic-americans in their districts and do you think the house is going to do anything with the senate's bill or just kill it? >> let me make two points. the first one is we're asking the house members to do something against their self-interest on some level. politicians rarely do that. for most republicans, voting for an immigration bill that will maybe help marco rubio run for president in 2016 is not their first priority. their priority is re-election. that's driving it. i would say i'm not as down on this process right now as other people are. the senate bill passed 18 days ago. so things in congress move pretty slowly. what john boehner is doing right

now is what he has to do. he has to sound negativabout this. he knows most house republicans are don't like this bill, and it's going to have to pass with democratic votes. he couldn't put a bill on the floor next week. he has to let this process come out. he has to let republican activists complain. he has to let republican members complain. he has to sort of, you know, act for a while. remember the fiscal cliff thing? we knew ultimately he was going to let the house vote for tax increases. he had to pretend to be outraged and go through that whole game and that whole acting process first. i think we have to watch that here. i think this bill is not dead. i think we have to, you know, the august recess will happen. republicans will hear from their constituents. then we can see in september where we are and if there's a house passing a more conservative bill and then sort of gradually move toward a path of citizenship. >> i'm just concerned there's a lot of acting going down in washington. i just don't like the sound of that. >> we're usually very candid here. in this case, i think there may be a little bit of people not

saying what their true position is. >> all right. perry bacon, thank you for of the report. up next, we have life imitating art in the hbo hit show "news room." we're talking season two up ahead. clients are always learning more to make their money do more. (ann) to help me plan my next move, i take scottrade's free, in-branch seminars... plus, their live webinars. i use daily market commentary to improve my strategy. and my local scottrade office guides my learning every step of the way.

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apologize to her? >> sure. >> on air? >> sure. >> so no? >> what are the consequences? >> she's been chasing a story. >> why? >> there's some evidence to suggest the army thinking about having different uniforms for home and away games. >> i don't believe that's the story. >> at some point i might need you for the red team. >> you could have said that. i understand that. i'm not a child. you have to tell me what the story is. >> no. >> at least tell me how it relates to the woman from ows. >> she can lead us to someone who might be able to help, but she won't unless you apologize. >> the woman is idiotic and unprepared. as a courtesy, i was dismissive. what does she want an apology for? >> being smug. >> that -- really? >> i know. i've never heard anybody say that about you before. i certainly can't identify personally. >> you're just chalk full of beans today. >> so that's a hard no on apologizing. >> the man is laughing at his

own dialogue. >> no, i was laughing at jeff daniels' performance. >> that's a sneak peek of what's to come in "the newsroom," the hbo series. when i watch, i feel like i know his world and i get flashbacks of somebody i used to know. i'm never quite sure who it is. there's somebody. who am i thinking of? >> we lead the world in only three categories. number of incarcerated citizens per capita, number of adults who believe angels are real, and defense spending where we spend more than the next 26 countries defined, 25 of whom are allies. none of this is the fault of a 25-year-old college student. you, without a doubt, are part of the worst generation period, ever, period. when you ask what makes us the greatest country in the world, i don't know what the [ bleep ] you're talking about. >> tens of trillions of dollars are being extracted from the united states of america.

democrats aren't doing it. republicans are not doing it. an entire integrated system -- >> oh, yes! we'll recall dylan ratigan almost to a tee. let's welcome the creator of "the newsroom" and countless others, aaron sorkin. welcome to the table. >> it's great to be here. >> as i said, he remind me somewhat of dylan ratigan. the brilliance, the passion, the big personality. then he also remind me of joe scarborough in that he's a republican who is moderate, who is very critical of his own party. who are the people in your mind who are the composite who make up will? >> will is an entirely fictional character. he's a product of my imagination and now jeff's imagination. but when you bring up joe scarborough and other republicans, i really thought, listen, the friction in this show is the friction between ideas. i thought that the better friction wasn't between right and left but between right and

far right. so that's where i put will. >> what i want to ask you is, your show last night is called "the first thing we do is kill all the lawyers." you have will battling with his own legal team, right? own legal team. >> yes. >> you have used lawyers and the law and the dream of justice in so many of your pieces and in a few good men, it's so inspiring because in that story, justice wins out over power, right? >> yeah. >> maybe we haven't seen is the whole season you're going in a different direction here. will seems to think the lawyers are in the way of justice. we're living in a world where a lot of people like the powerful don't get dealt with whether that's in the banks or all these other areas in our culture. are you gesturing towards that or more about will as a person. >> i'm very romantic about lawyers. everyone else in my family is a lawyer. i did this. wrote about lawyers. i like that dynamic, whether you're in a deposition room, in a courtroom like a few good men

or in the newsroom where they're being prepared to give a deposition. there's something about the question and answer dynamic that i like a lot. but marcia gay harden is playing rebecca halliday the lead counsel brought in to defend them, he's she's going to be one of the good guys. >> you work with old stories. the show exists about a year and a half, two years, last year was a lot about the tea party, you did the oil spill. this season you're working with a story that is not ripped from the headlines two years ago, which gives it a certain energy. it's not a story we know where it's going to go. >> i'd like to mention why it is i work with old stories. the whole show takes be place about 18 months in the past. i'm not trying to leverage hindsight into heroism. i'm not trying to tell professions how they should be doing their job. i think there's a mistaken narrative that is what i'm trying to do. that's what any of us are trying

to do on the show. it's not. i set the show in the recent past because i like the dynamic when the audience knows more than the characters do. if you get something over the wire that says a protest has broken out in benghazi, the audience knows we're headed for trouble and the characteristics don't. ity have that option available to me. >> hitchcock loved that. >> he loved letting the audience see the bomb under the dining room table and none of the characters saw it. i'll doll anything hitchcock does. >> do you think the newsroom has a coastal bias? >> i hope it doesn't. the newsroom takes place in new york. them -- their studio is in the bank of america building which we with computer graphics we make the atlantic world media building. sure, it takes place in new york but the characters are from everywhere.

will describes himself from being from a town outside a town outside lincoln, nebraska. they're from all over the place. so hopefully, all of america feels like their own show. >> i wish we could keep going. >> thank you so much for having me here. >> when i look back at season one and see you talking about the nsa bugging all of the america long before anybody ever heard of edward snowden. >> sometimes we guess right. thanks very much. appreciate it. >> aaron sorkin, thank you. we'll be right back with a comment on trayvon martin.

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the night trayvon martin was found guilty in his own killing i held my 5-year-old son and knew he's got the same demons chasing him. we are reminded as if we could have forgotten the less are worth the black bodies and the inherent criminality ascribed to them by some in the nation and the killability of black bodies by which i mean the ease we can be killed with no ramifications. this is an old dog eared narrative about the challenge of getting justice in the an american courtroom especially in the south or i should say especially in a stand your ground state. stand your ground states, whites who kill blacks are 354% more likely to be found justified to kill than white who's kill whites. extending the privilege of shooting first out of the home and into the public square may not have been racist in the original intention but it functions in practice to justify too many killings of blacks. and in this verdict, we are reminded of the challenge of

getting justice for a black victim from a nearly all white jury. how could it have been otherwise when the burden of proving martin's innocence was so high, his parents had to assert his humanity just to get an aarrest when this case became a political football divided along the left-right accism with some on the right posting zimmerman as the victim and predicting race riots would follow a not guilty verdict based on the idea that blacks are inherent lit violent. some whites would have rioted if he zimmerman had been found guilty. there's not a long history of painful injustice but who knows. the right part of why blacks vote predominant lit democratic just as gun tragedies like this interracial killing as well as the mass of enter racialings killings are why blacks support gun control measures at much

higher rates than whites do. the way to combat this tragedy lies in the weeds of gun control and not in the further prosecution of zimmerman at the federal or civil level. a civil case may heal the family but we still live in the same america that emmett till lived in, be where blacks are often judged to be a threat to order and citizens are able to destroy their bodies and be protected by the justice system and the black community is left in the pain. and black parents like me are left to teach their sons the lessons my parents taught me about how to survive. don't run in public if you don't have to. keep your hands out of your pockets if you're in stores. if you're confronted by the police, if compliant. insure ability to the molly phi white people could be the difference between and death. doesn't have to be this way. as this case proved in america, it still is. martin, i know you know what i'm talking about. >> i do, sir, thank you. good afternoon.

it's monday, july 15th. and what is the value of a black teenager's life in modern americ america? >> members of the jury, have you reached a verdict? >> we the jury found george zimmerman not guilty. >> you have no further business with the court. >> what it boiled down to is a kid minding his own business being followed by a stranger. >> we believe we put out the proof necessary to show that zimmerman did profile trayvon martin. >> things would have been different if george zimmerman was black for this reason. he never would have been charged with a crime. >> this jury kept this tragedy from becoming a travesty. >> trayvon martin will forever remain in the annals of history next to medgar evers and emmett till. >> he's a free man in the eyes of the court but he's going to be looking around his shoulder for the rest of his life. >> if he could,