George Zimmerman -- the Florida man who shot teenager Trayvon Martin to death -- has landed in the news again, after a panicked 9-1-1 call Monday from Shellie Zimmerman in which she told a police dispatcher she was "really scared" because her husband had threatened "that he's going to shoot us."

Sallie Mae has dropped its membership in the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) after a student-led campaign demanding that the nation's largest student loan lender cut ties with the controversial organization. Sallie Mae is the 50th corporation to publicly drop its ALEC membership in the past year-and-a-half as the organization has come under increasing public scrutiny.

Last week, CMD reported that a small GOP lobby shop tied to the Tea Party and David Koch's Americans for Prosperity group was awarded a $500,000 grant in a backdoor, sweetheart deal cooked up by ALEC leadership in the State Legislature and sanctioned by the Walker administration.