A huge trove of documents has been released by prosecutors in the Trayvon Martin case. Among the biggest revelations so far is that the autopsy reveals Martin had THC in his system. But police said the shooting was "ultimately avoidable."

ABC News, which is digging through the documents, reports:

"The autopsy report shows traces of the drug THC, which is found in marijuana, in Martin's blood and urine.

"The autopsy also shows that Zimmerman shot Martin from a distance of between 1 inch and 18 inches away, bolstering Zimmerman's claim that he shot Martin during a struggle that landed Zimmerman on his back, Martin straddling him and banging Zimmerman's head on the ground.

"Martin's autopsy report also revealed that there was a quarter-inch by half-inch abrasion on the left fourth finger of Martin, another indication of a possible struggle. The teen, who lived in Miami, was in Sanford while serving a suspension for a bag of marijuana being discovered in his possession."

The Orlando Sun-Sentinel reports that Sanford Police believed George Zimmerman's shooting of Trayvon Martin was "ultimately avoidable by Zimmerman, if Zimmerman had remained in his vehicle and awaited the arrival of law enforcement."

Zimmerman, a 28-year-old neighborhood watch volunteer in Sanford, Fla., says he acted in self defense on Feb. 26 when he shot Martin, a 17-year-old African-American. Martin's family and supporters have argued that Zimmerman racially profiled the boy and followed him through the Sanford neighborhood before their tragic encounter. The case has rekindled a national discussion about race relations and racial profiling.

Zimmerman has been charged with second-degree murder.

We'll have more on this story as we sift through the hundreds of documents.

Update at 6:45 p.m. 'Avoidable':

We're backing up and reading the documents a little closer. In their capias request or order to arrest, investigators said all the times that Zimmerman had called 911, he always identified black males as the suspects.

Investigators also point out that Martin was "was in fact running generally in the direction of where he was staying as a guest in the neighborhood."

"The encounter between George Zimmerman and Trayvon Martin was ultimately avoidable by Zimmerman, if Zimmerman had remained in his vehicle and awaited the arrival of law enforcement, or conversely if he had identified himself to Martin as a concerned citizen and initiated dialog in an effort to dispel each party's concern," the investigators wrote.

The autopsy also found that Martin was shot straight through the heart. The bullet, the coroner writes, hit Martin's "right ventricle" and it never exited his body, hitting the "right lower lobe of the lung."

Update at 6:32 p.m. ET. 'Small Lacerations':

In the report filed by the Sanford Fire Department EMS, they said when they arrived Zimmerman was handcuffed.

Zimmerman "states he was assaulted and his was struck on the pavement," the report reads. Zimmerman "has abrasions to his forehead and bleeding/tenderness to his nose, and small laceration to the back of his head. All injuries have minor bleeding."

We've added a copy of some of the documents here.

Update at 6:01 p.m. ET. Skittles And $40:

The AP reports on what police found in Martin's pocket:

"A police report says Martin had $40.15, Skittles candy, a red lighter, headphones and a photo pin in his pocket. He had been shot once in the chest and was pronounced dead at the scene."

Update at 5:51 p.m. ET. 'Throwing Punches':

NPR's Greg Allen has been sifting through the witness statements. He reports that one witness saw one man chasing another man, but there is no indication who was doing the chasing.

Another witness, who investigator Christopher Serino talked to the night of the shooting, said a black man was "mounted" on top of a white or Hispanic male and the black male was "throwing punches mixed martial arts style."

Greg tells us that Serino said they reviewed 911 tapes and determined that in one call Zimmerman can be heard screaming help.

Greg also reports that police say there was no indication that Martin was involved in criminal activity.

Update at 5:43 p.m. ET. 23 Witness Statements:

The Miami Herald reports the records released include 23 witness statements. The Herald adds:

"The documents include reports from five Sanford police investigators and recorded statements from 23 witnesses. One witness, records show, was interviewed five times.

"Also included are cell phone records for Zimmerman, Trayvon Martin, and the girl Trayvon chatted with in the moments before his death. In a court filing earlier this week, prosecutors said they also plan to present Zimmerman's cell phone text messages, photos and videos from the weeks after Trayvon's controversial death.

"Not included: his three statements to police or the video-taped reenactment he did for detectives the day after he killed Trayvon. Under Florida law, confessions are exempt from public records laws."

Update at 5:31 p.m. ET. Bloody Nose:

The AP reports that one of the photographs released showed Zimmerman with a bloody nose.

"A paramedic report says Zimmerman also had a 1-inch laceration on his head and forehead abrasion," the AP writes.

When Facebook makes its initial public offering Friday on the NASDAQ, the stock will be priced at $38 per share, a price that's expected to bring in between $16 billion $18.4 billion to the company. CNBC reports:

"[The price makes] it one of the most lucrative offerings the Street has ever seen. With that valuation taken into consideration, Facebook goes public with the highest valuation — in the $100 billion range — of any company on record at the time of its IPO."

The price is on the higher end of analysts' expected range of $34 to $38.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who just turned 28 this week, wrote a frank letter to potential investors to affirm the company's social mission even as it prepares to ask Wall Street for billions. Zuckerberg said, "[Facebook] was built to accomplish a social mission—to make the world more open and connected."

What does a company's public offering with one of the highest valuations in history mean for you? Slate's technology writer Farhad Manjoo says to expect more ads. A lot more ads:

"To justify Facebooks' $100 billion valuation, investors are going to expect amazing growth in its revenues—something on the order of 25 to 30 percent per year, according to analysts. At the moment, Facebook makes nearly $5 in revenue per user per year, and just $1 in profit per user per year. Because it will be difficult for Facebook to attract far more than a billion users—there are only so many Internet-enabled people on earth—its revenues must grow by selling each user for more money to advertisers."

Not every investor will be eligible to purchase Facebook stock tomorrow. Most of the big underwriters have minimal account requirements that must be met to place a buy during the IPO phase.

"Most shares will go to big institutional investors or wealthy brokerage customers instead of retail investors," reports the Los Angeles Times.

Several news outlets are reporting that computer giant Hewlett-Packard will announce the elimination of 25,000 to 30,000 jobs. All Things D reports that the announcement will come from CEO Meg Whitman when the company announces its quarterly earnings next Wednesday.

All Things D reports:

"Additionally, sources say, Whitman will, during a conference call with analysts, portray the cuts as necessary — not to bolster HP's earnings and satisfy shareholders, but rather as a means to make needed investments. On this point, Whitman will be borrowing a bit from the playbook of her short-lived predecessor, former HP CEO Léo Apotheker.

"Whitman will argue that many of the cuts made at HP during the five years that Mark Hurd was at its helm were made without corresponding investments in new and growing initiatives. This 'cut and reinvest" theme will apply across the company, sources tell me. The process has been an intense one among HP's senior executive ranks and has, as one source put it, 'consumed the company.'"

All Things D puts the number of jobs to be potentially cut at 30,000 while Bloomberg reports that will cut 8 percent of its workforce or 25,000 jobs. Yesterday, Business Insider reported that the company would make "significant cuts."

All of these news outlets are pinning the news on unnamed company sources.

After the news broke, HP stock's price rallied, climbing by as much as 7 cents.

All Things D says cuts will happen over "a relatively long period of time, perhaps a year or more."

The Syrian opposition is in disarray, the AP reports.

The head of the Syria's main opposition group, the Syrian National Council, said he would resign and some members of the group threatened to leave it "amid rampant infighting."

The AP reports:

"Burhan Ghalioun said he did not wish to be a divisive figure and was ready to step down, just days after he was re-elected to a third, three-month term as head of the Syrian National Council.

"'I announce my resignation as soon as a new candidate is picked, either by consensus or new elections,' he said in a statement. 'I will continue to work to serve the revolution from my position as a member of the council.'"

The BBC reports that the Local Coordination Council, which has been coordinating protests throughout the country, was one of the groups that threatened to walk when Ghalioun's new term was announced.

The BBC reports:

"The LCC said the council was moving away from the 'spirit and demands of the Syrian Revolution' and accused Mr Ghalioun of 'political and organisational failure'.

"'In recent months, we have witnessed apparent political deficits in the Syrian National Council and a lack of consensus between the council and the revolutionary movement,' it said."

The uprising in Syria is more than a year old and has killed more than 9,000 people, according to the U.N. Multiple attempts by the international community to reach a cease fire have proved fruitless. The latest one, brokered by international envoy Kofi Annan is also on the ropes.

Reuters reports that amid the political maneuvering, the violence in the country continues. They quote the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which says 40 people were killed during fighting on Wednesday.

President Obama has said "I don't bluff," when it comes to opposing any effort by Iran to develop nuclear weapons (which that nation says it is not trying to do). And, he told The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg in March, "all options are on the table."

So it would seem the president hasn't ruled out the possibility of military action if talks between Iran and the so-called P5+1 nations do not end with a diplomatic solution.

Still, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro is getting lots of attention today for saying this week, Reuters reports, that:

"It would be preferable to resolve this diplomatically and through the use of pressure than to use military force. But that doesn't mean that option is not fully available - not just available, but it's ready. The necessary planning [for military action] has been done to ensure that it's ready."

The talks with Iran are due to resume next Wednesday in Baghdad. The P5+1 nations are the five permanent members of the U.S. Security Council (China, France, Russia, the U.S., and the U.K.) and Germany (the +1).

A Michigan teen says he got a taste of more than just roast beef when he bit into his Arby's sandwich last week. Ryan Hart was nearly finished with his meal when he tasted something chewy — an employee's finger.

The Jackson Citizen Patriot reports:

"'I was about to puke... It was just nasty.'

"The piece appeared to be the back of a finger, including the pad and extending beyond the first knuckle. ...

"Upon learning of the 'isolated and unfortunate accident,' the franchisee's restaurant team stopped food production and thoroughly cleaned and sanitized the restaurant, [Arby's spokesman] John Gray wrote in a statement."

This isn't the first finger-found-in-food incident in recent years. We hope you're not eating lunch right now, as we take a look back at some of the more well-known meal time finger discoveries:

The Other Arby's Finger Incident

Much like our Michigan teen, an Ohio man said he realized something wasn't right when he bit into his Arby's sandwich in 2004. The AP reported that David Scheiding found "a piece of flesh about three-fourths of an inch long." When health investigators spoke with the manager, they saw a bandage on the manager's thumb. Turns out, he had sliced his thumb skin while shredding lettuce but reportedly didn't throw away the bin of lettuce.

The Wendy's Finger Chili Scam

A Las Vegas woman told police she found a human finger in her Wendy's chili, but it turned out she planted it there. The severed actually came from human appendage came from her husband, who got it from a co-worker after it was lost in an industrial accident. The New York Times reported that the woman, Anna Ayala, and her husband, Jamie Placencia, were both convicted on felony grand theft charges and sentenced to lengthy prison terms. According to the AP, the hoax and resulting PR incident cost Wendy's $2.5 million in sales losses.

The Legit Finger in the Custard

Right on the heels of the Wendy's chili news in 2005, the AP reported that Clarence Stowers found a finger in his custard at Kohl's Frozen Custard in Wilmington, N.C.. But not before eating all the ice cream off the finger, first. (He reportedly thought it was candy and didn't realize it was a human appendage until later.) Turns out a worker had lost part of his finger in the custard machine and Stowers was unfortunate enough to find it. Later, Stowers kept the finger for evidence for so long that the it was too late for the employee to get his finger reattached.

The Frozen Dinner Finger

It seems 2005 was a big year for finding severed fingers in food. A California inmate, Felipe Rocha, was eating dinner in March 2005 when he "chewed on a crunchy object" in his cornbread and discovered a fingertip, according to the lawsuit he later filed and obtained by the AP. The inmate's attorney said Rocha is a vegetarian and lost 15 pounds in six days because he couldn't eat after the incident.

The Friday's Burger Finger

In 2006, an Indiana diner found a finger on his TGI Friday's burger after a restaurant employee accidentally cut it in the kitchen, according to an AP story at the time. "The manager didn't even know it happened until he got to the hospital," the TGI Friday's spokeswoman said.

Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin, who renounced his U.S. citizenship, is now facing backlash from politicians: Two U.S. senators are proposing a plan that would prevent people like Saverin from reentering the country.

As we reported yesterday, by some estimates Saverin may save $67 million in taxes by giving up his citizenship.

"We simply cannot allow the ultra-wealthy to write their own rules," Sen. Bob Casey, the Democrat from Pennsylvania said in a statement. "Mr. Saverin has benefited greatly from being a citizen of the United States but he has chosen to cast it aside and leave U.S. taxpayers with the bill. Renouncing citizenship to simply avoid paying your fair share is an insult to middle class Americans and we will not accept it."

Casey and Sen. Charles Schumer, a Democrat from New York, said their plan — which they've called the Ex-PATRIOT Act — would re-impose taxes on expatriates and they would not be allowed to reenter the country until they settled their tax bill.

Through his spokesman, Saverin has said he didn't give up his citizenship for tax purposes. Tom Goodman, his spokesman, told The Wall Street Journal, Saverin renounced his U.S. citizenship because of the investment restrictions placed on Americans.

"U.S. citizens are severely restricted as to what they can invest in and where they can maintain accounts," Goodman told the Journal. "Many foreign funds and banks won't accept Americans. This was a financial rather than a tax motive."

That statement didn't stop Schumer from issuing some scathing words.

"Mr. Saverin has decided to 'defriend' the United States of America just to avoid paying his taxes," Schumer said in a statement. "We aren't going to let him get away with it so easily. It's infuriating to see someone sell out the country that welcomed him and kept him safe, educated him and helped him become a billionaire."

From the Casey's press release, here's a bit more detail on their plan:

"Under the proposal, any expatriate with either a net worth of $2 million or an average income tax liability of at least $148,000 over the last five years will be presumed to have renounced their citizenship for tax avoidance purposes. The individual will then have an opportunity to demonstrate otherwise to the IRS by meeting specific IRS requirements. If the individual has a legitimate reason for renouncing his or her citizenship, no penalties will apply. But if the IRS finds that an individual gave up their passport for substantial tax purposes, then it will prospectively impose a tax on the individual's future investment gains, no matter where he or she resides. This would eliminate any tax benefit and financial incentive from renouncing one's citizenship. The rate of this capital gains tax will be 30 percent, in keeping with the rate that is already applied on non-resident aliens for dividends and interest earnings."

Update at 4:38 p.m. ET. Statement From Saverin:

Reuters obtained this statement from Saverin:

"I have paid and will continue to pay any taxes due on everything I earned while a U.S. citizen. It is unfortunate that my personal choice has led to a public debate, based not on the facts, but entirely on speculation and misinformation."

Donna Summer, the queen of disco whose career spanned four decades and earned her multiple number one hits and five Grammy awards, has died after a long battle with cancer, TMZ and E-online and the AP are reporting. The AP confirmed the death with the singer's family.

She was 63.

Her first hit came in 1975 with Love to Love You Baby and continued with Last Dance, Heaven Knows, On The Radio — all songs that were the signature of the excess and glamor of the disco era. Throughout the years, she earned five Grammys, her latest came in 1997, when she took the prize for best dance recording for her single Carry On.

Summer was born LaDonna Andre Gaines in 1948. She grew up in Boston and sang her first song in her church's gospel choir, according to her All Music biography.

In 2003, she released a biography titled Ordinary Girl. It went against the image of Donna Summer as the perfect disco diva, as the original "Bad Girl."

"The disco songs were the singles, which they promoted," she told The New York Times in an interview. "That's how we got people to buy the albums."

In that same interview, she was realistic and sober about the post-war era that her songs with their lyrical choruses and those powerful, acrobatic vocal runs helped punctuate:

"Music just evolves, people just get tired of it, and they move on to something else," she told the paper. "In that period people were in a dance mood. They wanted to be lifted up, they wanted to have fun, they didn't want to think.

"You were coming out of the Vietnam war, the 60's , the protest era, and I was coming out of it as well. I think people were just in a different mind set. When dance music came out, with that beat and that movement, it was a switch," she said.

In an interview with Tavis Smiley in 2003, she embraced the Queen of Disco title and she said she would continue performing Last Dance until the end.

Update at 12:33 p.m. ET. 'Last Dance':

Make sure to check out 2003's Fresh Air interview with Summer. And we'll leave you by pointing you to The Record for more and also with Summer's rendition of Last Dance during a Nobel Peace Prize concert in December of 2011.

Update at 12:55 p.m. ET. The Family Statement:

Here is the statement from the family via NBC News:

"Early this morning, we lost Donna Summer Sudano, a woman of many gifts, the greatest being her faith. While we grieve her passing, we are at peace celebrating her extraordinary life and her continued legacy. Words truly can't express how much we appreciate your prayers and love for our family at this sensitive time."

Update at 12:55 p.m. ET. Died In Florida:

Brian Edwards, Summer's spokesman, tells the singer died at her Naples, Fla. home.

A 43-year-old woman in San Clemente, Calif., suffered second- and third-degree burns on her right leg and right arm Saturday after rocks in a pocket set her shorts on fire, The Orange County Register says.

Orange County Fire Authority officials tell the newspaper that the woman collected the rocks on a nearby beach, returned home and "was standing in her kitchen ... when the pocket of her cargo shorts caught fire."

"I talked to the paramedic who treated her, and in his 27 years in responding to calls near the beach, he's never seen this," Fire Authority Capt. Marc Stone told the Register. "The rocks were still smoking when firefighters took them to the hospital."

Now, they're being tested. It's possible, Stone said, that phosphorus in the stones may have caused the combustion.

(We'll say it before others do: This isn't serious news! It's for those of us who like the odd story on occasion.)

Raging wildfires are burning tens of thousands of of acres in Arizona, Nevada and parts of New Mexico and Colorado. But federal agencies overseeing the response say they're not worried — by this time last year, there had already been more fires that destroyed more acres.

"I would describe [this season] as getting off to a slow start," said Kari Boyd-Peak, a spokeswoman for the National Interagency Fire Center, which bills itself as a national support center for wildland firefighting. "We're just seeing a few fires get going. It's very typical for this time of year — we're behind last year's pace. We're well below the 10-year average for acres burned as well."

In response to the five fires currently burning in the Southwest, the interagency center has raised its fire preparedness level, a one-to-five measure of fire activity and resource allocation, from a one to a two.

The fires getting the most attention heading into this weekend are the Gladiator Fire and Sunflower Fires, in Arizona.

The Sunflower Fire is the largest, burning 12,000 acres and threatening some structures. The Gladiator Fire is considered by by authorities to be the top priority fire in the nation because it's threatening the community of Crown King, Ariz. Residents of Crown King have been evacuated.

The Gladiator Fire doubled in size overnight to an estimated 5,500 acres. Phoenix's KTVK-TV reports:

" 'This is a really fast-moving fire,' Karen Takai of the Southwest Area Incident Management Team said Thursday morning. 'Yesterday afternoon was explosive as it came across the road.'

"The thick cloud of smoke hovering over the Bradshaw Mountains is visible for miles."

"We still have a lot of resources available so these response teams still have a lot of cards in hand to manage these fires," said Boyd-Peak.

Interagency center averages show that that by this point in the year, wildfires typically scorch about one million acres. At this point in 2012, half that — 500,000 acres — have burned.

"It's unfortunate they are threatening homes and communities, but it's very typical this time of year," Boyd-Peak said.

In a classic example of "on the one hand, on the other hand" economic analysis, the word that Japan's economy grew at a strong 4.1 percent annual rate in the first quarter is being followed by cautionary talk of slower growth for the world's third-largest economy in coming quarters.

"Japan's economic growth probably peaked in the first quarter and analysts forecast the pace of expansion will halve by year-end as the boost from earthquake reconstruction fades," Bloomberg News says.

"Prospects remained uncertain for the current quarter because of fears about the European economy and other factors that could crimp expansion," Bloomberg BusinessWeek adds.

Reuters writes that "the figures underlined expectations that growth would slow down during the rest of the year, partly as the impact of the rebuilding effort fades."

Japan's northeast coast was shaken by a massive earthquake, and then pummeled by a tsunami, on March 11, 2011.

A group of devoted musicians crowded a stage in Sofia, Bulgaria last night, blowing bagpipes and hoping to set a new mark. When all assembled, Reuters reports 333 Bulgarian bagpipers performed, setting a Guinness Book World Record for the greatest number of bagpipers ever to play together at once.

Many performers were children in traditional dress, bobbing and swaying to the music.

Bagpipes.co.uk says don't be surprised at the location: "Bagpipes, while associated greatly with Scotland, are found across Europe and in many parts of the world and have been for a great many years."

The concert was paired with a lecture delivered by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, founder of the International Art of Living, which helped sponsor the event, notes the Sofia News Agency. The foundation has helped set other group efforts, says the Guinness Book, including the largest group of hand drummers to play together (1230 people), the largest buffet ever served (5,612 different dishes) and the biggest choir to ever perform together (121,440 singers).

The Bulgarian musicians performed on bagpipes known as kaba-gaidas and kicked off their concert with a traditional Bulgarian folk song; Reuters notes the music was included on a golden disk launched into outer space with the one of the Voyager space crafts in 1977.

The campaign for GOP presidential contender Mitt Romney and the Republican Party together raised $40.1 million in April, just shy of the $43.6 million that President Obama and the Democratic Party took in.

This is the first monthly report since Romney effectively wrapped up the Republican presidential nomination. And because money is one way to keep score during a presidential campaign, the news is getting a great deal of attention from the political media this morning.

Politico points out that "it's a strong showing for Romney and his allies as they move into the general election. The clearer test of the Obama-Romney fundraising match-up will come with the May money reports, since that'll be the first time both candidates will be raising campaign and victory money for the entire month."

The Los Angeles Times says the April figures signal that Romney is beginning to "chip away" at Obama's fundraising advantage.

According to ABC News' The Note, Romney's haul "should give the Obama campaign and the Democrats something to sweat about."

The Hill adds that, "Romney and the RNC have a fundraising total of $800 million combined, according to a campaign memo obtained by the press." And it writes that "the president's team expects to have a strong May, in part thanks to Obama's endorsement of same-sex marriage. Obama raised $15 million last week at a Los Angeles fundraiser hosted by actor George Clooney."

For more coverage of the 2012 presidential campaign, check It's All Politics.

Good morning, here are some of the headlines we're following:

As Feared, JP Morgan's Losses Are Growing; Reportedly At $3 Billion.

Minorities Are Majority Of U.S. Births, Census Says.

Activist Chen May Soon Have Passport, Be Able To Leave China.

NATO Summit Opens This Weekend In Chicago; Pakistani President To Attend. (CNN)

Trial Of Accused Serbian War Criminal Ratko Mladic Delayed Indefinitely Over Prosecution Errors. (Telegraph)

Greece Gets Caretaker Government, Banking Crisis Looms. (Washington Post)

Arizona Wildfire Grows Rapidly, Threatens Historic, Rural Community. (Arizona Republic)

Closing Arguments Set For Today In Edwards Corruption Trial. (CBS)

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s Wife Found Dead At Home In New York (New York Times)

Moderate Earthquake Shakes East Texas Early Today - Second Tremor This Week. (Longview News-Journal)

There were 370,000 first-time claims for unemployment insurance filed last week, the same number as during the week before, according to the Employment and Training Administration.

So, after a spike to a range around 390,000 per week in April, claims have slowed again to a pace that's roughly the lowest since the spring of 2008.

According to The Wall Street Journal, that suggests "the recently volatile labor market is stabilizing."

But Reuters takes a different angle, saying the news "will do little to ease concerns about a recent slowdown in jobs growth" because the no-change-news comes "on the heels of three straight months of slowing employment gains."

Update at 10:20 a.m. ET. Leading Indicators Tick Down:

The morning's other economic news is that The Conference Board's Leading Economic Index edged down 0.1 percent in April from March, "following a 0.3 percent increase in March, and a 0.7 percent increase in February." Still, the index, which aims to forecast how the economy will be doing in coming months, stands at 95.5 — not far below the 100 reading it typically hit or exceeded before the recession that began in December 2007.

Legal activist Chen Guangcheng has reportedly finished submitting applications to Chinese authorities and has been told that he and his immediate family could be issued passports within the next two weeks.

That would then allow him to come to the United States.

Chen, who overcame blindness to become a self-trained lawyer and went on to anger authorities with his work exposing a policy of forced abortions, has been at a Beijing hospital since leaving the U.S. embassy in the Chinese capital on May 2. He had been sheltered at the embassy for six days, after his escape from house arrest. He's being treated for a foot injury suffered during that escape.

Since Chen's flight from house arrest, refuge at the embassy and decision to leave there, his case has been closely watched around the world. He wants to leave China because he fears for his own and his family's safety. Chinese authorities have accused the U.S. of interfering in that nation's internal affairs. Meanwhile, diplomatic efforts to resolve the situation appear to have been making progress.

Wednesday on Talk of the Nation, fellow activist Bob Fu told NPR's Neal Conan that he had spoken with Chen that morning and:

"He said that for the first time the passport issue has substantial progress. This morning, China time, ... security officers from Shandong Province came to him and [made] him fill the forms for a passport application and obviously asked him to wait within 15 days. He was promised to have his family's passports. The U.S. said their visa have been approved already for a week. So it could, you know, happen in five days to 15 days."

Whether it all will come together that quickly remains to be seen, of course.

According to the BBC, Chen has told the news network that "government officials came to see him on Wednesday and completed passport applications for him, his wife and their two children. He said the officials told him the passport would take 15 days to issue, without giving a definite date."

"They didn't promise when we'll get the passport," Chen told the BBC. "They didn't say anything like we will definitely get the passport on a certain day, etc. There was nothing like that told to us."

"For the first time, racial and ethnic minorities make up more than half the children born in the U.S," The Associated Press writes.

As USA Today adds, that news from the Census Bureau is "a sign of how swiftly the USA is becoming a nation of younger minorities and older whites."

Census estimates, USA Today says, that:

"Hispanics, blacks, Asians and other minorities in 2011 accounted for 50.4% of births, 49.7% of all children under 5 and slightly more than half of the 4 million kids under 1."

According to Roderick Harrison, a former chief of racial statistics at the Census Bureau who is now a sociologist at Howard University, "this is an important landmark."

"This generation is growing up much more accustomed to diversity than its elders," he tells the AP.

The New York Times says the shift "has been long expected, but no one was certain when the moment would arrive — signaling a milestone for a nation whose government was founded by white Europeans and has wrestled mightily with issues of race, from the days of slavery, through a civil war, bitter civil rights battles and, most recently, highly charged debates over efforts to restrict immigration."

It adds that "whites still represent the single largest share of all births, at 49.6 percent, and are an overwhelming majority in the population as a whole, at 63.4 percent."

Update at 9:05 a.m. ET. Data Now Online:

Census has now posted its statement about the data here. There, it adds that "the population younger than age 5 was 49.7 percent minority in 2011, up from 49.0 percent in 2010. A population greater than 50 percent minority is considered 'majority-minority.' " Census has put links to several tables with supporting data here.

The bureau also says:

— "There were 114 million minorities in 2011, or 36.6 percent of the U.S. population. In 2010, it stood at 36.1 percent."

— "There were five majority-minority states or equivalents in 2011: Hawaii (77.1 percent minority), the District of Columbia (64.7 percent), California (60.3 percent), New Mexico (59.8 percent) and Texas (55.2 percent). No other state had a minority population greater than 46.4 percent of the total."

— "More than 11 percent (348) of the nation's 3,143 counties were majority-minority as of July 1, 2011, with nine of these counties achieving this status since April 1, 2010. Maverick, Texas, had the largest share (96.8 percent) of its population in minority groups, followed by Webb, Texas (96.4 percent) and Wade Hampton Census Area, Alaska (96.2 percent)."

The word on Monday that JPMorgan Chase's losses from risky trades that went wrong could climb from $2 billion to perhaps as high as $4 billion in coming quarters is being bolstered this morning.

There's this report from The New York Times' Deal Book blog:

"The trading losses suffered by JPMorgan Chase have surged in recent days, surpassing the bank's initial $2 billion estimate by at least $1 billion, according to people with knowledge of the losses."

As Deal Book reminds us:

"When Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan's chief executive, announced the losses last Thursday, he indicated they could double within the next few quarters. But that process has been compressed into four trading days as hedge funds and other investors take advantage of JPMorgan's distress, fueling faster deterioration in the underlying credit market positions held by the bank."

The blog also points out something that's been said many times in recent days: that the bank has been earning big profits overall in recent quarters, and is expected to do so again in coming quarters. So, it should be able to absorb the losses from blunders made by traders in its London office.

Regarding that London office, The Wall Street Journal this morning profiles JPMorgan trader Bruno Iksil, the "caveman" who became a "whale." It reports that "months before ... Iksil became famous as the 'London whale,' the trader who contributed to a loss of more than $2 billion at J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., he earned a different nickname: the 'Caveman,' for pursuing trades that rivals sometimes thought were overly aggressive but often led to huge profits."

Google announced a big change in its approach to search today.

The search giant said the move was the first step in transitioning from an "information agent" to a "knowledge agent."

"The Knowledge Graph enables you to search for things, people or places that Google knows about — landmarks, celebrities, cities, sports teams, buildings, geographical features, movies, celestial objects, works of art and more — and instantly get information that's relevant to your query," Amit Singhal, a senior vice president at Google, wrote.

Google is going to roll out the new feature slowly, but some users should begin seeing the feature this week. In practical terms, what's going to happen when you search on Google is that you'll see a separate "knowledge panel" on the right side of your regular search results that presents information about whatever your searching for.

Danny Sullivan, the search authority on the Web, says this is a "big change." Sullivan, who got a chance to test drive the feature, described his experience like this:

"A search for Star Trek brought up a panel that included a reference to Star Trek: Voyager, my favorite of all the series. Jumping to explore that, the Voyager box included a reference to Babylon 5, another favorite sci-fi show of mine. Jumping to that box, there was a reference to Claudia Christian, who wonderfully played one of the main characters in Babylon 5, Susan Ivanova. I surfed over for a look.

"If you've ever started reading a Wikipedia page and then gotten lost jumping from one topic to another, that's the experience I think many are about to discover with Google. You'll not only discover answers to factual questions, but you'll likely quickly explore more than you had planned and have fun doing it."

Google says that its search engine now contains 500 million objects and knows more than 3.5 billion facts "and relationships between these different objects." Google says it crawls more than public sources like Wikipedia and the CIA Factbook.