But what a racist blabbermouth. He had the jurors put themselves in the position of female residents of the complex who were afraid for their safety. He had them put themselves in Zimmerman's position getting the worst of the fight. The only person not considered is the one who ended up dead. No one was put un Trayvon Martin's place, who happened to be walking home in a place where he had every right to be when Zimmerman initiated the confrontation.
According to Rivera, the Martin parents did "the best they could with this kid." What a condescending, racist idiot.
What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.
So the evidence shows that Zimmerman lost Martin, and that he stopped trying to find him. That was part of the 90 seconds he spent talking to the 911 dispatcher after that dispatcher told him "we don't need you to do that" (chase after Martin). You know, the 90 seconds you don't seem to want to admit exists (or at least talk about). If Martin had stayed lost, or gone home, there would have been no confrontation. There is no evidence to contradict Zimmerman's account that Martin showed up and started the confrontation after Zimmerman got off the phone with Police. Your bigotry is showing, and it does you no credit to harp on someone else's perceived bigotry when you yourself have nothing but hate in your heart.
ReplyDeleteI'm not the one with nothing but hate in my heart. That's a strong accusation, one which I don't even level against Zimmerman or you Zimmerman supporters. But, typical of the gun-rights fanatics, you can't seem to express yourself without gross exaggerations or lies.
DeleteI didn't hear the part where the 911 call proved that 90 seconds elapsed. But let's say it did. Why wasn't the wannabe cop, vigilante back safely in his car then?
It always gets back to the fact that the guy with the gun instigated the whole thing and in the end was guilty of manslaughter.
Oh, please, Mikeb, you call us racist, ignorant, irresponsible, selfish idiots all the time. Then you go on to deny evidence. What a tiny world you live in.
DeleteHe wasn't back in his car because he had to walk around to the front of the building to get the nearest address that he had lost Martin at. And answer questions that the dispatcher was asking him. Just the act of getting out of his car is not instigating a confrontation, and he had just as much right to be in that area as Martin did.
DeleteTrayvon Martin was long gone. Had he actually gone home, or stayed hidden, there would have been no confrontation. Martin chose to confront Zimmerman, and evidence would seem to corroborate Zimmerman's account that Martin started the violence as well. Seems like the jury agrees.
No, what the jury said is there was a reasonable doubt. That's a long way from believing it happened just like you said.
DeleteWoah, Mike, are you saying you never listened to the whole Zimmerman call to the police? The foundation of what made this an issue, and you never listen to all of it? You quoted parts of it maybe a hundred times, but you didn't bother with it's entirety? Wow, and you call us "blind supporters"?
DeleteKudos to Jim, though. I've asked Mike about the last 90 seconds three or four times, and never got a peep in return.
I find the idea that Martin ambushed Zimmerman after that 90-second break in the action totally incredible. I could see GZ doing or saying something to provoke him. There was no evidence that the unarmed kid attacked the armed man, other than the armed man's word, which has proven to be less than reliable.
DeleteAccording to Jeantel, all Zimmerman said was "What are you doing here?"
DeleteI'll tell ya, that really qualifies as shooting off your mouth and just asking for an ass kicking.
Martin had no reason to believe that Zimmerman was armed.
Delete"According to Jeantel, all Zimmerman said was "What are you doing here?"
DeleteI'll tell ya, that really qualifies as shooting off your mouth and just asking for an ass kicking."
Actually, if you were where you had a right to be, like TM was, and someone approached you and asked that, wouldn't you have a problem with it? Couldn't you see how that first question could lead to an escalation of hostilities? It seems reasonable to me. My first reaction would be, "who the fuck are you?" What would you do, politely explain yourself?
So your reaction would be to shout obscenities? You wouldn't punch him in the nose, get on top of him and beat his head into the sidewalk?
DeleteWho started the violence is what matters. If they just yelled at each other until the police showed up, this would have been a non-event.
I'd probably have a similar response to you--"Why is that your fucking business?" or something similar.
DeleteHowever, notice that you and I would respond with a counter challenge, not fisticuffs. In that situation, in TM's shoes, I'm looking for a way out of there, not looking to escalate. In Zimmerman's shoes, I'm looking to make sure I can get out of there if the other guy responds irrationally and attacks.
In either one's case, there's nothing that justifies me giving the other party a beat down, and I'm going to try to avoid a fight. In either case, if the other guy attacks, I'm going to fight back force for force, up to and including potentially lethal force if that's what I perceive is being brought against me.
BTW, are you suggesting that Zimmerman was Escalating the situation by responding to TM's challenge with a counter-challenge? Because civilized people are able to have accusatory conversations without it being considered to have become an aggressor in a fight.
Sure, there are ways to manipulate someone into throwing a punch such that the person punched is as guilty of starting the fight as the puncher (maybe more guilty or solely guilty), but "What are you doing here" doesn't qualify.
"What are you doing here?" was the start of the hostilities. GZ was guilty of manslaughter. Only biased pro-gun zealots deny it.
Delete"What are you doing here?" was the start of the hostilities.
DeleteOne of your problems, Mikeb, is that much of the world is sane, making it very difficult to come to any understanding with you. So, for example, when you say that asking a question "was the start of the hostilities" (at least you're consistent on that subject, judging by how sensitive you get about certain comments here), the sane people of the world are thinking "sticks and stones . . . "--you get the idea.
In other words, rational people tend to believe that the "hostilities" started with the first act of violence. Speaking of which, did you see that Rachel Jeantel, the "Imprison Zimmerman!" mob's intellectual leader, thinks Martin threw the first punch?
Trayvon's "Why are you following me?" had just as much of an undertone of accusation as Zimmerman's question, so the same logic would say that HE is the one who started the hostilities.
DeleteAsking a question, even if the person asked is offended by it, does not count as starting a fight. If Trayvon hit GZ for asking that question, he's the one who didn't control himself and who is responsible for starting the fight.
I can't see the video (says "Restricted Content We're sorry, but the video you are trying to watch is currently unavailable for viewing at this domain"), but I can't imagine Geraldo Rivera not being an idiot. He does idiot very well.
ReplyDeleteWhere does the racism come in, though?
Racism permeated this story from beginning to end. It motivated Zimmerman to initiate the events that led to a death. It moved many of you to blindly support him throughout.
DeleteRacism permeated this story from beginning to end. It motivated Zimmerman to initiate the events that led to a death. It moved many of you to blindly support him throughout.
DeleteSo you say. Being rational, and given the lack of any evidence of this ostensible "racism," I remain utterly unconvinced.
Ah, yes, racism motivated me to support one guy in this case over another, in spite of neither of them being the same color as me...how does that make sense?
DeleteOne second it's because it's a gun case. Then it's because of racism. Then it's because of some other reason of the minute.
Ah, yes, racism motivated me to support one guy in this case over another, in spite of neither of them being the same color as me...how does that make sense?
DeleteMikeb seems not to have much interest in discussing the fact that Zimmerman is no more ethnically "white" than Obama is. It's almost as if that fact clashes uncomfortably with Mikeb's preferred narrative.
Yes, Zimmerman is half-white just like Obama. Yet, somehow Obama is seen as black and GZ is seen as white. That's just the way it is. In George's case, I suppose it's because the kid he killed was all black and compared to that it was easy for the gun-rights fanatics to consider Zimmerman white (one of their own).
DeleteSo the racists decided to ignore that he was mixed race and adopt him as white--because that's something racists do all the time?
DeleteYou're making less sense than usual.
If you want to say that people supported him because of some political position, fine, say that. It isn't true of me or many others, but it at least makes sense as a slander.
Accusing people of being racists for supporting a mixed race person by blinding themselves to half of his ancestry is just dumb--it's like a "crab people" conspiracy theory.
That's just the way it is. In George's case, I suppose it's because the kid he killed was all black . . .
DeleteR-i-i-i-i-g-h-t. If Obama had shot and killed Martin, people would call him "white."
Smoking the good shit lately, Mikeb?
Well, if you think about it it's not so far-fetched. The black kid was dead. The shooter was half white AND was immediately supported by ALL the gun-rights supporters. It built from there.
DeleteThe shooter was half white AND was immediately supported by ALL the gun-rights supporters.
DeleteBullshit, and I can prove it, with myself as the counterexample:
Late last month, 17-year-old Trayvon Martin was shot to death in Sanford, Florida, by neighborhood watch "captain" George Zimmmerman, who claims to have found Martin's appearance and conduct "suspicious." Zimmerman outweighed Martin by 100 pounds, who was "armed" with nothing more deadly than iced tea and candy, but is nevertheless claiming that when he confronted Martin, he was attacked and forced to fire the killing shot in self-defense.
. . .
Still, as more details come to light, Zimmerman's claim of self-defense appears to be standing on shakier and shakier ground. The shooting is now under investigation by both a grand jury and the federal government.
As I've said before, I precipitously jumped to unsupported conclusions. I still don't know whether or not it was legitimate self-defense, but there isn't now and wasn't then anything close to enough evidence to prove that it was not.
Ah, so if a bunch of white people support you, you become an honorary white?
DeleteAnd obviously if a bunch of people who believe in self defense support you, the only reason can be because of shared ethnic heritage (or at least a little bit of shared heritage). It can't be because they believe your side of the story and support the principle of self defense. It has to be because of race only.
Of course, since the same people who gave some credence to GZ's story also gave credence to Miss Alexander's story (one of your more recent posts), I guess that makes her white too and means that they only support her because they're racist against her black husband.
Jim: WHY DID ZIMMERMAN GET OUT OF HIS FUCKING CAR? THAT WAS STALKING, RACIAL PROFILING AND OUT OF LINE. He also broke three of the Neighborhood Watch rules, by following him, BEING ARMED and approaching him in the first place. As for your obsession with "law"--why was it acceptable to you for Zimmerman to break the rules of the organization he claimed to represent?
ReplyDeleteYes, some of us ARE bigoted against racists, since they are a plague and a blight up on the land. (Hasn't Zimmerman proven the damage to a country that open racists can do?)
If you are going to defend this scumbag, you can expect to be called a racist, since you ARE. As was the jury, which was all white. Stop lying, if the races were reversed you would *never* come to the same conclusions. Hate in your heart indeed... you show sympathies to Zimmerman, but not to the murdered child.
That is called R-A-C-I-S-M.
I don't care about the respective races of Martin and Zimmerman. All that matters here are the actions of each one, and the evidence presented supported Zimmerman's version of events. You call him a racist, though that's not clear, and you call us racists, even though that's far from evident. Oh, well, gun control freaks rarely care about facts or logic.
DeleteWow, talk about blind bigotry. I'll start at the end of your rant.
DeleteRacism? Really? Talk about an abused meme. Liberals have used that word so often for so many things that it almost loses its meaning. I had not heard that the jury was all white, but since neither Martin nor Zimmerman were white I do not see the reason for the distinction.
17 years old is NOT a child, and he was not murdered. He assaulted another human being and paid the ultimate price for it. I sympathize with his family for losing a son, but I cannot sympathize with a young man who chose violence. I would give the same answer regardless of the race of the individual in question. Can you say the same? If you start the violence, then you should reap what you sow.
And no, I do not sympathize with Zimmerman for what happened that night. He made mistakes as well (as did Martin), but in the end he felt he had to defend himself. To clarify, though, I feel sympathy with anyone who is tried in the press before they can face a trial of their peers. And the misinformation put out by the press in this case was stunning in its scope and magnitude.
I am not aware of the rules of the Neighborhood Watch that Zimmerman was a part of, so I cannot comment on that. I do know the rules for the one we have, and in that regard you are correct. I would point out, however, that breaking Neighborhood Watch rules is NOT the same as breaking the law.
And to call Zimmerman racist? Would a racist do this?
http://tampa.cbslocal.com/2012/05/23/zimmerman-sanford-police-covered-up-beating-of-black-homeless-man-by-white-officer/
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=8&cad=rja&ved=0CGgQFjAH&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwreg.com%2F2012%2F07%2F12%2Freport-zimmerman-worked-to-help-black-man-in-beating-case%2F&ei=Rx_jUbruGMGSyQGG2oHIDA&usg=AFQjCNEe2R67Le87vgTQlesPyvo8G1WIow&sig2=X5drrdLXV4TkK5IsmEnqog&bvm=bv.48705608,d.aWc
That incident took place in 2011. Would a racist really do this? Or are you so blind in your bigotry that you cannot see the truth?
It doesn't matter if Zimmerman adopted a thousand little black babies, he saw a black teenager that night and referred to him as a fucking punk. He got out of the car and initiated the events that led to the kid's death. If it had been a little blond-haired kid named Eric this never would have happened. That's racism.
DeleteMikeb, you're certain about so many things for which you have no evidence.
Delete. . . referred to him as a fucking punk.
DeleteUm . . . as it turns out, "fucking punk" is a racially neutral term.
You'll have to do much better than that, and you won't, because you can't.
And yet the FBI investigated this for a possible hate crime, and determined that there was no evidence that Zimmerman was motivated by racism. Maybe you should go to the FBI and teach them how to really investigate this kind of crime. Just be sure you never let them know you didn't even bother to listen to the whole 911 tape...
Delete"Um . . . as it turns out, "fucking punk" is a racially neutral term."
DeleteNot when you aim it at a black kid, it's not.
Is that kinda like how it's racist to call a good mathematician a math whiz if he's Chinese?
DeleteUsing a racially neutral insult against someone doesn't become racist if the person is black. There could be racist intent behind ascribing that insult to the particular individual, but you need more to tell you that than just the neutral insult.
DeleteNot when you aim it at a black kid, it's not.
DeleteCongratulations, Mikeb, by advocating different rules for different races, you have become the definition of racist. How proud you must be!
To people like Mikeb, it's only racist if it's against their favorite group. Remember all the things he's said about gun owners that objectively speaking are racist, but since he was attacking white southerners, it's o.k.
Delete