Toxic Topic of The Week: Trayvon Martin

[Eric Renderking Fisk]

Before I or "News Hound" post any links to the news story; I gotta ask - what do YOU know of the story so far and how do you see it unfolding?

[Major Eaton]

You mean, how is this being engineered into a welcoming demand for a greater police state?

to A) better protect the Zimmerman's of this world or B) to better protect the Trayvon's of this world.....

[Cousi]

I see this whole thing as very polarizing. The race-baiters are posting a bounty and encouraging chaos and a literal breakdown of society. The New Black Panthers have declared themselves to be independent of the laws of the United "Snakes" of America (is this their version of Sharia law) and now people are rioting in the streets.

First off, I think Zimmerman is guilty of murder. He either pursued the kid until he pushed a confrontation or he went after the kid specifically to force a confrontation. Either way, that confrontation led to the death of Trayvon and that confrontation was a direct result of his actions contrary to the advice of the police (or 911).

Second, we're learning a lot more about Trayvon and that he is not a shining example of teenage America. I don't think Trayvon was doing anything illegal that led to the confrontation, but his reaction to the situation certainly didn't help avoid violence. Regardless, Trayvon was innocent and Zimmerman ended his life.

The fact that the political left is using this to "take another look" at the "stand your ground" laws is nothing but political opportunism. I am in favor of "stand your ground" laws; a person has a right to defend themselves. Because of item one noted above, I don't believe the "stand your ground" laws apply in this situation because either Zimmerman or both Zimmerman and Trayvon pushed a confrontation. Leaving that aside for now, I think that because we have a right to defend ourselves and we have a right to own guns we have a right to defend ourselves with our guns. The fact that there is a movement afoot to form a posse, find Zimmerman and kill him frankly scares me and ironically reinforces the need for us to be able to 'stand our ground' and protect ourselves. Everyone in the news media should be speaking out against this. Since he has chosen to inject himself into this, the President should be condemning the bounty placed on Zimmerman's head and the actions of the New Black Panthers. We know he won't because his justice department refused to even consider pursuing the voter intimidation cases against them.

Zimmerman had every right to carry his gun. He went too far and caused a situation wherein he felt he was forced to use it. That makes Zimmerman a criminal. That does not mean the law is ineffective or the second amendment outdated. Our system isn't perfect, but it exists the way it does to prevent the situation developing in Florida. The law has to apply to everyone equally or it no longer has any relevance.

[n11pilot]

I think that this is one of those situations that no matter how much "information" is put out by the media we do not know exactly what happened. I believe that the local authorities dropped the ball by not launching a competent investigation of the incident and that lack of investigation caused a cascade effect. The result of the cascade effect was to open the door to the loony fringe to make charges in all directions. The opportunistic race industry seized the moment to parade their agenda before the media. The anti Second Amendment people jumped at the perceived chance to blame the CCW law. Even the POTUS decided to capitalize on the tragedy with a tear inducing "If I had a son" statement. Lets not forget the New Black Panther Party taking a page from the KKK playbook and offering a reward for the head of MR Zimmerman.

Since the media has long since abandoned its responsibility of delivering facts to the masses what do we really know to be true. Right now we know that an apparently unarmed teenager was shot and killed by a man who was apparently the Captain of the Neighborhood watch under disputed circumstances. We also know that under US law the watch Captain is presumed to be innocent until proven guilty. That is it, that is not enough information to form anything like an educated opinion. In the spirit of that lack of information I suggest that the primary law enforcement agency of the State of Florida conduct a credible, in depth, and expedited investigation both of the shooting and of the local police handling of the incident. Right now I believe that the US Justice Department should stay out of the investigation, unless of course it wants to look into the bounty put up by the New Black Panther Party (Look up Fat Chance in your Eric Holder dictionary.).
I would also suggest that MR Zimmerman's permit to carry be suspended without prejudice pending the results of the investigation.

[Super Ordinary Guy]

I think Pilot has the best outlook on this...

We will probably never know the truth ......

Very hard to say who is right or wrong with the into that is available to us at this point.

[davidg]

I think Pilot has the best outlook on this...
We will probably never know the truth ......
Very hard to say who is right or wrong with the into that is available to us at this point.

Unfortunately, I agree as well. The media is there to attract advertising.. and stir up people to make them watch.. NOT put forward a real story.. On the other hand, many people WANT to be stirred up and look on any story as entertainment, not information.

[Major Eaton]

And if there is no right or wrong...then we need to put more checks and balances in place to ensure this will never happen again to our beloved citizens...

My daddy used to say "You can't legislate morality"...I'm going to add "or stupidity, though they'll really try".

[AeroDillo]

I imagine there's a party involved that carries at least 51% of the guilt for the situation.

But I doubt anybody listening to the Fourth Estate will be able to make a reasoned and logical call as to which.

[Chivewarrior]

51% of the guilt is also an insufficient standard for criminal law-- now in civil court, they could probably get him.

That said, even a stand your ground law doesn't extend to actually chasing someone down if they're not an immediate threat to you or others, so what was done here doesn't qualify as a stand your ground thing even if he was engaged in suspicious behavior. We do have recordings of people telling him not to give chase, and he has to have given some kind of chase to have gotten within range to shoot. At that point, it's probably better placed in a court of law for a jury to decide. Or at least put before a prosecutor to decide instead of the police refusing to make the arrest. (Since it is an undisputed fact that the guy has not been arrested.) I find cases like this to be dangerous in another way: anything that can be perceived as an abuse of prosecutorial discretion-- never mind that in this case it's the police and not the prosecutor-- runs the risk of people creating laws to erode prosecutorial discretion. There's a reason for that discretion, an important judicial reason, which is that not every situation can be anticipated by law and somewhere along the line we have to trust human judgment.

The problem is when human judgment is compromised-- and I think if the only piece of evidence condemning him were the recording saying that he shouldn't pursue and he did so anyway and the kid didn't have a weapon, and this was not put at least before a prosecutor, human judgment was compromised.

[RetroRebel]

Ok... in this post I'm going to sound like a deranged conspiracy nut, so please bear with me.

First off, this incident happened over a month ago. In today's technological age, the question "Why now" must be asked. With Facebook, twitter, and countless Internet newspapers, why did it take so long to register on the national scene?

My answer?

To distract people away from the real issue. Obamacare and the Court's decision about it. Just think about it. With the government trying to disregard and squash your personal rights, it stands to reason that they wouldn't want people looking into this too closely. While the incident itself may not have been planned, the media's (and by extension, the peoples) reaction most certainly was.

My two cents on the matter.

[Fedoraphile]

RetroRebel, I agree with you. These distractions happen all the time.

Also, there are reports indicating that Trayvon Martin attacked Mr. Zimmerman.

[n11pilot]

RetroRebel, Fedoraphile, That thought had occurred to me as well. I guess I was just hoping that there was something that was beyond even the "Chicago" way.

[Eric Renderking Fisk]

I've been thinking the same thing, too. I'm wondering; how come this wasn't news when it first happened? The kid's been dead for a month and NOW this is a huge spectacle?

Dont' get me wrong, it's sad this kid went down a path that lead to his death and it's tragic in every meaning of the word.

[Major Eaton]

My answer?

To distract people away from the real issue(s).

While I agree that many media stories are created to distract the people from the going's on, I don't think that this is to dissuade America from Obamacare. That's just a side benefit. No, I think this is being engineered partly to dissuade us from the Middle East, and to institute more social controls.

[The Oracle]

I have a friend who was involved in a shooting were he went after a thief. When he caught up with the thug, he attempted to run my friend down with a car. Fearing for his life he shot the thief dead. No wrong-doing was found in the shooting. The police stated that my friend DID have a right to confront a burglar or stop a crime and doing so did not mean that deadly force was premeditated. He did not provoke the man to attempt to use force against him first and this was affirmed by a witness. To think that people are supposed to just sit back and be victims is as wrong as using deadly force when not justified. Attempting to uphold property rights is not a crime.

Let’s just say that in the Florida case, this kid was just passing through. We have been told that the people in this neighborhood live in a gated community; it was not a public street. Therefore, any resident had the right to investigate the presence of an intruder. Perhaps if given the chance Zimmerman would have simply asked him to leave the neighborhood. Still, a bigger picture has come out in this case. The liberal media was quick to make this a white hate crime against an innocent kid. Sorry, we now know the shooter was Hispanic and the kid was not so little and innocent. Does this mean the kid was guilty of a crime other than trespassing (so far as we know), no? It is funny how the race-baiters have started to shut up now that more facts are coming out (the mega-millions lottery draw got more air time than they did last night).

If you want to know what I found appalling in this case is, who saw Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson and the Black Panthers raise hell when this happened around the same time.

Infant killed in drive-by shooting on Detroit's west side
2/20/2012
DETROIT -- A baby was killed this morning in Detroit, in what police are calling a possible drive-by shooting. Detroit police say the infant was rushed to the hospital where it was pronounced dead.

Police say shots were fired into a west side Detroit home around 4 30 this morning. Shell casings were found in the street outside the home and police say the shots could have been fired from a moving car. A witness did report seeing a car speeding away after the shooting.

No arrests have been made and no further details are available at this time.
http://www.northwestohio.com/news/story.aspx?id=721566

Where are the racist media outlets and the reverends with no parishes protesting that no arrest has been made here? Why do they seek to destroy the dream of Dr. Martin Luther King? Equality for all, not some and not just those who share the same skin color. See the Detroit case is believed to be a "black on black" crime, so I guess justice does not count. These people do not care about justice or the family of this teenager; they only care about the publicity so they can make a profit off of keeping racism alive and well. That my friends will prove to be the real injustice in this case.