I find it fascinating that the judge thinks that George Zimmerman intended to flee prosecution.
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BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
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Fixed. Link works now.
You find it fascinating?
Why?
It’s just court business as usual. No one who is even near line-level sane puts any trust whatsoever in the courts of this country today. They are by and large just as beholden to the PermaGov and just as influenced by its media as are the other relatively public segments of the government. Assuming that this action has anything whatsoever to do with some form of morality-based “justice” is as foolish as thinking that Chief Justice Roberts’ recent Obamacare ruling was based on right and wrong. It’s all media/all PermaGov/all day in this country. Was Zimmerman a fool to play games with the money? Yes, he was. He shoulda played them better.or not played them at all. He’s in the big leagues now and he can’t fumble grounders like he used to when he was dealing with working class-level tax problems or hiding some recreation money from his old lady. The big media magnifying glass is focused on him and it will burn him up like an ant on the grammar school playground if he fucks up.
Which he did, of course. Smell the smoke?
Is he some kind of hero? No, he’s just a guy who got caught in a very bad situation. Probably something of an asshole, when you get right down to it. Trayvon Martin, too. Two assholes met up on a bad night and one of them died. But the surviving asshole suddenly found himself the subject of massive media coverage, most of it initially calling for his scalp on a platter without benefit of any so-called “justice” system. I’d get a little…antsy too. Wouldn’t you?
But of course…we’re too smart to fuck up like this. Right? And he’s just another dumb, vicious, (
kinda) white, (kinda) middle class racist motherfucker. Right?Riiiiight.
Consider, if you will.
You’re a white guy driving through a poor minority neighborhood on a sunny, hot Saturday afternoon. Not fast, not slow, just driving. Suddenly a kid jumps out from behind a parked car and you hit him.
You hit him bad.
Real bad.
The neighborhood erupts. I’ve seen it happen plenty of times, and so have we all. Big fuss. Cops. Reporters. The mayor…who’s up for re-election and needs the minority vote…makes “a statement.” Suddenly you’re in the papers. In the media. Most of the coverage is calling you a baby killer. Some group of fools who claim that they are “The New Black Panther Party” puts a fucking bounty on your ass.
Antsy?
Panicky?
Prone to fuck up?
I think so.
So it goes.
Justice?
Can’t get “justice” in a fender bender, most of the time.
There’s a pothole just outside my building, on a very busy, very complicated five-way intersection right in front of a large middle school/grammar school/high school complex. It’s about a foot deep and three feet long. A real wheelbuster, a real danger in terms of causing accidents. I first saw it almost 10 days ago. It had a big orange plastic barrel marker sitting in it. That lasted about an hour, because somebody hit it and knocked it about 10 feet away from the pothole. I put my own ass on the line in that kind of traffic and put it back. Then I called 911 and asked that some cops come over and make a better marker until the city gets around to fixing it. Next day? Same deal. Next day? I’m not putting my ass out there again. A couple of days go by, and I go into a local bank not a block away from there, in plain line of sight. In the bank is a policeman. I say “Just who I’ve been looking for!!!”…real friendly-like…and he politely hears me out. Then he says “Well…I’m not from this precinct. I’ve been sent down from headquarters to guard this bank. But I’ll call it in.”
“Guard this bank?” “From headquarters!!!???” Sheeeit!!! It’s a little backwater bank branch in a working class Bronx neighborhood. I’ve never been in it when there were more than two customers. Guard it from what? High school breakdancers? Please.
Of course, I don’t say this to him. I mean…he’s got a gun and a double 007 rating to use it. Licensed to kill, he is. Bet on it. Ain’t no breakdancers gonna graffiti this bank on a hot summer Thursday!!! No sirree Bob!!!
And I go on my way. Did he call it in? I couldn’t even get him outside to look at the pothole. 96+ degrees outside or an air-conditioned bank? No contest. Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t. Pothole’s still there now. And the orange plastic barrel has been hit so many times it looks more like an orange plastic sheet.
Justice?
Can’t even get potholes fixed.
Ain’t no “justice” in this system.
It’s broke and it’s broken.
Get used to it.
Justice?
No.
Juicetice.
You got the juice; you get the justice.
Bet on it.
If that pothole was out front of the local assemblyman’s office or next to the precinct house/firehouse/etc., it would be gone before it happened.
I got yer “justice.”
Right here!!!
Zimmerman understands all of this on some level. Why do you think he was out there patrolling his neighborhood in the first place? Just because he likes to bully people? No, it’s because the system isn’t doing the jobs it claims to do. Not on any levels whatsoever. It’s got him in its clutches and he is frightened to death.
I can’t blame him.
Can you?
Later…
AG
OK, you’re right.
Z has a lot more reason for panic than the usual poor schmuck in the hands of the criminal justice machine.
And that’s plenty, already.
“Zimmerman understands all of this on some level. Why do you think he was out there patrolling his neighborhood in the first place? Just because he likes to bully people?”
ummmmmmm…Yeah. from what I’ve been able to read that’s EXACTLY what he was doing patrolling, He likes to bully people.
Just because he likes to bully people?
Yeah, his past seems to support that.
It’s got him in its clutches and he is frightened to death.
Zimmerman should have thought of that before he decided to go all John Wayne on Martin.
He should have thought of that before he lied to the court.
He chose poorly, and not just once, for that he should face the consequences.
When Zimmerman and his wife lied to the court, he turned the 9 on any credibility he might have had and blew it all to hell.
Your hostility to the democratic process has been duly noted.
My view is that vigilantism is a cancer. Unless it is treated quickly and aggressively, it will kill our republic in very short order. I’m hopeful that the judge understands this.
Of course, the term “vigilante” was generally used for people who were avenging some sort of actual crime, rather than a kid walking through his neighborhood unarmed.
I agree, vigilantism is basically the province of morons who don’t understand how a proper grown-up country works, but I’d rather not buy into the frame.
This guy stalked and killed an unarmed kid, and did so not in response to any actual incident. That’s not vigilante behavior. It’s murderer behavior.
I’m guessing people do really stupid things when they’re charged with murder.
Very reasonable to be scared to death, innocent or guilty.
There’s a reason for that suicide watch.
It is interesting. Mostly because he also went ahead and gave him the opportunity to pay bail. Basically despite the flight risk, the judge thinks there is a good chance the guy is walking. Possibly means the state’s case is crap as presented so far.
dude had a SECOND PASSPORT.
why does one have a SECOND PASSPORT that one did not turn over to the court
UNLESS TO FLEE?
One possible explanation:
Associated Press:
Another?
Zimmerman does not trust the U.S. government and probably has not trusted it since well before he got into this particular scrape. Sounds like a sign of intelligence, to me. Maybe we all oughta get one.
If y’know what I mean.
It generally takes a long while to get a new passport so he must have had this one for longer than the history of this case. Had he applied for one after this case hit the media (February, was it?) even this almost totally dysfunctional system would raised red flags.
Again, the leftiness rush to judgment is absurd.
Is Zimmerman the perfect man?
The Prophet of the Age?
No, he’s just some poor working schlump with some attitude problems.
Will justice be served?
OH yes!!!
And it is a very hungry eater these days.
Bet on it.
You sure you want to see him served up, rikyrah? We’re all at risk here, y’know.
AG
I’m not sure I understand your post, at all, but I don’t see how you can assume a rush to judgment, on the one hand, and then give us a Zimmerman mind-reading on the other.
Whether or not Zimmerman is guilty of breaking the law, this is a case that should be prosecuted and in which the facts should be weighed by a larger audience (i.e., a jury). Whatever Zimmerman “knew” about the “PermaGov,” or whatever you’re talking about, is completely irrelevant to his actions on the night in question and whether or not he can be trusted not to flee the jurisdiction.
No mind reading. The judge gave one take; I’m giving another. When no one knows “the facts,” guesses are all we have to go on.
Yes, it should be tried by a jury. One that is fairly seated. It’ll never happen, rfahey22. Even in unpublicized trials the back-and-forth between defense and prosecution is all about winning. Not doing something well or correctly…just winning. Careers are at stake and pure justice takes a header every time.
In a nationally publicized case?
Big careers are at stake. And big money, too. Power corrupts. The further up the ladder of power…and power comes from the coffers of a bank, not the barrel of a gun as Mao Zedong claimed (You need money to buy the guns…or the media, a much more effective weapon than a gun in the present DisInfomercial Age)…the further up the ladder of power, the more corruption exists.
There are…and have been for months…many leftiness bloggers literally holwlng for George Zimmerman’s scalp. This is a left-over kneejerk reaction from the wayback years of the Civil Rights era, and it is racist at its core.
“Racist” in the sense that it assumes whiteish people to be be more guilty than are brownish people until proven otherwise.
Sure…let the courts decide.
All I’m asking is…do you really trust the courts? If it was your ass on trial or that of someone you love, would you still trust them?
Not me. The hustle is on so deeply, the fix is in so strong in most cases that it is all a relatively non-wealthy person can to to get an unfair trial that does not completely ruin their lives.
Sorry, but there it is.
So it goes here in the present-day United States of Omertica.
Deal wid it.
Or not, as you must.
Later…
AG
And here once again is the leftiness mindset in all of its glory. Zimmerman’s a “stalker;” he went out there that night with the idea of fucking someone up just for the pleasure of it, and hang him high and wide!!!
No mention of the broken system in which he lives…in which we all live unless we are truly wealthy…of the total absence of successful action against the repeated robberies in his neighborhood. He’s just assumed to be a vicious asshole. The cops are considered by most leftiness sheeple to have crookedly colluded with him initially…if that assumption is so easy to make, why not go whole hog and admit that a police department that rotten is most likely not taking care of any business except polishing its own stolen apples?
“He said/she said” transformed in this instance to “his hustlers say/the court’s hustlers say” and spewed into the media in an attempt to…to what, exactly?
To win, of course.
Not necessarily to see justice done, for sure. That’s the way the system works now. In point of fact, it appears that this is the way it has always worked. Only now, so-called “justice” is no longer even an assumed possible by-product of the process. It’s just about money and position. How much has he had to spend so far on finding and hiring legal representation that has enough juice…remember, at this level of publicity and hype it is definitely a juicetice system, not a justice system…to combat the sheer financial power of the media-driven government? And how much more will he have to spend in order to not end up in jail for the rest of his life? Had he simply passively accepted the system as “just” when the massive media hoo-haw rolled out about him it would have rolled right over him and he would have been absolutely doomed to conviction with no semblance of a real trial. He’s in way over his head in this situation, but at least he’s trying to survive.
Was he right or wrong in his actions? He said/she said. The verdict is still out in a true “justice” sense. Somewhere in the middle, more’n likely. As will be his punishment if “justice” is truly served. With the odds stacked against him the way they are in this country now, he’s gotta be some combination of two or three times luckier and/or better at the hustle just to be able to have a chance at a reasonable outcome.
He’s learning.
The hard way.
Watch.
And learn yourselves.
Watch.
AG
P.S. My so-called “hostility to the democratic process” has been duly noted by someone above. As Ron Paul said regarding free market ideas, we no longer know what would happen if a truly democratic process were to be applied to anything at all in this country because that “process” has been bought and sold by big money so many times that its resemblance to the real thing is about the same as is the resemblance of processed foods to unadulterated, earth-grown and nourished produce.
All we have now is Cap’n Crunch justice.
Get on the wrong side of the Captain and you will get crunched.
Bet on it.