YES! Evidence clearly showed he stalked & murdered Trayvon.
68%
NO! It's another example of our broken justice system.
32%
Comments
Thom's Blog Is On the Move
By webmaster
Hello All
Thom's blog in this space and moving to a new home.
Please follow us across to hartmannreport.com - this will be the only place going forward to read Thom's blog posts and articles.
Images of Thom
From Screwed:
"If we are going to live in a Democracy, we need to have a healthy middle class. Thom Hartmann shows us how the ‘cons’ have wronged this country, and tells us what needs to be done to reclaim what it is to be American."
From Screwed:
"I think many of us recognize that for all but the wealthiest, life in America is getting increasingly hard. Screwed explores why, showing how this is no accidental process, but rather the product of conscious political choices, choices we can change with enough courage and commitment. Like all of Thom’s great work, it helps show us the way forward."
From The Thom Hartmann Reader:
"Through compelling personal stories, Hartmann presents a dramatic and deeply disturbing picture of humans as a profoundly troubled species. Hope lies in his inspiring vision of our enormous unrealized potential and his description of the path to its realization."
It's very obvious to me that a young Black man in this state, Florida, is not allowed the same rights under "Stand Your Ground" as a person who is not Black. If you listen to the 911 recording of Zimmerman on the phone with the 911 operator, you can clearly hear that Zimmerman is not just following Martin (which the 911 operator asked him NOT to do), he is "running" after him. Everything in Zimmerman's pockets can be heard clanking and jingling. So when Martin turned around and stood his ground, the jury system here found Zimmerman not guilty of murdering Martin because Martin - in effect - stood his ground. Lord knows, we can't have that!!!! The stand your ground law was intended to protect white people, not black people! Now which one of these players REALLY had the right to stand his ground? That question never came up at trial.
I wonder what Zimmerman, the wannabe cop, would have done in the same situation if he had not been given a concealed weapons permit and a gun. Would he have still chased after that suspicious-looking black man wearing a hoodie, or would he have stayed in his car?
The Stand-Your-Gun law inflicted on the citizens of this state MUST be repealed. It was passed by a racist governor, in a state where racism among some whites is worn like a badge of honor. It's sickening. I live here. I overhear these racist conversations all the time, the word "nigger" is used here on the west coast of Florida more than I ever heard it used in the 30 years that I lived in Miami, and any progress made in the past 50 years towards easing race relations have been totally wiped out by the few years this racist governor, and thieving governor has been in office.
If the DOJ needs to do any investigating, it needs to carefully investigate Gov. Scott for hate crimes.
Kangaroo courts in Florida...
consider this ruling...after Zimmerman's aquital...???!!!
A Black Florida woman who fired warning shots against her allegedly abusive husband has been sentenced to 20 years in prison.
http://www.wtsp.com/news/article/324906/19/Fla-mom-gets-20-years-for-fir...
A racist and backwards state in my opinion.
aloysiusbe: The Florida mom getting 20 years is no surprise to me. In fact, women in this state (any color) have not much higher standing than Black men. Many women in this state (as well as other southern states) are considered property, and being beaten by their husbands or significant others is an accepted practice. Some women have had limbs broken so badly that they never walk right again or can't carry bags of groceries. Yet, when they"ve (the women) have reached the breaking point and can take no more they retaliate. Unfortunately, they usually pick a time when the man is either asleep, or in no condition to retaliate. This is not new. In fact, it's quite old. If you never saw the movie, The Burning Bed, you can probably get a CD of it out of your library. It must be at least 30 years ago and starred the late Farrah Fawcett. That movie was based on a true story. But such retaliations by women go back to the days of the Founding Fathers.
Remember, women had to march and protest in order to get the right to vote just in the last century? So in the minds of many men, they have all the right in the world to keep "their woman" in line. And the jury system, more often than not in those cases were made up of men. Is there injustice in this country? You betcha! And the best we can do is keep writing our local, state and federal representatives to act to change the injustices. But this is a particularly bad time to accomplish anything positive. We have a bunch of losers all over government. We just have to do better next time. We can also get involved with any and all organizations that do the work for us: seek out and learn about who the next best representatives are from each state, prepare petitions that accomplish our goals and sign into them so they will send you knew petitions on new matters for consideration. I probably sign petitions from no less than 100 different .org progressive entities that have something to do with everything from the endangered species list (Credo, Sierra Club, Humane Society) to legalization of marijuana, stopping privatization of prisons, and tell this or that senator or representative this or that. Occupy something, whether its banks or oil industries or equal rights across the board, it's all up to us.
Thank you 'Marsh in Florida' for the inspirational words. I sign many of the .org petitions you speak of and have a site to boot, although dont have much time to update... http://vperry.co/. I feel somewhat powerless to do more as a working single mother. The mom story and Zimmerman's to me is enough is really pushing me to dispair. I can't imagine what it would be like for my daughter and I to be separated by jail. I wish I could occupy full time.
Thanks aloysiusbe, for your kind words also. Like you, I really wish I could occupy, travel to sites where they are picketing, etc. But I'm afraid at 70 years of age, neither my financies nor my body would support such activities. We have to be very, very grateful for the young people today who are doing those things I used to do in the 60's. And jail, my gosh, perish the thought. Once in the system, very few ever really get out of it. Especially now since they are in large part privately owned and no only like keeping it filled to bursting, they want (and will probably receive) building of more jails. This is definitely not the world I grew up in. Peace to you and your daughter.
Some things have never changed in the south, as much as they try to say otherwise. Somewhere there is still some sort of confusion in the Bible-belt about treating others as you would like to be treated. No where in that Bible does it say treat others as you would like to be treated but only if you're/they're a white man. In fact, just the opposite.
If the black kid has no weapon......accuse him of using the sidewalk. They teach that to kids in preschool down here. I wish I could afford to leave, but old, tired, flirting with poverty, I guess I'll have to hang around and do some constructive bring out the vote work this coming election. I think the outrage may evolve into a positive unifying force for "liberals" to begin putting differences aside and rid ourselves of these self righteous political types by using the most effective weapon anyone has. The Ballot Box.
That's my optimistic take on the situation, but it will only come to fruition if we stop allowing the powers that be to keep us fighting with each other. JUSTICE FOR ALL NOW! PEOPLE UNITE. Vote and take someone who needs a ride with you. Help anyone you can to get registered. Be willing to provide transportation as needed. Even if the Governor has removed your vote! You can bring many votes to the polls. They can't take thay away. Carry someone on your back if necessary. The survival of a Democratic America depends upon it. We must all stop watching and waiting. Time to bring positive energies together for freedom and Justice. VOTE
can you stop putting words in our mouths? a yes or no answer in a poll doesn't require you to add your thoughts to the selections. Saying yes to a negative and saying no to another way of saying another negative or what you want us to say is not a poll. Shouldn't a poll have an opposing answer to the same question?
I'm not really surprised, Zimmerman did stalk, confront and then kill Trayvon but your "choices" were the same.
I wish the south would seceed, so they could be free to teach their kids ancient superstitons, force their women to stay pregnant, shoot blacks with impunity and go further backward so we could close the border with them and be allowed to progress without them. Who needs the south? Their a bunch of ignorant, arrogant racists and anyone with half a brain would leave for some other country. We should offer free transport for any person of color who want's sanctuary from these dangerous racists.
Let the south wallow in their own hate and ignorance without the rest of us.
I would like the NW states to seceed from this fascist, criminal, unjust, corporate controlled government so we could stop being forced to pay for their wars, enact just laws, empty our prisons and jails of victimless "criminals" and cut our taxes and improve social services and infrastructure. We would be better off without this federal government.
I sure know how you feel sheilach2, sometimes I think the same--then I remember, I was white liberal woman relocated to Western North Dakota, where the state legal system allowed my husbans to sexually violate my 3 daughters for 6 l-o-n-g years. That's my beef w/Heidi Heitkamp when she was ND Attorney General. She did ABSOLUTELY NOTHING when she learned of our case in the early 90's, by then it have been going on since 1986.
It took Senator Kent Conrad to step in finally, around or in 1991 or 1992.
For years I thought Senator Conrad did it for my girls, but as I watched him through the years (his voting record in the Senate), I realized he stepped in, demanding Williams Country reign in their "son of ND" or with all the evidence piling up against the County Court, Williams County would one day have a multi-million dollar very winnable lawsuit on their hands (with this wild mother bear woman who wouldn't quit fighting for her children)--and, whose to say, I still have "all the evidence", maybe one day, when my children have their memories return--if they get mad enough, maybe they'll go back and sue the hell out of the county.
So, had I not been in a state that was part of the "larger whole" of the United States--and, ND did to me "what they really wanted to do with me (completely silence me--let me tell you, they tried to discredit me, practiced economic terrorism against me--of which Williams Court System happily engaged--right before Senator Conrad stepped in I was fired from a County for even writing a letter to Senator Conrad (got that evidence, still, too).
So, we need to keep fighting for women and blacks in the South. They are as much a part of our United States as we are--and, we can never forget that.
Hopefully, my photo will be attached to my profile and comment below:
It appalls me, but it doesn't really surprise me. Not given what Sanford, Florida is - a town steeped in institutional racism - and given who Zimmerman's family is and their attitudes.
I was hoping for Zimmerman to get some kind of punishment for stalking and killing this young man just because he assumed he was suspicious. I prayed they wouldn't just call him Not Guilty, when the decision was annouced I felt a hard blow in my heart and stomach. All he had to do was call report and stay in his vehicle till the police came -no he was on a mission to make an empression that he was eligible to become a police officer who could take on this young man.