[MT2008]

Normally, in cases like this, I completely ignore the people who play the race card and side with the law. I'm as weary as you guys of all the bitching and whining about how racist and evil America is, which seems inevitable whenever stuff like this happens. (And in this case, it's really ironic, since Zimmerman is half-Peruvian, which makes him as "white" as our President.)

But from what I've read so far, Zimmerman was really NOT in the right here. He apparently had a reputation for being short-tempered, and he had a record of his own (several arrests for domestic violence and even an assault on a fellow officer). The 911 dispatcher told him NOT to pursue Martin, but he did anyway. Sounds to me like a bit of a hothead, possibly with a Napoleon Complex (since he was such a short dude). Even if Martin is a teenage thug, and even if he was killed in self-defense, it still appears that Zimmerman may have acted in a way that made the situation more dangerous than it needed to be. And the stuff that I've seen on Zimmerman detailing his history isn't just being posted by my leftist Facebook friends, either - there are quite a few Libertarians who find him unsympathetic.

None of this, of course, changes the fact that investigators should have the chance to evaluate the evidence before we draw conclusions. And I doubt that the evidence will cast Martin in a good light, either way (no matter what his leftist sympathizers want to believe). I just don't think you should all be so quick to get behind Zimmerman and absolve him of any guilt just because of what he was, as opposed to who he was. Law enforcement may be an honorable profession, but it can attract some very dishonorable people.