In yesterday’s post  I questioned the liberal portrayal of George Zimmerman as a white supremacist.

The media demonization of Zimmerman as a white racist has been so complete that Jesse Jackson was able to call it a miscarriage of justice when Zimmerman was released from jail on bail, pending trial. “Tomorrow Mr. Zimmerman’s freedom will be restored,” said Jackson, “This decision cheapens black life.”

Legally speaking, the only legitimate reason to deny bail to any crime suspect is the fear that he will jump bail, which is obviously not the case with Mr. Zimmerman. Our judicial system is based on the presumption of innocence, which means that no effort should be made to punish a suspect for his alleged crimes until after he’s been convicted. The idea that Zimmerman should rot in jail even before he’s been convicted is remarkable, even for Jackson.

The Reverend Jackson doesn’t seem to think constitutional principles should apply to Mr. Zimmerman. Jackson is taking this position on the Zimmerman case because, he says, “Racial profiling and killings have become a national pattern.”  

Leaving aside the injustice of wanting to punish one individual person for this alleged “national pattern,” and the injustice of wanting to do it before the accused individual has even been convicted, one look at George Zimmerman’s face undermines the idea that he’s a white supremacist. 

I have a couple questions for anyone who wants to make Zimmerman the poster child for white racism:

Is George Zimmerman whiter than Sally Hemings?

Zimmerman’s father is white, but his mother’s side of the family is black and Hispanic, as shown by this family photo. Sally Hemings, the slave who apparently bore several children to Thomas Jefferson, had more white blood than Zimmerman, but the Jesse Jacksons of the world are not reluctant to embrace her as a sister. (Hemings’ father was a white man named John Wayles, and her mother’s father was a white man named John Hemings.)

Is George Zimmerman whiter than Jeremiah Wright?

I don’t know anything about his family tree, but if you put a picture of Jeremiah Wright next to a picture of Zimmerman, it’s hard to argue that Zimmernman looks any whiter than the fire-breathing advocate of “Black Liberation Theology,” whose relationship with President Obama has been so controversial.

Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, and the other self-promoting greivence peddlers who are trying to devide the nation over this case would be in a stronger position if the “villain” they’re bashing were a blond haired blue eyed Anglo-American. Unfortunately for them, the actual human being who shot Trayvon Martin doesn’t look like that, so they have to make do with what they have.  

But if someone with Zimmerman’s family tree had been the one who got shot, rather than the one who did the shooting, you can bet that Jackson and Sharpton would be describing him as a black man, and demanding justice for his death.