Soledad O’Brien interviewed Frank Taaffe, the Former Neighborhood Watch captain for George Zimmerman’s neighborhood who said that his neighborhood had 8 burglaries by young black males over the prior 15 months and that George Zimmerman had actually stopped one in progress at Taaffe’s house by calling the cops and having the burglar apprehended. So it was apparently something of a normal thing for the Neighborhood Watch captain to do patrols through the community.
After explaining to O’Brien all the above and more, O’Brien tried to cast what Taaffe was saying in racial profiling terms by asking him:
“So it sounds like to me you’re saying that it made sense to you that George Zimmerman would be fearful of young black men?”
Fearful? Talk about a loaded question. That is indeed NOT what Taaffe was saying at all. In fact he answers by saying “No, it would be consistent that the perpetrators were all of the young black male ID. That’s a fact.”
O’Brien then asked him to repeat it because she claims she didn’t understand what he meant and he simply responds that “all of the perpetrators of the prior burglaries were young black males.”
O’Brien then tried to make it, once again, about racial profiling:
“So when he saw Trayvon Martin, in your mind it would make perfect sense to say he’s a young black male, he probably is a robber. Is that what you’re saying?”
Unfortunately Taaffe didn’t catch on to exactly what she was doing here and responded, “Well you know, there’s an old saying: If you plant corn you get corn.” She didn’t understand that and asked him to explain.
“It is what it is. It is what it is. I would go on record by stating that of the eight prior burglaries in the 15 months prior to the Trayvon Martin shooting, all of the perpetrators were young black males.”
***
It’s clear to me that all Taaffe was saying was that Trayvon Martin met ONE criteria, that he did match the profile of those who had burglarized the place 8 times before. But of course O’Brien, making a mockery of actual journalism, ignores what Zimmerman actually said on the 911 tape about suspicious behavior and instead focuses her line of questioning on trying to make Zimmerman out to be a racist, or at best someone who racially profiles young black males.
Look, all you have to do is listen to the 911 tape and you’ll hear Zimmerman describe suspicious behavior. He told the 911 operator that he saw someone meandering around, looking at houses. He never made it about race until he was asked specifically about race by the 911 operator. But these agenda-drive hacks in the MSM continues to try and push this idea that Zimmerman had a problem with black people and that’s exactly what O’Brien’s despicable line of questioning was aimed.
In the second below O’Brien presses Taaffe further, suggesting that Zimmerman actually did racially profile people and when Taaffe explained that Zimmerman didn’t care about race, that he was looking for anyone who looked suspicious, she accused him of contradicting himself.
Ugh.
Watch the videos below: