Examining Trayvon Martin's Record is not a 'Smear Campaign'

It also emerged today that he might have attacked a bus driver, according to a tweet by a teen identified as his cousin.

The revelation about the suspension in October, in a school report obtained by the Herald, was condemned today by Trayvon’s family as part of a campaign to smear their dead son.

The “burglary tool” seems to be a screwdriver modified in some way. It’s understandable that the family doesn’t want this information out there. They have lost their son, and it’s surely adding to the pain to have all of these past incidents, which were probably also painful to his family, dredged up.

But lefty bloggers have no such reason to want the information about Martin’s record concealed. While George Zimmerman surely didn’t know anything about Trayvon Martin’s record that night, the record speaks directly to Martin’s character. Was he, as Shepard Smith and others have insisted, an “innocent little boy,” or was he a 17-year-old young man already making the kinds of decisions that had him on a path toward disaster? Most relevant is the possibility that Martin attacked a bus driver. Why? Under what circumstances? Are there any similarities between that incident and the one that cost Martin his life? Was he more likely to be minding his own business that night, or was he more likely to pick fights?

If it turns out that Martin was developing a taste for adventure and crime, it makes Zimmerman’s version of events more plausible. For the left, having sainted the young Martin without any factual basis, and having smeared Zimmerman and the Sanford police at the same time, their desire now to conceal the truth says quite a bit about how they want to use the tragic death of the young man.

Update: Also relevant.