I only saw the full video yesterday so here's my honest take as someone who's very much anti-gun in general. I've also done 1.5 years of law studies but admittedly I haven't read Wisconsin law.
Fundamentally, a murder one on Rosenbaum was never ever going to stick in a court room in a country that has the second amendment in the constitution. Premeditated murder, what they charged him with, means that he searched out individuals or groups of people to assassinate them, had planned it and would run towards them. It's just not what the video shows, even though the kid clearly got a screw loose.
You could maybe make an argument for a second-degree manslaughter for using excessive force although it's quite clear that he ran away. It's not inconceivable that one count on that could've won over at least part of the jury.
Due to the camera angle behind the cars concealing what went on it's impossible to say what exactly happened and how close Rosenbaum got to him and his gun though. One of the most basic things in law school is that the evidence needs to be absolute for the most absolute of charges. Either way, he should've never been there with the gun, he shouldn't have been in possession of a gun, but it definitely wasn't premeditated. They overcharged him.
The final two cases, in no way could be considered anything other than self-defence considering he way laying on the ground. I'm sorry for those who got affected by what happened but this is a very terrible situation in the first place. There are no winners. I genuinely do believe Rittenhouse (while it's clownish to show up with a firearm) had zero intent of actually hurting anyone that night and then made some hasty decisions when feeling under threat the first time which set off a chain reaction.
Him walking on the gun charge is ridiculous.
That being said, out of principle I don't believe adolescents should be able to receive life without parole. Maybe I'm too Swedish, I don't know.
I definitely don't endorse him, the NRA, gun nuts or the Republican Party, but what I do endorse is that when it comes to self defence, there should be a benefit of the doubt. It's better that a guilty person goes free than that someone innocent is thrown in jail, in particular when we're talking US sentencing. The jury made their call, it was 12-0 in the end from a jury in a suburban swing county, so I think it's better if people respect that.
Guns are bad. Don't do guns. That's all. RIP to the deceased and I hope Grosskreutz is able to live a decent life even with his arm injury. I hope that his skin colour didn't influence the verdict, I don't know. I hope a black guy would've been offered the same benefit of the doubt on murder one, but sadly I doubt it
The US has a very racist/biased legal system depending on definition.