The "Beer Summit"
This whole little sideshow has the sickly air of a face-saving gesture about it.
We'll probably never know what happened inside Professor Gates' house that day he was arrested, but I'm sure he was tired and cranky after a long flight from China, and maybe Officer Crowley was still a little tense, not knowing what he might face when he answered the supposed burglary call.
President Obama, on the other hand, should have known better. He was right: he didn't have all the facts. We all are guilty of shooting our mouths off without knowing what we're talking about, but we're not all President of the United States, whose every word is parsed, weighed, and weighed again for symbolism and meta-meaning.
Only an African-American can truly know how intimidating it is to face a law-enforcement officer who may be harboring a presumption of guilt just because of his color. Hell, I'm afraid of them, and I'm white. Obama may have used the word "stupidly" because of his own experience, but it is prejudiced thinking also to assume that the white officer was automatically at fault, just because other white officers in the past have acted a certain way out of bigotry. As it turns out, Officer Crowley was exactly the wrong person to hang the bigot label upon.
Obama had the grace to admit to his poor choice of words. I'm sure he learned a valuable lesson from this. He's one of the fastest learners in public life.
Let's hope the "Beer Summit" works in that it gets Gates and Crowley to bury the hatchet without resorting to suing each other in civil court...the country really doesn't need that kind of a circus right now.
CHAN LOWE has been the Sun Sentinel’s first and only editorial cartoonist for the past twenty-six years. Before that, he worked as cartoonist and writer for the Oklahoma City Times and the Shawnee (OK) News-Star.
Comments
We all are guilty of shooting our mouths off without knowing what we're talking about,
No we're not. Obama didn't just blurt something out in the spur of the moment. He had time and advisers to help him prepare a statement. He simply believed he carried enough clout to make any statement he wanted.
Hell, I'm afraid of them, and I'm white.
I agree with you here Chan. In general I am skeptical about arrest claims made by police. However, Harvard professors, Black or White, are among the most arrogant people in the Universe. I tended to believe the police in this case, not because of race, but because of hubris.
As it turns out, Officer Crowley was exactly the wrong person to hang the bigot label upon.
It was just bad luck. Obama would have gotten away with it if he had picked on someone else.
Let's hope the "Beer Summit" works in that it gets Gates and Crowley to bury the hatchet without resorting to suing each other in civil court...the country really doesn't need that kind of a circus right now.
It's not optional. These people are going to be told what to do and say. The outcome will be to make Obama look as good as possible under the circumstances.
I am wondering exactly what kind of circus the country does need right now. It will probably be business as usual, just more bread and circuses.
Posted by: Lolly! | July 28, 2009 7:50 PM
The professor was wrong to go off the hook on a cop doing his job.
The cop was wrong to arrest him once he found out it was his residence.
And Obama was wrong to call the police department stupid after admitting he didn't know all the facts...that's STUPID.
And this "beer summit"...STUPID!
If I were the cop I'd know better than to go blindly into an ambush. He’s going up against a powerful, connected, black racist and his friend, the first black President of the United States of America who has already decided the cop is “stupid” with out knowing all the facts. He's a cop, not a politician, he's out of his element and he's going to fail.
Posted by: Pointman870 | July 29, 2009 7:35 AM
"Obama had the grace to admit to his poor choice of words. I'm sure he learned a valuable lesson from this. He's one of the fastest learners in public life."
You are a slobbering fool and the Emporer is wearing no clothes. Poor choice of words? So instead of "stupidly" he should have said what? It wasn't his poor choice of words, it's his poor judgement that is the case here, and for that, he has not apologized. This arrogant loser probably thinks we misunderstood him. He plays you like such a fiddle, Chan.
Posted by: dave | July 30, 2009 3:11 PM