Obama regrets choice of words in scholar's arrest
 

Trying to tamp down an uproar over race, President Barack Obama said Friday he used an unfortunate choice of words in commenting on the arrest of black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. and could have "calibrated those words differently."

The president said he had telephoned the white policeman who arrested Gates, and he said the conversation confirmed his belief that the officer was a good man and an outstanding officer.

Dennis O'Connor, president of the Cambridge Police Superior Officers Association, said Obama's remarks were "misdirected" and the Cambridge police "deeply resent the implication" that race was a factor in the arrest.

Sgt. Leon Lashley, a black officer who was at Gates' home with Crowley at the time of the arrest, said he supported his fellow officer's action "100 percent."

thumbs up to obama jumping the gun yet again.

paraphrasing obama.... "i know skip, and the officers acted stupidly"

soon enough it will be... i never knew skip, and was never his friend ala jeremiah wright

look out skip! obama won't want to be your friend soon enough.

cops are like a gang who band together no matter what...

so are the black teachers at harvard supposedly.

That's why I never clicked.

http://fc07.deviantart.com/fs12/i/20...ersmustdie.jpg

Looks to me like Obama racially profiled the Caucasian officer.

Yep no doubt

he did say before commenting that his opinion would be biased and the words he used were:
...the policeofficer overreacted, cooler heads should have prevailed"

if a policeofficer came into my house and started to harass me, i would certainly also call him names and show him the fucking door, regardless of his color.
one word of advise if the police asks you to step outside, DONT GO OUTSIDE.

:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

Here's how I think it went down.

Neighbor sees someone trying to get in the front door of a house and suspects
it's a break in so they call police.

Police answer the call and find a person inside the house. The person provides identification proving that he is in fact the resident of the home.

Police are satisfied and are ready to leave but the homeowner gets irate and plays the race card saying this would have never happened if he was white. Police try to diffuse the situation but the homeowner becomes increasingly belligerent. After ignoring numerous request by the officers to calm down he's arrested for disorderly conduct.

The homeowner then takes it public to gain notoriety and use the incident as a teaching tool. The incident is misunderstood and race never played a part in it until the homeowner decided it should.

I'm amazed the neighbor who called it in didn't recognize Gates

:2 cents:


That was his first attempt to backtrack - after stating that the police "acted stupidly". :Oh crap


I don't get this... :helpme

You do understand that the police were CALLED to that residence by a neighbor who witnessed what she thought was a break-in to her neighbor's home. She saw to two men, with backpacks, and one of them pushing his shoulder into the door - in what appeared to her to be an attempt to break in.

The cop in question takes the call, shows up, the 911 caller meets him out front and relays what she say to him, he goes up to the door, spots someone inside, and asks him to step outside so that he can talk to him. Immediate Gates starts getting belligerent and going off on him. :Oh crap

So what is the cop supposed to do?? If that's your house, and your neighbor thought they saw someone breaking in - the cops show up - the bad guys answer the door and tell the cop to fuck off - you just want the cop to say "OK, sorry to have bothered you", leave and then allow them to steal your stuff and rape your cat???

Seriously??!!

Consider another scenario - it IS your house, but some dirtbag is standing in the next room with a gun to your kid's head warning you not to tip the cops off... If you're acting irrational the cops have no choice to assume that something's up and they're going to press the matter to investigate further. You'd rather they just blow you off and leave you and your kid in there w/ the badguy??

Bottom line, this could have been a 5 minute false alarm. They get them all the time. Show the cops your ID, let him know that you're the resident and that all is OK. End of Story. Again - the cops didn't instigate this - it was a 911 call from a neighbor. Read the report.

Yeah there are plenty of asshole cops - but there are a lot more decent cops - and they've got a pretty shitty job when you stop and think about it. They never know if the next person they run into is going to be the last person they see or not. When every call you get could be your last you HAVE TO be cautious of everyone and everything until you're certain you understand what's really going on. (And even then, too many have gotten lax and wound up dead).

Sorry for the rant, but come on - this Obama FuckFest is getting really old. You want to put him up on such a high pedestal and claim he's saving the world - at least be big enough to call him out when he TOTALLY blows a call like this one! :321GFY

You are beyond stupid. Check the facts, that is not what happened.

least the police could have said sorry sire, we didnt mean to act as if we thought you were a thug, we bad.. have a great day and let us know if we can help you with anything.

no, instead they start playing with their police muscle...lets arrest him for calling my mom a biatch.. he must be a bad man who deserves prison.

and yes i agree there are many good cops too, and i am sure this guy is not a bad cop, just bad manners.

thanks, now GFY:321GFY:321GFY:321GFY

This whole thing will be an endless debate between the crowd that likes cops and the crowd that doesn't.

If you like cops, then cops can do no wrong.

If you don't like cops, everything cops do is suspect.

http://www.examiner.com/x-536-Civil-...rties-Examiner

Gates is a race baiter, bottom feeding racist who makes his entire living off pointing at whites and saying "racist!" This guys entire life is based on digging up and promoting the idea of racism in America, from his tv shows, to books, to dvd documentary he is race profitter like jesse jackson and Al Sharpton.

Yes, Obama was dumb for calling cops stupid for arresting the race baiter.

This is a total he said he said kind of deal. Gates is saying he was trying to be cool and the cop was harassing him and the cop is saying just the opposite. I have the feeling it was a little of both.

A few days ago I got pulled over for having expired tags. I actually had the new tags in my glove box, but I had been too lazy to put them on. I thought I had until the end of the month when the reality was the tags had expired a week or so before. So he pulls me over and tells me why, he never even looks at my license. I tell him I have the new tags in the glove box and I will get them for him. As I go to get them he tells me that having expired tags is a $250 ticket. I grab the tags and temp registration and hand them to him and he asks me, "Where are you going?" I have a lot of friends who are cops and understand a lot of what they do, but this kind of pissed me off. I felt like saying, "What the fuck does it matter?" the guy has no right to know where I am going and it kind of pissed me off. I just kind of looked at him strangely and he then said, "Let's put these on here before you pull away." So I jump out and he takes one sticker and I take the other. We put them on, he hands me my registration and shows me where on it the actual expiration date was so I would know the exact date these new tags expired.

I could easily have seen how it could have escalated. I could have said, "What the fuck does it matter where I'm going? It is no business of yours." Then he has me get out of the car, runs my license and is not happy with me. So he writes me the ticket for the tags. If I get angry about that I could see where would then want to handcuff me which would only make things worse and it could all go downhill from there.

So I think that is what happened here. I think the cop said something that pissed this Gates guy off and he then said something that pissed the cop off and things grew from there.

This is horseshit, I am about as anti cop as one can be, usually only referring to them as pigs, however, I do not let that stand in the way of reason and wisdom. Cops were right in this instance.

Escalation and emotion.... bad things happen

Obama is a racist. Whats new?

I think all 3 of them were wrong:

1. Gates was wrong to get ignorant & mouth off to the cop - the cop was just trying to do his job. Cops don't it like when people cuss them out no matter what color the person is.

2. Sgt Crowley was wrong to abuse his power & arrest Gates - I think the officer arrested him just to be vindictive and teach the old man a lesson for mouthing off to a police officer. Many police officers walk around demanding respect and get quite irate when they don't get it.

3. Obama was wrong to say the police "acted stupidly" without knowing all the facts. He needs to remember he is the President of the USA now, any direct, unbridled criticism of anything or anyone is bound to piss off certain special interest groups and blow up in his face.


I'm saying this from my personal experience of numerous direct encounters with police officers in my youth - from being accused of a various criminal activities to being stopped for suspicion of DUI. I have never been arrested because I knew enough to keep my mouth shut and not get lippy with the officer even though i was innocent (most of the time :winkwink:). :thumbsup

RIGHT ON MAN...He's another Louis Farrakhan,

Crowley acted according to proper police protocol. He did NOT abuse his power.

The biggest problem in this matter is that people are not researching the entire story.

Once again:

Gates was the problem in this entire scenario. From the time that the officer came to his door to check out the situation, Gates was non-compliant.

The officer gave Gates several opportunities during the encounter to calm down and comply, but Gates refused on several instances and continue to berate the officer when he finally did comply. We must all remember that the officer could have arrested Gates from the very moment that he refused to come out on the porch and identify himself.

Instead of doing that, the officer kept his cool and asked again for identification.

Many have automatically thought that the police officer was the culprit, and, on the opposite end of the spectrum, that Gates was clear of all wrongdoing because of his color and the fact that he was in his house.

The ironic thing about this situation is that Gates chose the absolutely wrong person to try to pin racism/racial profiling on. Crowley actually is a police instructor who teaches officers how NOT to racially profile citizens, was the officer who try to resuscitate Reggie Lewis, and is highly regarded by his black superiors in the Police Force.

The race card got pulled by Gates and it backfired - BIG TIME!

Disorderly conduct in his on house? is that for real?

You've been brainwashed well... Before, cops were all about protect and serve the citizen and only arrested criminals... Nowadays, people think it's fine if a cop arrest someone because he didn't comply immediately and got a little mouthy.... In 5 years from now, you'll say something like "We must all remember that the officer could have tazered Gates from the very moment that he refused to come out on the porch and identify himself." lmao

My guess is either he invited the police in and they arrested him or the police asked him to step outside and then arrested him. I don't know the actual facts of the case.

Fuck the commie!!

its not against the law to be an asshole in your own home.

I wouldn't be surprised if Gates was stirring shit up on purpose, hoping to provoke the officer and make big news out of the event... :2 cents:

Them spooks, they all look the same at night :uhoh

Your opinion.

The facts are clear. If you are ever in a situation where a police officer asks you to do something at a potential crime scene BEFORE the facts have been clarified and verified, simply refuse.

White, Black, Yellow, Red...whatever color you are...they can take you into custody until the facts are verified.

Know your laws and don't be dense.

First of, when a 70yo man, well dressed, well spoken open the door.. is asked to step outside by a cop, confused he protests, the police should adjust to the non-threatening situation, communicate with the guy to try to find a way to get the info he needs... The guy isn't going anywhere... For you to claim that it would have been perfectly fine to arrest him on the spot for protesting a little is craziness... And I dont care what the law says...


oh btw,... here is Henry Louis Gates Jr. version
http://www.theroot.com/views/lawyers...louis-gates-jr

Now, he obviously left out a few details but seems like he showed his IDs fairly rapidly after refusing to step outside.. but then got mouthy and was arrested for that... in his own house.. disordely conduct.. lol Serve and protect!!!

Gates was offended that a 'lowly' officer took a stern tone with a Harvard Man such as himself. He should step outside of his Ivory Tower once in awhile.

Being inside of a home and claiming that you own it isn't proof of ownership. Answer the officer's questions, give him the ID he asks for. If there really was a break-in, Gates' life could be threatened. There is nothing wrong with the officer trying to establish who owns what and who belongs where, after somebody reports a break-in.

Gates should have been thankful for the officer's speedy response, and more understanding of the officer's perspective. Instead he's using the event to manufacture a racial tension.

Notice carefully that Gates never says in that particular statement to The Root what he initially said while the officer was explaining why he was there

"I told him that I was "Sgt. Crowley from the Cambridge Police" and that I was "investigating a report of a break in progress" at the residence. While I was making this statement, Gates opened the front door and exclaimed "why, because I'm a black man in America?".

THEN

"I then asked Gates if there was anyone else in the residence. While yelling, he told me that it was none of my business and accused me of being a racist police officer. I assured Gates that I was responding to a citizen's call to the Cambridge Police and that the caller was outside as we spoke. Gates seemed to ignore me and pick up a cordless telephone and dialed an unknown telephone number. As he did so, I radioed on channel 1 that I was off in the residence with someone that appeared to be a resident but very uncooperative. I then overheard Gates asking the person on the other end of his telephone call to "get the chief" and "what's the chief's name?". Gates was telling the person on the other end of the call that he was dealing with a racist police officer in his home. Gates then turned to me and told me that I had no idea who I was "messing" with and that I had not heard the last of it. While I was led to believe that Gates was lawfully in the residence, I was quite surprised and confused with the behavior he exhibited toward me. I asked Gates to provide me with photo identification so that I could verify that he resided at # Ware Street and so that I could radio my findings to ECC. Gates initially refused, demanding that I show him identification but then did supply me with a Harvard University Identification card. Upon learning that Gates was affiliated with Harvard, I radioed and requested the presence of the Harvard University Police.

Gates knew the routine and was quite aware that he had a sympathetic public ear as an older black man. If the situation really did go down as flowery on his end as he "described" in The Root article, the officer would have been on suspension already.

All Gates is doing at this point is using the publicity to drum up support for another one of his documentaries, because, in truth every Black man who has every been truly profiled by the police would disown Gates for trying to represent them. He doesn't represent mainstream young Black men in the least.

Obama screwed up in defending his boy and Gates screwed up and was rightfully arrested.

He doesn't and should not get a pass from being taken in custody for being black, old and ornery.

In any event I can almost tell you what will happen next.

All that Gates has to do is put the focus of attention on his "fellow Black brothers" who are victims of racial profiling and few will step up and go against that.

It will all be tossed away as a "learning experience" and Blacks in that community will feel like their "rights" were defended.

Unless the witnesses and the audio transmitted to the station when Crowley was talking over the radio are released...

Regardless of color, Obama IS a n00b. He should stick to presidency - not trolling local authorities.

Well, that's good that Pres. Obama is admitting that he was wrong. Now it's Mr. Gates' turn.

the police arent vampires... if gates never came out, the police would have gone in. they don't need a search warrant like gates has been saying. if they have probable cause (someone calling the police about a break in) and they get there and the person will not come out and is an asshole, uhhhh they are going in.

normal people are compliant, gates obviously isn't normal and was an asshole from the get go.

Once the cop. Found it was his house.the cop should of said sorry to bother you and left.the cop is supposed to be the professional.Once he found out gates was in his own house it should of been end of story.

Once the racist said "You dont know who you are messing with" that gave the police enough reason to arrest him. That is a direct threat to the police officers safety. Who knows "who he is messing with?" He could have been "messing" with someone who goes to his bedroom to get an ak-47, follow the cop down the road and shoot him up at the next stop light.

A old well dressed man with a cane? How can you say that with a straight face. If it was Dr Henry Kissinger it would be interesting to see how it would be perceived. Once the cop knew it was the mans house, a professional would of said sorry to bother you have a good day. Being mouthy isnt illegal especially after you find out the person you are going to check on is actually the home owner. The person whose taxes pays the cops salary.

Why are you profiling? "Old man with cane". Being mouthy isnt illegal. THREATENING a police officer is. :winkwink:

there's white and black racist in this country scum of the earth their time will come

See, that's the thing. When the cops tried to verify his identity, after being called there for a possible burglary, Gates pulled the black man in America schpeel and refused to show his ID. Then when he did show an ID, it was his Harvard ID, instead of a government issued ID. If anyone refused to show an ID, when asked for by an officer, they would have been arrested also. That's just how it is.

This woman explains it well. http://www.ireport.com/docs/DOC-303137

That isnt a threat and he wasnt arresting for threatening a police officer. He was arrested for being difficult,difficult isnt a crime.So try again :)

once again he wasnt arrested for that. The cop didnt like him being mouthy once again thats not a crime and he did show the cop id so the cop knew it was his house. If the cop was a professional he would left, a professional doesnt let assholes get to him.

Threatening a police officer is disorderly conduct. :upsidedow