Obama, Gates and Crowley - a few thoughts

It is obvious that Gates' defenders either have not read the police report or are ignoring it in the hopes that their readers have not read it. The most common phrase that they use is that "Gates was arrested in his own home." After that, they speculate that Gates should have simply walked away.

According to the police report, Gates admitted Crowley into his home to show the sergeant some id. He was also agitated. Gates's own account indicated that he was sure that Crowley was a rogue, racist cop immediately. According to the police report, Crowley was convinced that Gates belonged in the house. Gates was still yelling at Crowley, demanding his name and badge but not staying listening when Crowley gave it to him, twice. Crowley gave up and left the house. If Gates had left it there and complained through official channels then there would have been no story. Instead, Gates followed Crowley through two rooms and onto the front porch where he continued to call Crowley names, this time in front of others.

In some neighborhoods this could have started a riot but I doubt that Cambridge is one of them. Crowley could have left Gates to rant to his audience. Instead he warned Gates twice that he was becoming disorderly. Keep in mind that, at this point he was not in his own home. He was on the front porch. There are lots of things that you can do inside your house that you can't do on the front porch. Crowley decided that shouting racial diatribes was one of those things and arrested Gates.

So, by my count, Gates had at least three opportunities to calm things down and Crowley had one.

Why is this incident still news? Because it is polarizing. It is easy to side with one of these men and overlook his part, giving complete blame to the other. That's what President Obama did last week when he said that the police acted stupidly. Obviously, Gates also acted stupidly but Obama still seems blind to that.

A few days ago Glenn Beck used the incident to call Obama a racist. While I don't agree with him that Obama hates white people or white values, there is a double standard here.

First for anyone who is upset by Beck's statement, I'd like to know what their reaction was when people called George W. Bush a racist and accused him of allowing, or even ordering, New Orleans flooded? This was a much stronger accusation than Beck's but I don't remember anyone being fired or even disciplined for saying such things. So, if it was ok to call Bush a racists then why not Obama? Obviously it is because Obama has darker skin and many people believe that racism is ok as long as the racist is black.

Another double standard is Obama's set of friends. He counted the Reverend Wright as a close friend and advisor until videos of Wright peddling racial hate came to light.

Professor Gates is another example. His entire career is based on racial grievances. He is a believer in conspiracies against blacks as a race.

What does it say about Obama that he counts these men as friends? If the races had been reversed then association with either man would have doomed a white politician's career.

Obama can imply that the typical white person is a racist but Joe Biden's presidential run crashed and burned when he described Obama as "articulate", possibly implying that there were black men who are not articulate.

Whites are beginning to resent the one-sidedness of it all. Not long ago Crowley would have been dismissed as the rogue, racist that Gates described him as but things are different this time. The police force stood up for him and whites are saying that Crowley may have over-reacted but he would probably have done the same thing to anyone shouting at him regardless of race.

Ironically our "post-racial" president contributed to the national debate. If he had simply said that both sides had acted stupidly then neither side could have complained. Instead he sided with his friend. Years from now historians may look back at this as the event that unravelled the Obama presidency. (Actually, health care reform was already in trouble which is why he was giving a prime-time news conference in the first place but historians will still say that the Gates incident was the biggest factor).