Obama, Gates and racism

Obama's been silent for many years on Chicago Police brutality. He's been silent on call to the CPD to make public officer compliant statistics. (His Wife's cousin was a high ranking CPD officer.)The Prez has kept out of Chicago PD business for years. I was flummoxxed to see him easily step into this mess. The guy's had plenty of experience and the one time he should have waited, he didn't.Now, can he call Dick Daley and Jody Weis and tell them to lift the embargo on CPD's many complaints?

I think the media is screwing this story up royally by hyper-editing Obama's actual quote in their ledes.Obama's statement taken in full context — "Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home" — is absolutely true, and is why the city has already issued an apology.DK, you should go back to Walter Pincus' piece in CJR a couple issues ago. There he does a number on this concept of "staying on message."

Obama was a soldier in Emil Jones 8th ward organization in Chicago. Not Mayor, but sort of God's right hand. Chicago Cops don't cross Jones lightly.Remember Chicago is a city where a Congressman quits to run for Cook County Prez and it's considered a huge step up if he gets the job.

Treg, point taken, but Chicago has had such horrible experiences with abusive Police, and Obama's silence about it all has been tragic. After Obama became a US Senator he had a powerful opportunity to be a reform driver in Illinois and he failed completely. He just wasn't interested. If the argument was he had no business getting involved in Police Business in his district and state as a State, and then US Senator, than it is all the more remarkable he waded into Cambridge Mass Police business so easily last night.I was very surprized by it. Obama's very familiar with Police issues from his work and family. I can only guess the moment gave him a chance to speak again of himself and I think that's the Prez's real weakness. He loves to do that. Lynn Sweet (and I think deliberately) saw the chance to get him on that tack, and he bit…when he should have been keeping the focus on health care.Savvy guys like Rahm and David A. must have been having fits.

This was a big win for the enemies of health care reform. What will do the most good for poor minorities? Having a president fire off a one-liner about a Cambridge pissing contest, or having him stick to message and make universal health care a reality? The fact is: now health reform is not the headline. Two Cambridge idiots are. It's disheartening to see such a lack of discipline. Winning in Washington is all about perseverance and discipline. Stepping into this type of mess is exactly what I feared about Obama when he was elected, that he's simply too green to deliver the change he talked about. With that one liner he squandered countless hours of effort to put the focus on healthcare reform. And if he did it out of frustration over some idiot racists forwarding offensive jokes, then that would make it even worse. Because he handed a victory to those clowns.

@Revival,Now you know why I was flummoxed. The stimmulus bill was mistake number one. It tied the administration up on something that would do nothing for the immediate problem.This is huge mistake two.There are a bunch of others in between, and plenty more to come.Obama has a heads up on these questions. Especially from an old friend like Lynn Sweet.At first I thought she couldn't resist a big story, but considering this was planned, it's an historic blunder.God help America if he fouls up Foreign Affairs like this…

Lynn Sweet is a long time Chicago columnist. http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/If this question had been pre arranged it really raises questions about the judgement of all involved. As a footnote, I first started following Obama when he ran for Congress against Bobby Rush. The only precincts Obama could carry were in the Irish 19th Ward. An area filled with Cops and Firemen and guys who look a lot like Sgt Crowly. He got their votes by avoiding guys like Skip Gates. Obama knows this world very well.All I can think is Obama is trying to shore up support on the left and thought a strong response would help. He certainly knows how this would go over with big city Cops and Firemen (of all ethnicities: his Wife's Cousin is a high ranking Chicago Cop) because Obama was their candidate in the past. This has to have been a calculated move that really backfired.

A lack of discipline? He has, in no particular order:- A war in Iraq- A war in Afghanistan- A massive financial meltdown- Missiles coming out of N. Korea- A currency knockdown with China- Drugs pouring in from every direction- Health care reform – A Supreme Court nominationAnd you're worried about him staying on message? Forest for the trees, guys. With all that to cover, it's amazing he can get out of bed in the morning.

Mike – all the more reason for him to have given this question a "pass" in the first place.

BREAKING: Michele McPhee on 96.9 WTKK is reporting that the ceremonial Mayor of Cambridge is fighting hard to prevent the release of the police radio tapes containing Prof. Gates "sounding like a maniac" (so much for the bronchial infection) at the scene while Sgt. Crowley is completely calm. Cue up Johnny Most: "It's all over! It's all over!"DEVELOPING:::

Hopefully any and all police recordings of pertinent phone calls etc. will not get erased or otherwise "disappeared". Maybe cops should carry digital recording devices and activate them before responding to calls. Not only would this protect them from false accusations about their conduct etc. but it might keep them in line as well. Let's hear those police tapes and all eyewitness testimony about what really happened. Gates is on record as claiming that he did not yell and was even physically incapable of yelling. If recordings exist of him yelling and screaming or otherwise being unreasonable they should be made public AFAIAC.

If anyone actually read what Obama said, I think he nailed the situation exactly right.The rest of you should be ashamed. Shouldn't even call yourself American. Go do something productive and find Whitey Bulger, a white, conservative mass murderer who the police deliberately let slip away.

So rock solid that the charges were dropped.*GUFFAW!*

The case is hardly rock solid. There would be no conviction. Even if by small chance there was a conviction, it would not hold up. It would be ruled unconstitutional.State law requires the police officer to properly identify himself.Disorderly conduct law is aimed at preventing behavior likely to set off wider unrest. Merely asking for the officer's name in a loud voice is hardly disorderly. The scene of spectators was caused because of all the police that had gathered.It must take place in public or on private property where people are likely to gather which is not Professor Gates' front porch.I don't like it when anyone breaks the law to violate someone's civil rights. Civil rights and protection under the Constitution are basic and important rights to be respected rather than violated by over enthusiastic police who vent their anger by using punitive actions towards their victims.

All I've heard is the clarification to ensure that his comment is not taken out of context – and that is that the incident was stupid. He was not labeling the police as stupid. I take this to mean that a smart police officer did a stupid thing. That is what I hear. And, I agree.

Fish continues to spread his inane and uninformed nonsense that the clerk-magistrate "found probable cause."The clerk will sign just about any application for criminal complaint produced after an arrest. The person arrested has no opportunity to present his side of things before it is issued. More instructive is the fact that the Cambridge P.D. agreed withthe DA to dump the case prior to arraignment — the point in the process where a criminal records entry is made. Cambridge PD brass agreed to dump the case because they knew that Gates would prevail, either after a motion to remand to the clerk-magistrate for a show-cause hearing at which Gates would actually be heard, or at a hearing pursuant to Commonwealth v DeBenedetto at which the accused is given the right to formal hearing on the issuance of a criminal complaint.As for police tapes from the actual arrest, I'd hardly call a recording made from a remote site, during which the cop would know he was being recorded, is dispositive of anything.What do we learn from all this? We learn that right-wing wackos have found a new code phrase to justify racism. To complain of inequality or disparate treatment is now "playing the race card." Much easier to use shorthand, knee-jerk justification than to deal with the issue at hand.

Officer Crowley appears to me to be someone committed strictly to procedure. He seems to make no attempt to intuitively perceive the particular circumstance at hand and apply common sense. This was well within his discretion. He used the strictest application of the law, going over appropriate bounds, to be punitive towards the less-than-polite professor. The professor has a First Amendment right to verbally express his opinion from his front porch to an assembled audience. Not every country has a similar Amendment. We do, and it should be preserved and protected. Removing him from his front porch violated his protection under the 14th Amendment, among other protections.There are sufficient places on the planet that don't have such freedom, and those who choose to live otherwise can also choose to live elsewhere. Officer Crowley did not make a contribution to the civility of his city or our country, the inverse of his fundamental purpose and expense to taxpayers.

I'd just like to note that if Gates actually did have a bronchial infection that kept him from yelling– there's no way China would let him into, or out of, the country. They have ample experience with SARS and swine flu, and those dudes do not screw around with foreigners who have respiratory infections. You're quarantined. Period.Just something to ponder. I think Gates is a flat-out liar here, who was rambling and incoherent, and the police just assumed he was another MDP (mentally disturbed person) who should be hauled in. I'd have probably done the same, because like Crowley and 99 percent of the rest of us, I wouldn't know Henry Gates from a hole in the wall if I met him on the street. He's just pissed society didn't give him the respect he believes he deserved, and he's playing the race card to get it.

Face it, Sergeant Crowley is the left wing's worst nightmare. My fear before seeing him was that he might sport a tight military haircut (enter "skinhead" label), or be inarticulate ("dumb" label), be overweight ("donut" jokes), or have a record of racial problems ("bigot" label). Instead Crowley is the antithesis of the big, bad, ignorant cop. A real problem for the liberal spin machine and for Gates' false claims. In fact, by most accounts Gates appears to be the ignorant racist in this case. It's poetic justice! —Amused writes: "The clerk will sign just about any application for criminal complaint produced after an arrest."—Key words, "just about any." In other words, the clerk won't sign them all, but he signed the complaint against Gates. A finding of probable cause is an absolute defense to false arrest. Perhaps the clerk magistrate has heard the tapes of Gates "acting like a maniac" that the ceremonial Mayor of Cambridge is fighting to conceal.Dan, you're all about public access to government records, could we have a FOIA or whatever it's called here, so we can hear the tapes?

I'm hearing this morning of a growing effort by active and retired Massachusetts police officers to establish the Sergeant James Michael Crowley Award to be bestowed annually on a MA police officer who, against all odds, has held his ground in pursuit of justice, despite immense political and other external pressures. It would be something like the Trooper George Hanna and MDC Officer Robert Dana Awards, presented at the State House on Law Day, although unlike those two, Crowley only gave a piece of his reputation and not his life, in service to us.The Lieutenant who called to ask me to get behind this effort is right. In an era of "just say sorry and get it over with," too often a police officer is forced to apologize when he has done nothing wrong in order to save his career that will then be tarnished by the apology. In the case of Sergeant Crowley, he steadfastly refused to make that devil's deal."Between two evils, choose neither, between two goods, choose both." — Tryon Edwards

I believe that there is a major error in the police report. For Gates, it lists Occupation: Professor. It should be Occupation: Race.

The magistrate agreeing there is probable cause isn't worth a hoot in this case. More importantly: was the arrest necessary?By the time the arrest was made the threat that this was a possible crime scene had diminished.When the officer arrived Professor Gates should have realized that the policeman's job is not easy and that his cooperation would be needed to facilitate ensuring that the house was clear of any intruder and that any rightful occupant was safe. This apparently was accomplished, but with difficulty, and perhaps with Officer Crowley being too over bearing from the start.For some reason, the professor felt traumatized as evidenced by Officer Crowley and it was the officer's professional responsibility to attempt to subdue that with courtesy and respect. Instead, he allowed it to accelerate, exactly the inverse of what should have happened. The subsequent arrest caused undue trauma to the professor.Ironically, both Professor Gates and Officer Crowley have been committed to contributing to the improved orderliness of our civilization. Both have made a horribly poor example.

Amazingly, Obama failed to put the issue to rest, AGAIN! He'll need to come out a 3rd time.All he needed to say was, "I'm sorry" but he doesn't have the humility to do it.Then to again mischaracterize the situation by saying, "Gates was pulled out of his house." What? After several warnings, Gates was taken off a porch where he was attracting a crowd with his venom. Get it straight, Obama.I didn't vote for Obama, but I feel sorry for the poor advice he is getting.Dan, do you want to rescind your initial comment from earlier in the week, about Cambridge PD having a public relations nightmare on their hands? Like I said then it's Gates who has the problem, and amazingly Obama is now spinning like a contestant on Wheel of Fortune. Awesome to watch!

Sigh. Sorry, Fish, a clerk signing an application for a criminal complaint based on a police offices statements is not an absolute defense to a suit for false arrest. Not here, not anywhere. Someone arrested has the right to put a clerk's decision to the test through a motion to dismiss for lack of probable cause as provided by Commonwealth v. DeBenedettoFrom the jury instructions book comes this instruction: "For the defendant to be found guilty, his (her) actions must have been reasonably likely to affect the public, that is, persons in a place to which the public or a substantial group has access." Moreover, the law "cannot constitutionally be applied to language and expressive conduct, even if it is offensive and abusive, unless it falls outside the scope of First Amendment protections, i.e. it constitutes 'fighting words which by their very utterance tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.'"The officer, in his report, states that in order to arrest Gates, it was necessary that he "stepped up the stairs onto the porch." The officer cannot claim that Gates' porch was a place to which the public has access.The cop acted like a hothead and all the babble about protocols, procedure and teaching courses cannot erase the fact that one of the essential elements of the "crime" with which Gates was charged flat out did not exist. The cop was on the sidewalk, according to his own report, while Gates was on the porch, hardly a place to which the public has substantial right of access. If members of the public were in danger of hearing Gates while walking on the sidewalk, then Gates would have needed to speak words that might "incite an immediate breach of the peace," and the officer makes no such allegation. The streets of Cambridge were not on the verge of riot due to Gates commentary.The arrest was abusive and unjustifiable under the law.

If the mayor of Cambridge is "ceremonial," how can he have the responsibility to release turret tapes?

To Amused – your post about how the arrest was abusive and unjustifiable under the law was excellent.And to meamoeba: Your last post about how the president has called Officer Crowley on the telephone is excellent, too. Thanks.

matteomht, having been to China 9 times in the past 8 years, I can say with authority you can most certainly enter the country with any kind of respiratory illness. As for the Crowley apologists, what's clear is that this is one the courts will decide, and I'll bet dollars to donuts Gates wins and whitey loses. Remember — you're the clowns who keep bringing up race. Gates is a 60 year old man who walks with a cane and was in the presence of the limo driver who had just driven him home. Crowley by all accounts denied him his civil rights. With a good lawyer, race won't even matter.

One really doesn't help one's cause with the statement "whitey loses."It may leave an impression of one's own ….. well, I'll just let that speak for itself.