From the "Black People Arrest Themselves" files

[CountDeMoney]

I hate the phrase "teaching moment". Fuck that shit, I ain't doing any homework.

Let's reach out, and engage our stakeholders.

[Siege]

I think a person half Gates's age would be more in a position to be threatening whereas Gates, at his age, with a cane is at best 'tumultuous'.

A friend of my father's was responding to a backup call for a domestic violence situation, and arrived to see an elderly couple the whatfor to each other;  he tried to pull the old man off his wife, and in doing so, the wife swung at him.  Punched him right square in the nose, inducing a stroke.  Had to retire on full medical, and spent the next year learning how to walk, talk, and write again.  All from a seventy-something.

Everyone is any situation is potentially threatening.  Something you people, who have never had to deal with that sort of situation, don't ever understand.

Absolutely true.  Everyone is potentially threatening.

[derspiess]

"This could and should be a profound teaching moment in the history of race relations in America," Gates said. "I sincerely hope that the Cambridge police department will choose to work with me toward that goal."

"At least he got arrested for a good cause."
"What cause is that?"
"Race Relations?"
"You'd better flush out your head, new guy. This isn't about race relations; this is a race riot. If I'm gonna get arrested for a word, my word is "Rodney King"".

 

Wonder if they re-re-mastered the movie for Blu-Ray.  The first release looked worse than the DVD version.

[DisturbedPervert]

"This could and should be a profound teaching moment in the history of race relations in America," Gates said.

[Sophie Scholl]

And, like a good family sitcom episode, we all learned a valuable lesson at the end of the episode.  We learned something profound about race relations and how equal justice before the law is for everyone. 

...as long as you're friends with the President.

[derspiess]

...as long as you're friends with the President.

The President would probably say you acted stupidly with that comment

[Sophie Scholl]

...as long as you're friends with the President.

The President would probably say you acted stupidly with that comment

Will he later rescind that comment and invite me for a beer?

[Razgovory]

I hate the phrase "teaching moment". Fuck that shit, I ain't doing any homework.

He's a teacher.  He lives for this shit.

[Admiral Yi]

Did Fate revert to the other personality again, or did he just forget to log back in as Hansy before posting?

Fate is pissed at Obama for not being sufficiently homosupportive.

[The Minsky Moment]

Obviously all lies, because JR says so.

the police report supports my position and I have quoted it and cited it extensively in this thread.   

[The Minsky Moment]

I am kinda surprised by your wide-eyed credulity in this case, JR.  You are making silly arguments to dismiss even the possibility that the cop was in the right.  Any chance you have a horse in this race?

I see a well-known person in the community arrested on patently bogus charges that were immediately dropped once the grown-ups found what happened.

I think I can at least place on that.

Some people here seem to think that a private person in the sanctity of his own home bears the burden of being on his best behavior when a cop barges in without permission and starts asking questions.

I think the burden is the law enforcement officer to act in a lawful manner.  Unfortunately that this seems to be the minority position here.

[The Minsky Moment]

And I disagree - interfering with a police officer trying to do his job

he wasn't charged with that.   

[garbon]

I prefer "teaching moment" to "teachable moment."

[Caliga]

BREAKING NEWS: Cambridge, Mass., police to release Gates tapes; audio, transcripts expected soon

[garbon]

Also, I love the human interest piece of this story.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/2009/07/26/2009-07-26_hello_sgt_crowley_its_the_president.html

Sgt. James Crowley was having a burger and a Blue Moon beer in Tommy Doyle's Irish Pub when his cell phone rang.

The Cambridge cop spoke for a moment and hung up looking altogether amazed.

"His jaw dropped," recalled Peter Woodman, a co-owner of the Kendall Square pub and two others of the same name. "He said, 'Jesus Christ, you'll never guess who's going to ring me.'"

Word quickly spread through Friday's lunchtime crowd that White House press secretary Robert Gibbs had just telephoned Crowley to say President Obama would be calling him.

"'No way!'...'No way!'...'No way!'" patrons exclaimed.

A hush swept across the whole place. The TVs and music went off. The clanging in the kitchen ceased.

Crowley remained at a table by the front window, the cell phone set before him.

"He got a bit nervous for a minute or two then he got his head, Woodman said. "Cool as a cucumber, just sat there sipping his beer."

The pub stayed absolutely silent.

"You could hear a pin drop," Woodman said. "Literally 80 to 100 people standing around him. It was surreal."

A couple came in from the street and asked for a table.

"The whole bar [said,] 'Shhh! Shhh! Shut up and sit down!'" Woodman said.

After five or maybe six minutes, the phone rang again.

"He braced himself, took a deep breath," Woodman recalled.

After two, perhaps three rings, Crowley answered.

"Hello, Mr. President."

Obama addressed him as Sgt. Crowley.

"Call me Jimmy," Crowley said.

Obama said to call him Barack. They spoke for five minutes or more as the crowd stood transfixed.

"Not a person breathed," Woodman said.

Woodman watched a happy change come over the cop whose life had been upended after he responded to a report of a possible burglary. He had arrested Harvard Prof. Henry Gates for disorderly conduct.

Woodman knew Crowley to be the ultimate professional, an officer of the law before all else when on duty.

"He might know you outside work, but when he's working, he's Sgt. James Crowley," Woodman said.

Woodman is friendly with Crowley, but knows to expect no favoritism.

"If there's something wrong, Jimmy is the first guy going to roast me," Woodman said.

"If you break the law, you broke the law; if you don't, you didn't."

The world surely has too many racist cops, but by everything Woodman and others say Crowley is not one of them. Woodman saw in the days after the arrest that the accusation cut deep.

"He's blown away anybody could call his integrity into question," Woodman said. He won't admit it, but I think he was genuinely hurt by the whole thing."

Crowley seemed particularly bothered by the effect on his family. The media was staking out his home and the three kids could not just go out and play.

"You could see over the last few days he was stressed, he was under pressure," Woodman said.

The situation intensified after Obama said at a press conference on Wednesday that the Cambridge cops had "acted stupidly."

The police union held its own press conference on Friday to demand an apology from anyone who suggested the arrest was influenced by race.

Afterwards, Crowley and the cops took Woodman up on an invitation to stop into the pub for lunch away from the media.

Then came the phone calls. Obama told Crowley he regretted his choice of words and praised him as "an outstanding police officer and a good man."

At one point, "Barack" asked "Jimmy" what he was drinking. Barack said he also is partial to Blue Moon. They talked of getting together with Gates for a beer at the White House.

When the call ended and Crowley set down the phone, the pub erupted in cheers.

Obama would continue to suggest Crowley may have overreacted, but allowed that Gates may have as well. The fact remained that the President had called the cop. Woodman beheld a cop restored.

"A new man," Woodman said.