In his own words: The President wasn’t there, didn’t know all the facts, but is sure the Cambridge police “acted stupidly.” Support of local police hit a new low as the President spoke, more change we can’t live with:
As his press conference about healthcare was wrapping up, President Obama chose to comment on the arrest of his friend, Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr., needlessly and recklessly injecting himself into a local police matter. Admitting that he didn’t know “all the facts,” the President nevertheless went on to excoriate the Cambridge Police Department by characterizing as “stupid” actions by the arresting officer. Incomprehensibly droning on about racial profiling where none existed, Obama managed to do incalculable damage to race relations in America. The President’s preposterous remarks made police work across the nation, especially in minority neighborhoods, a lot tougher and more dangerous. And this from the man who dared lecture the nation about matters of race.
Unfortunately for Obama, he’s picked on the wrong cop. Sgt. James Crowley, a 16-year veteran, has a spotless record and even teaches classes to fellow officers on the evils of racial profiling. Crowley is also not afraid to defend himself. In response to Obama’s accusation, the Crowley simply said “I’ve done nothing wrong” and has since related details of the events leading up to Gates’ arrest that cast the shadow of racism on one of Harvard’s finest. Police associations have responded with less propriety, expressing outrage at the President’s folly and demanding an apology, something the President excels at. But in this case, don’t hold your breath.
The President, like F.O.B. Gates, is consumed with race. Unable to get over the past, Obama believes racial injustice still dominates America. The last slave died in 1937 and Jim Crow was abolished in 1964, but the President is stuck in a history that is dead and gone. Nothing else explains his readiness to interpret Gates’ arrest along racial lines. The President’s view is that white cops are prejudiced, blacks are victims, and therefore every encounter between a white cop and a black citizen is immediately open to question. Far from being the one to heal America’s racial divide, Obama must first heed the Biblical instruction: physician, heal thyself.
As for professor Gates, there’s one (or more) of him on most college campuses. Living off racial hatred and bigotry, race merchants like Gates do inestimable damage to students of color. In the 1970s I watched firsthand as black professors convinced black students that “whitey” was an implacable foe. After a couple semesters spent ingesting the poisonous brew of Gates and his ilk, too many black students become the very thing they claim to hate — prejudiced. Gates’ bailiwick, black history courses, all too often are little more than recruiting centers for black extremists. At least this current episode has raised the curtain a little on what is certainly a most unseemly department of American higher education.
Americans have gotten a shocking glimpse into the soul of our President, an unpleasant experience to be sure. Racial bias is alive and well at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. It remains for the rest of us to guard and further the tremendous progress in race relations our nation has made, judging people by the content of their character, the correctness of their actions, and not the color of their skin. I guess we’ll just have to wait for the President to catch up.
Posted by Jerry Pomeroy in Obama Presidency, Race Relations, Video