Let me get this straight.
There's an incident where cops got a 911 call about a guy apparently breaking into a home. They go there, find the guy inside the house, and they say he is abusive and nonresponsive to them, yelling about race and saying "you don't know who you're messing with".
The guy says he lives there (turns out true), and says he was never abusive or nonresponsive. He says the police were racially motivated.
And then the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, who admits he doesn't know the details of the case (it's likely he hasn't talked to either party), goes on national TV and announces that the guy was right, and the cops were not only wrong but "stupid"?
I can't recall when I've ever heard a Presidential announcement like that, on so little evidence. Even Richard Nixon never made one quite that, ummm, "out-front", though he came the closest in my memory.
And this President wants to run our banks, car companies, and health care... for starters? How long would it take for him to decide *I* was "not only wrong but stupid" if I have a dispute with a car repairman or doctor?
I don't have the visibility this other guy does, of course... but that's exactly the point. Obama wouldn't know my details any more than he knows this guy's details. Where does he get off stating AS PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES that the subject of an incident is right and the cops "acted stupidly"?
Maybe the cops did act stupidly, I don't know (and neither does the President). Or maybe the professor acted stupidly. At this early stage, it depends on who you believe.
And people with any wisdom, are refraining from official announcements until all the facts come out. Apparently, that doesn't include our President.
The President's job is to make sure US laws are followed. Tell me again how he has accomplished that here???
http://www.myfoxboston.com/dpp/news/local/obama_cambridge_police_acted_stupidly_072209
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(snip)
Obama called Gates a friend, and said he doesn't know all the facts of the case. Nonetheless, Obama said, anyone would have been angry if treated the way Gates claims police in Cambridge, Mass., treated him. Gates claims he was arrested in his own home after showing ID to police who responded to a report of a possible burglary.
Police say Gates yelled at the officers and initially refused to show his ID. Gates allegedly yelled “this is what happens to a black man in America” and “you don’t know who you’re messing with” before he was arrested, and police said he was uncooperative. ( read the arrest report )
"Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof he was in own home," Obama said during a prime-time news conference....
