Obama remark on black scholar's arrest angers cops

[hugo]

The goosestepping continues. The fact is Gates was evoking his 1st Amendment rights to protest government at the most local level. It is sad how TJ has joined the same mindset of those who would shut down talk radio. Sad, how disrespect for our once great Constitution fills both sides of the political divide.

 

I will finish with this unless TJ can actually address the philisophical and constitutional issues which would be akin to expecting a three year old to discuss nuclear fusion.

 

Henry Louis Gates Arrest Case Is About Liberty, Not Race, Beer, or Stupidity

 

Both parties acted stupidly, as did the president. But being obnoxious in your own home is no crime

By Robert Schlesinger

Posted August 5, 2009

 

My first reaction to the tale of Henry Louis Gates Jr.'s arrest was that we were seeing a Cambridge, Mass., community theater version of Rashomon, the classic Akira Kurosawa film about how the same story can seem dramatically different depending upon the participants' perspective.

 

 

But just under three weeks and one presidential happy hour later, I see that the significance of what took place in and around Gates's home lies less in how the participants viewed the incident than in what the rest of us perceive. It's a national Rorschach test. So the story of Gates and Sgt. James Crowley becomes a narrative of race, how the fact of Barack Obama's presidency cannot reverse the historic treatment of black men in America, especially at the hands of law enforcement. Or it is seen as a tale of class, how the elitist, pointy-headed Ivy Leaguer looked down on and mistreated a hard-working blue-collar type and then got preferential treatment from his buddy the president.

 

But there's one perspective that I've heard disturbingly little of, especially since it seems to me the most indisputable (if, perhaps, politically unpalatable). This is a story of civil liberties and constitutional rights. Because even if you assume that Crowley's account of the incident is absolutely accurate and that Gates's version is a whole-cloth fabrication, Crowley and his colleagues acted not only stupidly, as President Obama so bluntly put it, but also wrongly.

 

Gates, by Crowley's account, behaved obnoxiously. He opened with race: Told by Crowley that he was investigating a break-in report, Gates exclaimed, "Why, because I'm a black man in America?" He was confrontational, yelled, and was manifestly uncooperative. He played the officious, self-important jerk, picking up the telephone to tell someone to "get the chief" (of police, presumably), he called Crowley a racist, and he warned the officer that he had no idea whom he was "messing" with. When Crowley, satisfied that Gates did in fact reside in the house, told the yelling professor that he was leaving but would answer any more questions outside, the response was: "Ya, I'll speak with your mama outside." (You'd think that Harvard's Alphonse Fletcher University professor and director of its W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research could come up with something better than a "your mama" crack.)

 

Gates, of course, did follow Crowley outside and eventually, unwillingly, all the way to the clink. Arguably worse than acting obnoxiously, Gates was acting stupidly, to use the word of the moment. But acting stupidly is not a crime. Neither is mouthing off to a cop or, for that matter, breaking into one's own home. Peel away the racial and class overtones, and what you have is someone being arrested in his own home for being rude to a police officer.

 

"The professor at any time could have resolved the issue by quieting down and/or going back inside the house," Crowley told a radio interviewer. True. But the police officer could also have resolved the issue by rolling his eyes, wishing the cranky old professor a nice day, getting in his car, and going off in search of an actual crime. And as the person with greater power—in this case, the power to arrest and incarcerate—Crowley had more responsibility to defuse the situation. As Colin Powell observed to Larry King, at some point, one would think, "some adult supervision would have stepped in." Instead, according to published reports of a recording of the radio communications between Crowley and a dispatcher, the officer asked for backup, saying, "Keep the cars coming." This presumably to deal with the threat posed by Gates's acerbic tongue.

 

Policing is by definition dangerous work. Those who do it deserve our respect, but that is a moral obligation, not a legal one; violation of it is punishable by derision or disappointment, not handcuffs or jail time. And respecting someone does not mean you cannot question his behavior, any more than doing an important or respectable job imparts infallibility. After all, power does not bring the wisdom of when to use it (or not), as anyone can attest who has had to deal with a petty bureaucrat or, yes, a testy police officer. Give enough people authority, and some are bound to misuse it. It's not a knock on the police to say that they occasionally behave badly; it's a knock on human nature.

[RoyalOrleans]

Where does it stop RO?

 

On my property.... where I can be an absolute asshole if I want to be and granted to me under the Bill of Rights.

 

That's the one place, in this world, where I am right all of the time and everyone else is fukken insane.

 

So... go tend your own yard.

[ImWithStupid]

On my property.... where I can be an absolute asshole if I want to be and granted to me under the Bill of Rights.

 

 

That is a completely false statement. Things you do on your own property can infringe on the rights of other people. Sounds carry past your property lines.

 

That's why repeatedly, over and over, city ordinances, including disturbing the peace, and disorderly conduct have been deemed lawful.

[RoyalOrleans]

That is a completely false statement. Things you do on your own property can infringe on the rights of other people. Sounds carry past your property lines.

 

Well, yes, of course. I'd like to think that the one time I blow up in front of my neighbors, I'm not going to be hauled off to jail.

 

That's why repeatedly, over and over, city ordinances, including disturbing the peace, and disorderly conduct have been deemed lawful.

 

Now if I were to step into the street with my little tirade, I would expect to be arrested for disorderly conduct.

[timesjoke]

Correct me if I am wrong but was this not University property?

 

Not his property, he was just allowed to stay there as a perk but it is not like he was paying anything to live there, not even taxes.

 

 

At any rate IWS hit the best point, just because your in your own home, there are many times your still not allowed to take things too far, this is where hugo cannot tell the difference between reasonable and unreasonable actions where they pertain to Gates.

 

That is also why he is running away from his own Spencer quote in his signature. If you live your life making excuses for your own bad bahaviors, you will never be a responsible human being.

 

 

 

 

hugo, this was not about Gates speaking out against the government, it was not about the Holocaust, it was not about anything noble or pure, it was 100% Gates being an out of control racist.

 

If your reaching so desperately for excuses, obviously your wrong.

 

I think you need to go read that Spencer quote a few more times and stop trying to defend stupidity wrapped in racist beliefs, just because Gates is black, that does not mean he should be allowed to behave any way he wants.

[Ahhlee]

Never said Gates was acting reasonable. If failing to act reasonable is a jailable offense women got sumtin to worry about.

 

Of course, they don't deserve that treatment.

 

HEY!!!!! Grrrrrrrrr!

[ImWithStupid]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bB9-NcunsKc]YouTube - policemen[/ame]

[timesjoke]

I like that video........it is so true, I find myself wondering........as much as hugo and RO talk about the constitution and founding beliefs for America with small Governments and freedoms...........

 

Can they name one time in America's early history where a law officer would have tucked tail and ran away from being screamed at like this? Even a white man screaming at a white sheriff in the old west, the real freedom days, do they believe the sheriff would have walked away?

 

 

A person showing their azz to such a massively horrible degree has never been considered reasonable in America. The day after the constitution was signed you did not scream at the local law enforcement so I completely reject any claim that Gates was treated unfairly.

 

 

 

Only now, only these lower moral days, these days of dodging responsibility is it considered by people like hugo and RO that screaming at and disrespecting police officers is being Patriotic.

 

 

Patriotism... is not short, frenzied outbursts of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime. ~Adlai Stevenson

[hugo]

Correct me if I am wrong but was this not University property?

 

Not his property, he was just allowed to stay there as a perk but it is not like he was paying anything to live there, not even taxes.

 

 

 

Hate to tell ya this, but ya ain't gotta own, or even pay rent, on the property you reside within to be covered under the Bill of Rights. You also need to read more than my quotes of Spencer, so you can understand Spencer's quotes in context. Believe me, Spencer was no fan of people being dragged from their property for talking to an irresponsible police officer. The officers responsibility is to proyect and serve, not to incarcerate honest citizens for talking crap to them.

[Old Salt]

Was that Paul Harvey narrating the video?

[ImWithStupid]

Hate to tell ya this, but ya ain't gotta own, or even pay rent, on the property you reside within to be covered under the Bill of Rights. You also need to read more than my quotes of Spencer, so you can understand Spencer's quotes in context. Believe me, Spencer was no fan of people being dragged from their property for talking to an irresponsible police officer. The officers responsibility is to proyect and serve, not to incarcerate honest citizens for talking crap to them.

 

 

What you keep ignoring is the FACT, based on the course of events and witness statements, is that the officer stood there and took Gates' crap like you seem to think he should, and it was only after, the officer was attempting to disengage himself from the confrontation, as you say he should and attempted to do, did Gates insist on committing a misdemeanor in the presence of the officer, and even after being warned specifically of the crime he was committing, Gates CHOSE to continue to commit that crime, which didn't involve the officer as a victim but the people of the public, then and only then, did the officer make a lawful and constitutionally valid arrest.

 

The FACT is, Gates wasn't arrested for talking to the officer. The officer took his and tried to walk away. Gates took the issue into the public. Same reason you can't stand in your yard naked, in a residential area, and masterbate with one hand and wave to the paperboy with the other.

 

Again. Your rights only extend as far as they don't infringe on the rights of another.

[timesjoke]

Hate to tell ya this, but ya ain't gotta own, or even pay rent, on the property you reside within to be covered under the Bill of Rights.

 

Never said you did, I was pointing out the context of a spoiled, elitist, racist professor who thought he was better then the white cop and could bully the cop because he had "powerful friends".

 

You also need to read more than my quotes of Spencer, so you can understand Spencer's quotes in context. Believe me, Spencer was no fan of people being dragged from their property for talking to an irresponsible police officer. The officers responsibility is to proyect and serve, not to incarcerate honest citizens for talking crap to them.

 

Well, now your back to calling the cop irresponsible, but point by point you say he did nothing wrong up to the point of the arrest, hard to say the officer is irresponsible for doing his job and following the law hugo.

 

And Spencer was a big supporter for people being responsible for their own actions, you certainly are not representing his views by saying people like Gates should be protected from their own folly.

 

 

 

What a cage is to the wild beast, law is to the selfish man. ~ Herbert Spencer

 

Would Gates be considered the selfish man? Thrashing at the bars screaming about the unfairness of it? Calling those who enforce the law racists when their not? Using his political ties to escape the enforcement of the law?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oh, protect and serve, your right, but your problem is you only see Gates as important, you see fighting against the police as noble, even when the police are right.......but the police are there to serve and protect "everyone" not just one person at the expense of all other people. Once the racist took his tirade outside, he was imposing his hostility and irresponsible outbursts to everyone. What is his out of control behavior teaching the kid next door who sees the police get abused in this way? This is one example but there are many ways an out of control person in a community can cause severe harm to that community, just like arresting him can teach a valuable lesson to the same kid who sees that bad behavior is punnished.

[ImWithStupid]

Hugo, RO and most people on a ride along...

 

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-HghaoDu9Ac]YouTube - COP FOR A DAY[/ame]

[timesjoke]

The truly funny thing is people who put down cops the most would never have the backbone to do the job themselves.

 

And, they are the first ones to be critical of the police when they need them. I say if your so down on police, never call on them either.

 

 

I love it that hugo pretends to follow spencer when it is Spencer who says it is fine to drop your connection to the state, but at the same time you loose your protections from that same state:

 

"Government being simply an agent employed in common by a number of individuals to secure to them certain advantages, the very nature of the connection implies that it is for each to say whether he will employ such an agent or not. If any one of them determines to ignore this mutual-safety confederation, nothing can be said except that he loses all claim to its good offices, and exposes himself to the danger of maltreatment ? a thing he is quite at liberty to do if he likes. He cannot be coerced into political combination without a breach of the law of equal freedom; he can withdraw from it without committing any such breach; and he has therefore a right so to withdraw."

[ImWithStupid]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFW_HrrR8I8]YouTube - Queensland Police Union[/ame]

[hugo]

. Same reason you can't stand in your yard naked, in a residential area, and masterbate with one hand and wave to the paperboy with the other.

 

 

You can't do that while waving at the neighbor's wife either.......er...uhh...that is what a friend told me.

[ImWithStupid]

You can't do that while waving at the neighbor's wife either.......er...uhh...that is what a friend told me.

 

 

You can, if she isn't startled or alarmed, and doesn't complain.

[snafu]

You can, if she isn't startled or alarmed, and doesn't complain.

 

I guess that would depend on who you are.

[Ahhlee]

You can, if she isn't startled or alarmed, and doesn't complain.

 

I take a few pictures with my cell phone and then offer up a round of applause after the performance, but that's just me.

[hugo]

I believe Officer Crowley has learned a lesson from this. Next time I am sure he will do the responsible thing and realize his job is to protect and serve the citizens of his city, not defend his ego. It is all about responsibility, by a government employee, not to abuse the power he is entrusted with.

[ImWithStupid]

I believe Officer Crowley has learned a lesson from this. Next time I am sure he will do the responsible thing and realize his job is to protect and serve the citizens of his city, not defend his ego. It is all about responsibility, by a government employee, not to abuse the power he is entrusted with.

 

 

That's exactly what a socialist like you, would say.

[hugo]

That's exactly what a socialist like you, would say.

 

Not sure how supporting property rights makes one a socialist. The responsible thing for any employee to do is to spend his time at work doing what his employer hired him to do. It is all about responsibility.

 

Personally, I feel a responsibility to defend the Constitution from attacks from both the left and right.

 

From Locke's Second Treatise:

 

Sec. 199. AS usurpation is the exercise of power, which another hath a right to; so tyranny is the exercise of power beyond right, which no body can have a right to. And this is making use of the power any one has in his hands, not for the good of those who are under it, but for his own private separate advantage. When the governor, however intitled, makes not the law, but his will, the rule; and his commands and actions are not directed to the preservation of the properties of his people, but the satisfaction of his own ambition, revenge, covetousness, or any other irregular passion.

 

 

 

I remember once arguing with an unreasonable client at her place of residence. I finally decided to teach her a lesson in responsibility by handcuffing her, bending her over my knee, and admihistering a good spanking. I got in a bit of trouble over that.

[timesjoke]

Your fast to claim the officer had a responsibility to let the unruly person show his Azz, but you do not address the responsibility of the person to not loose his cool with the officer in the first place.

 

Responsibility swings both ways but you only see responsibility from one side, that makes you sound like a socialist Hugo.

 

 

You admitted that up to the time of the arrest the officer did nothing wrong and was instead doing the job he is paid to do. So the entire time the officer is taking this verbal abuse, you do not place any blame on the guy tossing the abuse. Incredible.

[hugo]

Your fast to claim the officer had a responsibility to let the unruly person show his Azz, but you do not address the responsibility of the person to not loose his cool with the officer in the first place.

 

Responsibility swings both ways but you only see responsibility from one side, that makes you sound like a socialist Hugo.

 

 

 

The greater responsibility lies with the person with the most power. That is the official of government. Those who wish to allow government run amuck, such as you TJ, are the socialists.

 

From Locke's Second Treatise:

 

Sec. 199. AS usurpation is the exercise of power, which another hath a right to; so tyranny is the exercise of power beyond right, which no body can have a right to. And this is making use of the power any one has in his hands, not for the good of those who are under it, but for his own private separate advantage. When the governor, however intitled, makes not the law, but his will, the rule; and his commands and actions are not directed to the preservation of the properties of his people, but the satisfaction of his own ambition, revenge, covetousness, or any other irregular passion.

[timesjoke]

The greater responsibility lies with the person with the most power. That is the official of government. Those who wish to allow government run amuck, such as you TJ, are the socialists.

 

From Locke's Second Treatise:

 

Who had the most power Hugo?

 

The cop or the racist black man with a racist President in his pocket?

 

Responsibility is responsibility Hugo, you cannot hold one accountable and the other not becuase as in this case, it was the irresponsibility of person, not the cop that put the dominos in motion.

 

 

My point is responsibility, responsibility to "NOT" start crap that the officer must now have to deal with. Only the professor was acting from hate, but you seem to support hatred of the police.

 

 

You like to parise Milton Friedman a lot, do you think he would have even been cought screaming at a cop on his front porch?