Friday, July 24, 2009

Obama, Gates, Police and Black Folks

When the President ran for the Presidency he invoked his dear white mother and grandparents to get into power. Threw his former pastor under the bus, and made no commitments to black Americans for their collective vote. Now the president has pissed off the white cops. Instead of Barack Obama pissing them off for a good reason, like shooting black people in the back or tasering black folks while black, he had to say something about his Harvard Buddy.



As reported by MSNBC, many police officers across the country have a message for President Barack Obama: Get all the facts before criticizing one of our own.

Obama's public criticism that Cambridge officers "acted stupidly" when they arrested black Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. could make it harder for police to work with people of color, some officers said Thursday. It could even set back the progress in race relations that helped Obama become the nation's first African-American president, they said.

"What we don't need is public safety officials across the country second-guessing themselves," said David Holway, president of the International Brotherhood of Police Officers, which represents 15,000 public safety officials around the country. "The president's alienated public safety officers across the country with his comments." More HERE

AAPP: Many in the Brotherhood of Police Officers have alienated and abused black folks for years. Whites have wanted to politically dig into Obama for some time, he has given them the opportunity with his support of Louis Gates over police in this issue. Here is what Barack obama had to say:

Obama was asked about Gates' arrest at the end of a nationally televised news conference on health care Wednesday night and began his response by saying Gates was a friend and he didn't have all the facts.

"But I think it's fair to say, No. 1, any of us would be pretty angry," Obama said. "No. 2, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home. And No. 3 — what I think we know separate and apart from this incident — is that there is a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately, and that's just a fact."

AAPP: Why can't Barack Obama ever talk about black people, without including some other group? Why don't Gates and Obama get it? Just because you have a Doctorate degree or Law degree from Harvard "your still black in America." Maybe, just maybe, The President should be supporting the "voiceless" blacks who have been abused, shot, tasered and killed by police, rather than supporting a man who already has a voice, and get's paid well, to express his opinion on how he feels white police act towards black people. It's interesting how black elitist Louis Gates and President Barack Obama, are all of a sudden one of us common black folk.

The flap over the arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, top left, by Cambridge Police Sgt. James Crowley, bottom left, has renewed attention to an ongoing question of whether the U.S. has moved past racism.

When do we begin to hold people accountable? Who should be held accountable? Should it be the Police who are seeking an Obama apology? I guess Obama's honeymoon period with the American people is over. What do you think?

More about this issue on African American Political Pundit.com


1 comment:

Pete Goode said...

I personally think that the whole thing was a bunch of crap. The professor should have simply worked with police as they were working to make sure his home and his safety were secure. Besides the fact that Barack Obama may have been a personal friend of the professor, what does the president have to do with this incident? It would be like a friend of Bill Gates calling him because they got poor customer service from a Microsoft support agent and got hung up on.

Should the officer have been a little more lenient & understanding? Sure. Should the professor have been a little less of a jerk? Absolutely. Should the president have said what totaled out to: "Boston police are idiots?" HELL NO! Those guys are putting their lives on the line every day of the week. When they come to a house where there's a suspected break in, they have to be on their toes or they may die. They HAVE to be on guard. All it takes is for them to be wrong ONCE and they go home in a box. I have the utmost respect for police even if they are jerks at times. They work with stresses we civilians do not.

Finally... yes, I believe the President owes the officer, the Boston PD & Police everywhere an apology. These guys are our first defense against lawlessness.