Question:
How can one get invited to the White House, presumably at taxpayer's expense, and have a beer with the President?
Answer:
Be obnoxious.
So, let's see. A Harvard Prof gets incensed because a police officer has the audacity to question his identity. He raises a raucus. He gets arrested.
A police officer, who presumably realizes that the obnoxious "suspect" is who he says he is, decides to teach him a lesson and arrest him anyway for "disorderly conduct". Charges are dropped.
The President of the USA, who in the midst of a economic recession, decides he wants to act like the school Principal, and wades in. He calls the police stupid. He then discovers that perhaps the blame was not entirely on the police, and ( as he is wont to do), backs down .
Now to reward them both (or to "incentivize" their bad behaviour) he invites them both to the White House for a beer.
This is truly a "teachable moment".
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Lewis,
ReplyDeleteYours is one fair interpretation of this strange event.
But here's another. America is a conflicted society, and Obama has been criticized -- by you among others -- for failing to mitigate this. I take the beer invitation as a statement that shit happens (and obviously Obama was mistaken to make his initial comment) but let's try to get beyond it and restore a sense of civility, community and respect.
I think that's how most Americans will view this event, and I think it's a positive symbolic gesture.
Mentions of "how to get to the white house", incentivizing, and school principal sound like talk-show wisecracks but are spurious.
Ron
Professor Klar,
ReplyDeleteIsn't this the kind of puffed-up, media-created non-story that we've been complaining about? Don't we have better things to get mad at President Obama for? Like his weak handling of the health reform debate, his continuation of still more Bush national security policies, including his Cheneyesque reticence to release White House visitor logs, his lack of action on Don't Ask, Don't Tell... the list goes on.
If we're going to talk about Gates, maybe we can talk about the legal issues. There were twogood pieces in Slate about that, one by Christopher Hitchens.
As one of the Slate pieces point out, regardless of what an idiot Gates was being, you can't create a "disturbance", as defined by the law, on your own porch. For another, the officer-- and he appears to be a smart, stand-up guy-- was legally required to give his name and badge number when Gates asked for it.
What about suing. You're a tort guy. In the Times last week, Randy Cohen suggested that Gates should sue the Cambridge police department. Cohen wrote that Gates probably did overreact. "But," he said, "if Gates overreacted, he did so only as an individual, an outburst that might be obnoxious but is not criminal. There is no law against Contempt of Cop. If Crowley overreacted, he erred as a professional, perhaps abusing his office in a manner that is particularly fraught, given the history of African-Americans and the police. That’s what should be examined in court."
Do you think that's a good idea? Why, or why not?
Hope things are going well over there. Jane says hi; it's her birthday tomorrow!
Scott
Your previous post suggested that Obama was imprudent for drawing conclusions respecting an event about which he knew nothing. Yet now you feel perfectly comfortable doing just that. Gates was "incensed", raised a "raucus", and all because of a police officer's "question"ing his identity.
ReplyDeleteI gather you were there. But I'd love to cross-examine you on this.
To your readers "out there": this post demonstrates why defence lawyers cross-examine Crown witnesses.
I actually like how the President handled it. Should he have allowed himself to be drawn in at the outset? Well he's human and can be granted his particularities. But while a court process could be a healthy way to affirm police responsibilities. it doesn't allow everything to be aired. You couldn't hang your hat on being "A black man in America" in procedural issues, but you want a hearing that validates your concerns. Much in the same way as an opportunity to receive validation of not being a racist that isn't subject to legal parsing.
ReplyDeleteSort of principal-ish I guess, but don't forget this was a huge media issue before Obama even weighed in, and the flames were being fanned just fine without him. On this issue, I'd rather have an Obama for dispute resolution than a Reverend Jackson. In fact, what is interesting is that Gates himself is a high authority for resolving race relations. The question of who polices the police, and who mediates a mediator -- one isn't completely off base to think a president can step in.
But I disagree that an invitation to the White House "incentivizes" bad behaviour. To be in the spotlight, and to have a supervised face-to-face with one's opponent isn't exactly what you would call an honour. Sure it gets you attention, but you'd probably get more attention if you turned down the offer.
I'm sure the taxpayers can affford 10 bucks for a few beers. What would they pay if it goes to court?
Lawrence Skuller
Thanks for the views. I of course agree with Scott that if you want to criticize Obama one can find a lot of bigger issues on which he has not done well. No surprise here. It seems like the polls are showing that America is waking up. A 4 year President? Could be.
ReplyDeleteI do not agree that the "beer suummit" did anything to improve race relations. I do not think race was the problem anyway.
Anyway, I guess the media will now move on to the next Obama story. Even Obama has begun to mock them for their obsessions with him and their lack of perspective.
I don't know how you can say race wasn't the problem. It's another thing to say that race shouldn't have been the problem (like the view of the hopelessly dumbfounded arresting officer). It has to do with the performativity of language. If someone says they are the victim of racialist policing, then that calls the issue into being, saddling it with concerns. It's like the old riots. How do I know it's a riot? Because I read the riot act. Why is it about race? Because the language of race interpolates the subject it identifies. (I'm trying to keep this jargon-free).
ReplyDeleteGates has worked on literary theory, deconstruction, etc, etc, so is very steeped in this stuff, and knows the statement "because I am a Black man in America" is irrefutable because it operates on discursive tropes that "law" and "politics" don't accomodate. It is understandable, thus, to say race wasn't the problem, if one's conception of "problem" is so constrained.
This is why I like Obama's move, as it's more open, encouraging face-to-face. But that's for the resolution of this discrete issue amongst the parties. As to the question of whether it improves race relations more generally. I think not! This administration will probably go down as the most racially divisive in history, and things will get much much worse. But that doesn't mean we can't extract redeeming insights from this particular encounter.
So if one wants to downplay the importance of this, well let me overplay it. This has the potential of being a watershed moment in the presidency - admirable intensions, the right way of handling it once drawn in. Unfortunately, it will be distorted. Lest I be distorted, allow me to state my political position as unabashedly conservative, that I generally dislike the Bamster's platform, and wish him the speediest farewell imaginable on the political front.
Lawrence
A Man's Home Is His Constitutional Castle
ReplyDeleteHenry Louis Gates Jr. should have taken his stand on the Bill of Rights, not on his epidermis or that of the arresting officer.
http://www.slate.com/id/2223673/
Hello ITP: Could you blog about the following story and how it compares to the Gates incident?
ReplyDeletehttp://apnews.myway.com/article/20090815/D9A30C6G1.html
Thanks,
A Loyal Fan