Obama more bartender than mediator at beer summit
The White House was working hard to lower expectations about Thursday’s beer summit, characterizing the president’s role as more bartender-in-chief than mediator.
So don’t expect apologies or even a rehash of the day Massachusetts police Sgt. James Crowley, who is white, arrested prominent Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates, who is black.
In fact, don’t expect to hear much at all.
“I don’t anticipate sound at the meeting,” White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said. “The president is not going to announce anything tonight.”
Crowley busted Gates on a charge of disorderly conduct after a confrontation at the Harvard professor’s home. The policeman had been dispatched to the scene to investigate a report of a possible burglary in progress. Words were exchanged.
The 58-year-old Gates, a well-known documentary filmmaker who walks with a cane as a result of a childhood injury, had returned home from a trip to China to discover his door jammed.
A neighbor saw two men, Gates and his driver, trying to shoulder their way into the house and phoned the police.
Obama to engage in beer diplomacy
Over the decades, we’ve had ping-pong diplomacy, shuttle diplomacy and cowboy diplomacy. And now we’ve got beer diplomacy.
President Barack Obama is going to sit down for a beer on Thursday night at a picnic table outside the Oval Office with the two main players in a racially charged case — Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates and Cambridge, Massachusetts, police Sergeant James Crowley.
The first diplomatic task may be in selecting the beer for each attendee.
Crowley told Obama he wants Blue Moon, a Belgian-style white beer brewed by Molson Coors. Gates is said to prefer either Red Stripe or Beck’s. Nothing fancy for Obama, who was criticized on the campaign trail for musing about the price of arugula. He is sticking with the good old American brand, Budweiser.
Obama said last Friday that he hoped the episode will be a “teachable moment” about why can’t all of us just get along with each other. Crowley was called to Gates’ home on July 16 to look into a possible break-in and arrested the Harvard scholar, who forced open the door of his own home because he didn’t have a key. Words were exchanged.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Obama hopes to have an informal discussion.
“I would not construe this as formal discussions. This is about having a beer and de-escalate,” Gibbs told reporters.
Yes, he’s the President. But can he not sit and have a relaxing beer and sit with a couple of guys that he feels like he wants to sit with?? What’s so wrong about that? If you don’t ever do that, then perhaps you should take some notes off of the guys that is leading your country. He IS the leader for a reason, hmm?
Drink orders in for Obama meet with policeman, professor
President Barack Obama’s peacemaking efforts with a Harvard professor and a Massachusetts police sergeant are still up in the air, but the drink orders are in.
Obama invited Cambridge Police Sgt. James Crowley and Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates to the White House for a beer last week as he tried to make amends for inflaming a dispute between the two men.
Crowley, who is white, arrested Gates, a prominent black scholar and documentary filmmaker, after going to the professor’s home on a report of a possible burglary in progress.
Gates had arrived home from a trip to China to find his door jammed and had difficulty entering. The two men got into a dispute and Crowley arrested Gates on a charge of disorderly conduct – touching off a debate over whether the incident involved racial profiling. The charge was later dropped.
Obama inflamed the situation at his news conference last week by saying he thought the police “acted stupidly” by arresting in his own home his friend Gates, a 58-year-old man who uses a cane to walk because of childhood injury.
Obama called Crowley and Gates last week to try to calm tempers. At Crowley’s suggestion, he agreed to invite the two to the White House for a beer.
Spokesman Robert Gibbs said on Monday the White House was trying to organize the meeting for this week, but it hadn’t been set yet.
It’s interesting to note that no one mentions the black officer who was in the photo of Gates yelling. He backed up the police officer in question.
I suppose that is an inconvenient fact and no one wants to say anything about it because it screws up their story of racism.
I am one of the people who like the President, but he sure did make a big mistake in this case. As another contributor has noted, it appears that both the officer and the “suspect” overreacted. Mr. Gates does need to remember that the officer had been dispatched to a possible burglaryt-in-progress, and he really should understand that Crowley likely was a bit hyped up. Years ago I worked in both law enforcement and private security, and any time I was sent on such a call, I felt the way anyone normal does: on high alert. I gather Crowley doesn’t know Gates, so he can hardly be faulted for not recognizing him as the homeowner. On the other hand, once Gates did produce ID showing he was in his own home, Crowley would have been better off to just let the matter drop. Had he done so, there wouldn’t be all this brouhaha about it.