Prof. Gates giving his side of the story now on CNN

[Uzybone]

says all he did was ask for the cops name and badge number.

[valerief]

1. Thanks!

[BlooInBloo]

2. He's so tumultuous. Somebody please arrest that Very Scary Black Man!

[CatWoman]

4. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

:hi:

:rofl:

[MUAD_DIB]

11. Anybody can be an asshole to others.

A cop can be to a Harvard professor or a Harvard Professor can be to a cop.


Right?

[BlooInBloo]

12. TUMULT!!!!!

[MUAD_DIB]

13. That's a great reply. Very DU of you BTW.

Call me when you actually want to have a discussion.

[BlooInBloo]

14. Don't tase me, bro.

[MUAD_DIB]

15. So you had nothing to add? Why bother replying then?

[LooseWilly]

60. That sounded like a poetic response to me...

Imagery of a college student being an "ass" by insisting that he wasn't breaking any rules, followed by a cop being an "ass" by tasering him and dragging his shocked, stunned, immobile ass away.

Hmm... all "asses" are not created equal... are they?

[Raineyb]

16. Perhaps if you had a point...

I have no idea what it is you're trying to say.

[MUAD_DIB]

19. I do have a point. You appear to be missing it...on purpose?

There appears to be a rush to judgment by both sides: the defenders of the police officer and the defenders of the professor.

My point is that either or both of them could have overreacted and caused the unfolding mess.


Could this cop have been a racist asshole. Sure.

Could the professor have shouted at the cops. Sure.


I'd rather get the FULL story instead of watching the polarization here at DU.

[EFerrari]

29. Ridiculous. We usually don't call it polarization. We call it thinking

through a problem with the best evidence available. The best evidence, as President Obama just said, is that the Cambridge police acted stupidly.

[MUAD_DIB]

34. Oh, how nice of you to call it thinking. ;D

I've seen plenty of polarization on this board 24/7. What I have seen is nothing close to "thinking it through."

If DUers really were thinking it through then they would wait for more people to come forward with evidence leaning in either the favor of professor Gates or the Cambridge police.



President Obama said that he may be biased. The Cambridge police may have acted stupidly. Did Professor Gates act stupidly as well?

[EFerrari]

43. Well, no. The department has a history of this behavior, Gates does not,

the charges were dropped.

How many more people do you need to hold your hand while you sort out this terribly difficult problem?

[MUAD_DIB]

50. Does the arresting officer have a history of racism?

You see, I hate group think and passing judgment on other before the whole story is in.


You might want to try it some time, and good luck with your emotional responses.

[EFerrari]

51. You seem to be repelled by think of any kind.

And is that what you do, tell people you disagree with that they are "emotional"?

Pathetic.

[MUAD_DIB]

63. Well, each time you offer a barbed answer pretty much tells me that you are emotional.

It is an emotional issue.

[Raineyb]

30. What does the professor shouting at the cops have to do with anything?

There's no law against that. Once the cops determined that Gates was in his house and he wasn't a burglar they were to leave. There's no full story to get. It doesn't matter what Gates said once the police determined he was the person who lived there they should have left. If Prof. Gates wants to berate them for being asshats while they're on his property they can suck it up. The cops were wrong. So I ask again what is your point? Because you don't have one that makes sense in this situation.

[MUAD_DIB]

36. You don't know the police that well my friend.

Like I said to another poster last night: don't give a cop a reason to be an asshole to you. They will.


All I am waiting for is the full story, like you, but many here have already seem to have made up their mind.

[Hutzpa]

53. Don't give a cop a reason to be an asshole

hmmm..... that statement is shrouded with ignorance, try again....

[Raineyb]

55. Your rationale for excusing extremely unprofessional behavior in the police department

is disconcerting. What you're advocating is that people behave like obsequious minions to the police when it's the police who are the ones who work for the public. Your attitude mirrors that of the police and is part of the problem. If the cops can't do their job without deciding to spite people because they can then they need to find a new line of work. We have too many bullies on our police forces as it is.

[MUAD_DIB]

64. What a strange world that you live in where I seemingly appear

as the boogey man simple because I proposed that you shouldn't agitate the police...if that is in fact what happened.


It appears that you have already decided that the police are guilty. Damn their hides. Fire them all and break them.

I wonder how you might handle it if it turns out that things are not always what they seem.


Also, thanks for lumping me in with all the thuggish and brutal appeasers of police brutality. It just reaffirms to me how easy it is to condemn others for expressing an opinion.

[EFerrari]

18. This is THIS situation, not any situation.

Here we have a police department with a history of racial profiling who made a bad arrest that got the case thrown out vs. a guy with zero history of behavioral crap who was arrested in his own home.

No, you can't pull a Fox News "but he was at fault, too".

[MUAD_DIB]

20. Like I replied to an emotional DUer yesterday.

Don't give the cops any reason to be a hard ass to you. Ever.

Let them do their job and be on their way.



The main thing that I would like to hear more of is the real account on the ground from the other officers present.

Was the black officer at the scene a racist as well?

[EFerrari]

21. Yes, you are a broken record defending these racist assholes

when their own department has already said they were wrong.

Good job.

And the black officer was not in charge, his idiot white sergeant was. But, nice try.

[MUAD_DIB]

38. And here come the emotional reply, folks. :D

Let me ask you a very simple question.

Were you there?


What I am looking for is what many here have seem to forgotten: finding the truth before passing judgment.

[seaglass]

48. The arresting officer is not apologizing. In addition, the neighbor

who took the photograph of Gates arrest said he was yelling - something that Gates has repeatedly denied. The truth lies somewhere between what the police officer has stated in his report and what Gates has stated as his side of the story or there is a 3rd party now lying.

http://www.thebostonchannel.com/education/20143900/detail.html

"There are not many certainties in life, but it is for certain that Sgt. Crowley will not be apologizing," Sgt. James Crowley told NewsCenter 5.

AND


Bill Carter, the man who snapped a photograph of Gates being led away in handcuffs, said police officers were calm and that Gates was "slightly out of control" and "agitated" when he was arrested.

"The officers around kind of calmed him down," Carter said. "I heard him yelling -- Mr. Gates yelling. I didn't hear anything that he was saying so I couldn't say that he was belligerent."

AND

"I was recovering from a bronchial infection which I contracted in China. It's impossible for me to yell even now," Gates said.

[MUAD_DIB]

49. To be honest I would be yelling too if I was being led away in cuffs.

I had not heard hat any other party had come forward with any info.


Thanks for not flying off the handle at me. I'm just questioning the validity of what has happened.

I'm not siding with the cops or Gates as yet, but I would rather find out what happened.

[Raineyb]

58. When have the police ever bothered to apologize when they've behaved like assholes?

Oh right never!

[EFerrari]

59. "You're emotional" is not an argument. And your simple question

is just an evasion of the facts in hand.

You sound exactly like that freep Congressman that Tweety ate for lunch yesterday, that kept dog whistling to his racist base by claiming he didn't have the facts about Obama's birth certificate. Nice going.

lol

[MUAD_DIB]

61. Your words.

"Yes, you are a broken record defending these racist assholes...


You were being emotional, and now you are resorting to the tried and sad "you're a freeper" epithet.

No, I am not a birther, a freeper or a racist. I am a Democrat, that likes to find out the truth, and is not afraid of admitting if I am wrong.

Can you say the same?


You are getting funnier by the minute with your stick. :rofl:

[BlooInBloo]

22. Ur doin it wrong. The term is "oversensitive".

[MUAD_DIB]

52. How about thin skinned?

[sendero]

23. When someone is still questioning..

... you in your own home after you have proven it is your home, you have a right to to yell at the racist son of a bitch. Fuck that stupid ass cop and fuck you.

[Uzybone]

27. +1

[MUAD_DIB]

41. Great. Why don't you try that some time and let me know how it all works out.

:rofl:


You're really hurting my feelings now. Talk about an emotional response.

[sendero]

56. Fools..

.. engender that in me. Tough shit.

[fishwax]

24. why would what other police officers present say be "the real account"?

Don't give the cops any reason to be a hard ass to you. Ever.

We don't know that Gates did do any such thing ...

[MUAD_DIB]

45. You're right. We don't know if Gates did any such thing.

We also don't know if Gates did, or if the cop is a racist asshole.


Do you believe that all the cops are liars?

[BronxBoy]

33. Why is it that in this day and age..

Blacks have to accept the fact that the have to behave differently in situations in a manner that most times their White counterparts wouldn't have to in similar circumstances?

[BlooInBloo]

35. Because white folks say so...

This has been another episode of Simple Answers To Simple Questions.

[BronxBoy]

42. LOL

I better take my boisterous ass back across the bridge and study harder.

[MUAD_DIB]

46. I didn't say that in the least, and please don't paint me with the

racist brush.

[proud2BlibKansan]

37. Asking for an officer's name and badge number justifies the cop being a hard ass?

Who knew.

[MUAD_DIB]

47. Do you have the full accout of the incident? Please share if you do.

i would appreciate it.

[proud2BlibKansan]

54. Here is his attorney's statement

http://www.theroot.com/views/lawyers-statement-arrest-henry-louis-gates-jr

[MUAD_DIB]

62. Thanks, I'll read it.

I actually met Mr. Ogletree years ago. Nice guy.

[Forkboy]

17. If being tumultuous was a crime I'd have a rap sheet longer than Al Capone.

[EFerrari]

28. 9 out of 10 teenagers would be in custody.

lol

[Forkboy]

40. Don't give them any ideas.

:)

[CatWoman]

31. AS IF YOU DON'T!!

:)

[Forkboy]

39. You can be the Bonnie to my Clyde anyday.

:loveya:

[CatWoman]

44. lol

where's my tommy gun???

:rofl:

:loveya:

[virgogal]

3. This will be a classic "he said-he said" case.

[CatWoman]

7. not really --

his driver was there......

[EFerrari]

8. Only in the minds of the extremely limited.

[fishwax]

25. actually, it's a classic "drop the charges because the arrest was bullshit" case

[WeDidIt]

5. I don't watch CNN any more

So long as CNN employs Lou Dobbs, CNN is blocked on my cable.

[valerief]

6. Wow, he's so Loud and Tumultuous! LOL!

:rofl:

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

9. Maybe he failed to provide his birth certificate.

[Uzybone]

10. LOL

[Kadie]

26. LOL n/t

[blogslut]

32. Best reply of the day

You win! :hi:

[theboss]

57. God, I wish Billy West was still on the Stern Show sometimes

"Marge Schott" would have a lot to say about this.