It's not often that I agree with a poster from The Smallest Minority so I thought I would bring Kevin's (not Baker) comment regarding the Gates flap out front.
Gates was acting like an ass. His behavior, however, was NOT illegal. Crowley hooked him up and stuck him with BS charges for the offense of "contempt of cop". I highly doubt racism was a factor in this - I believe it was a petty tyrant with hurt feelings ruining the guys day, simply because he could. I think I would have been arrested had I behaved as Gates did, because cops have an expectation of deference from the ones they "serve". The fault lays with the cop - he's supposed to be the professional.
I agree completely. And thank you, Kevin, for having the viewpoint that I thought most conservatives would have on this issue.
9 comments:
Wrong.
You thought (wait, no...you SAID) that most conservatives would consider the police responding to calls they get as an "intrusion by the state into a citizen's private domain". That was your gripe in addition to the charge of racism and facism. Kevin didn’t mention anything your original charges of intrusion by the state, he disagreed with you about your taunts of racism, he didn’t think of fascism when emergency personnel respond to a scene they have been called to, he didn’t mention anything about "this is an issue of a man's (or a woman's) castle", and it doesn’t look like he thought this was all about "a man defending his property".
Kevin said he disagreed with the charge of disorderly conduct that was Mr. Gates was charged with. Nothing wrong with that because the charge of disorderly conduct can have a pretty subjective definition. He even agreed that he would be jailed for acting like Mr. Gates did so don’t try to tell me that his post is what you thought all along. You thought emergency personnel responding to calls they get are invading a citizens private domain and you claimed racism and facism as well.
Your words are in quotes...
The thread started out with "make believe that we aren't racist and then smirk about it" and "In addition to being racial issue," and was ended with ""I'll give you that it may not have been racially motivated" and "I agree that race was not an issue in the incident itself". Now you agree with Kevin "completely" when he said that he highly doubted racism was a factor in this?
And you were the one who said conservatives can’t have it both ways? Do liberal charges of racism have an expiration date or something?
Boy, last, you have a real problem when Mark is right about anything, don't you? In fact, has there ever been a time when he has turned out to be right about something and you have been wrong...in your eyes?
What Kevin wrote jibes with Mark was saying, especially this quote...
"because cops have an expectation of deference from the ones they "serve"."
That is very clever jibe at how the state actually has authority of the people that supposedly pay their salaries. It's another way of looking at Mark's orginal assertion that some conservatives should be on Gatees' side but aren't because of they "make believe that they aren't racist and then smirk about it."
I say if it was Rush Limbaugh that was being harassed in his home your reaction would be different as would Rush's or any other of the RACISTS in the Republican party.
I took Marks comments he made about race from the beginning of the thread and put them next to the comments he made about race at the end of the thread and I said there was a difference. Perhaps you didn't see any difference. or perhaps you want to tell us that his position on race was consistent through the entire discussion. ??? Do tell.
Kevin was talking about the specifics of the disorderly conduct charge. A legitimate question.
Mark was talking about racism, facism and government intrusion into a private domain.
There is a difference.
Keep typing chickenshit. I don't listen to Rush. I work during the day.
So can I conclude that someof you disagree with Colin Powell?
I think this is more complicated than most people realize.
The police have a legitimate concern about public displays of disobedience toward them. They fear that letting the public witness outbursts against them will incite others to do the same, making it difficult to maintain control in situations where there is actual danger.
My guess is that to the cop, the Gates situation was not a whole lot different from domestic abuse. The guy was irate and yelling, and when that happens a cop is afraid that a gun or a knife is going to suddenly appear and something bad is going to happen. Cops have to control bad situations before they escalate.
That said, it doesn't appear that this incident rose to that level. Gates was alone. The only source of his anger was the cop. Why the cop didn't just remove himself from the situation I don't know.
It seems that by the time the yelling got intense there were other cops there. And Crowley couldn't let Gates dress him down in front of the other cops. He had to take action to maintain his standing in front of the other cops. To do anything else would mean that Crowley had let Gates insult the entire police force, in essence.
Gates was unwise to have a shouting match with a cop, but was completely within his rights to do so in his own house. Obama's comment about the arrest being stupid, however impolitic, is correct. When you haul someone down to the station on a bogus charge it's a stupid waste of taxpayer money. Why should the police department spend all that time and effort to take some professor down a peg?
What puzzles me is that the cop didn't know who he was dealing with. Don't they have computers in their cars these days? Why didn't Crowley find out who lived in that house (so he'd know who had a right to be there)? If cops going to an address knew this sort of thing, a lot of misunderstandings could be avoided.
"Obama's comment about the arrest being stupid, however impolitic, is correct. When you haul someone down to the station on a bogus charge it's a stupid waste of taxpayer money. Why should the police department spend all that time and effort to take some professor down a peg?"
This is correct and let me be another conservative who chimes in, like Kevin, and says that the representative of the state (in this case the police) intruded on a man's home and we, as conservatives, should be outraged by this. I like Rush but he is off on this one. President Obama did not give the black militant answer. The police did overstep their bounds and it IS a waste of taxpayer money. Any true conservative would think this.
This sort of thing doesn't happen in rural Iowa, Mark. That's why you should move down here!
More talk about the disorderly conduct charge. Lovely.
Police responding to a residence they have been called to is not considered an intrusion by the government.
Doesn't really matter now though. Pretty much all of you have dropped your "well-reasoned, well-articulated argument grounded in rationality" (what a joke) that consisted of racism, facism, and the response of emergency personnel to the scene as being anything close to government intrusion.
We went from "make believe that we aren't racist and then smirk about it" to "I'll give you that it may not have been racially motivated" to (see above) "THE REPUBLICANS ARE RAAAAAAACIST!!!!". Now that's what I call a well-reasoned, well-articulated argument grounded in rationality.
"Police responding to a residence they have been called to is not considered an intrusion by the government."
Correct. But once it was established that he lived there, dragging him out of his home for being disorderly (in his own home!) is an intrusion by the state.
And, as Bill Maher, says...not all Republicans are racist but chances are, if you are a racist, you are probably Republican. Continue to deny it, last, and you continue to alienate millions of registered voters.
Millions of voters? haha, you mean like those voters in the "How Obama Got Elected" videos on youtube? Continue to immediately shout racism any chance you get (as Mark did) and you'll bring tens of millions of voters over to "your side" (you know, the side of 28% who think that obama said the right thing at his press conference). Care to tell me why obama "clarified his remarks" if he was so right on the button in the first place? Did John Kline make him clarify his remarks? Perhaps it was something Laura Ingraham said.
So as long as you are standing inside your house, you can impede investigations and act disorderly to the police. Got it, thanks for the update. If you want to get real technical, it wasn't even his house. Harvard University owns that house, Gates was leasing/renting that home.
Once it was established that he lived there they no doubt should have dropped the burglary investigation but standing in your home does not automatically shield someone from being arrested for disorderly conduct. Gates started yelling at the police right away when they were trying to figure out what was going on there.
I got an idea. Why don't some of you tell us what we can and can't do in our homes since we now have experts on here on Emergency Pretenses. If a husband is beating the crap out of his wife in full view of the living room window, should the police "intrude" and "drag him out of his home"?
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