Free Republic

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is jumping into the fray over Fox News talk show host Glenn Beck, whose assertion last month that President Barack Obama is "a racist" led to a boycott of the companies advertising on his show, and ultimately, led some to drop their sponsorship of his show. Palin on Wednesday had this to say on Facebook, the social networking Web site that, since she stepped down as governor, has been the former Republican vice presidential candidate's main platform for communicating: "FOX News' Glenn Beck is doing an extraordinary job this week walking America behind the scenes...

Whatever happened to that “post-racial” America we were supposed to be living in? Whatever happened to those warm and fuzzy feelings we got when we elected America’s first black president? Whatever happened to being so proud of ourselves for having bridged the racial divide? Didn’t last very long. Today, America does not seem to be very post-racial or very united, “teachable moments” not withstanding. Just about a year ago, we were able to laugh about things that don’t seem very funny today. --snip-- But how did things turn around so fast? They didn’t. They may never have turned in the...

President Barack Obama recently met over beer with Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Sgt. James Crowley, hoping to diffuse tense debates over racial profiling and racial bias triggered by the arrest of the Harvard University scholar by the Cambridge, Mass., police department officer. Though that racially charged conversation may be over, vicious attacks on the first Black President of the United States are not. Analysts say don't expect the attacks to end anytime soon. The most outrageous charges may have come from radio and TV talk show host Glenn Beck. “I'm not saying that he doesn't like people I'm...

I was lying in my hospital bed in Boston when I got an e-mail from someone making an oblique reference to the arrest of Skip Gates. I thought the writer was mistaken and wrote back saying, “But Skip is in China.” I couldn’t believe there was anything under the sun that would lead to Skip getting arrested—unless it was in China. And even then, what could he have done? Asked an official a tough question about human rights or something? So I did what I always do when I need to reach Skip, who, like me, lives on his BlackBerry....

Throughout the campaign and continuing into his presidency Obama has decried George W. Bush as an “ideologue,” a man blinded by preexisting conceptions and inured to evidence which contradicted his worldview. But it is the Obama team which in just seven months has perfected the art of denying or evading facts. It doesn’t matter if the subject is small or large. It can be a domestic or foreign policy issue. The modus operandi is the same: don’t give them the facts; they’ve made up their minds. We just witnessed Gates-gate — the triumph of an ideologically driven narrative (America is...

THREE stories that have kept the US news media on a breath taking slew of commentaries in recent weeks, producing some of the worst racial hype in years. First: President Obama's nomination of Sonia Sotomayor -- a federal judge on the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit -- to replace the retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter had stirred the Republican base to try to denigrate and defeat the nomination. Sotomayor, a Princeton graduate and a Yale Jurist Doctor, has heard appeals in more than 3,000 cases and has written about 380 opinions in the Second Circuit, is considered...

In the days before President Obama's last news conference, as the networks weighed whether to give up a chunk of their precious prime time, Rahm Emanuel went straight to the top. Rather than calling ABC, the White House chief of staff phoned Bob Iger, chief executive of parent company Disney. Instead of contacting NBC, Emanuel went to Jeffrey Immelt, the chief executive of General Electric. He also spoke with Les Moonves, the chief executive of CBS Corp., the company spun off from Viacom. Whether this amounted to undue pressure or plain old Chicago arm-twisting, Emanuel got results: the fourth hour...

Well, that was pathetic. And it wasn't an accident. The fix was in from the beginning. Last week's lackluster "Beer Summit" featuring Sgt. James Crowley, professor Henry Louis Gates Jr., President Obama and Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. was orchestrated to end a national discussion on race, not begin one. That's why there were no microphones, even though each participant showed himself to be perfectly qualified, astoundingly articulate and camera-ready for an illuminating and much-needed public debate. The problem for the White House was the more the esteemed professor talked, the more trouble he created for his friend, the...

Ann Coulter discusses racial profiling and the Gates arrest.

Race Relations: Two people acted responsibly in Gatesgate and did what they were supposed to do. Only one of them got invited to the White House to have a beer with the president and the professor.We don't know whether Lucia Whalen is a connoisseur of fine brews. We do know she wasn't invited to have one with President Obama, professor Henry Louis Gates and Sgt. James Crowley of the Cambridge, Mass., police department. She should have been. The rabid left would say Whalen "acted stupidly" in reporting a possible crime in progress. Some are in fact saying it. The facts...

BOSTON – Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. has sent flowers and a note to the woman who unwittingly sparked a national debate on race by calling police to report what she thought might be a break-in at Gates' home. Wendy Murphy, the lawyer for Lucia Whalen, called the flowers a "gesture of gratitude." She declined to say what was in the accompanying note.

THERE is a war going on in America right now, and they are not taking any prisoners. It is a race war, but you would not know it. Everyone involved couches their comments in clever, carefully disguised language that only the combatants know. Most of the incoming artillery is directed at President Barack Obama, the first African American to assume that high office. It is not about scoring points in the short run, although that would be nice. No, those pushing the racial warfare have a far loftier goal in mind—rallying enough whites to believe that Obama is a lousy...

(Received From Email) IS OBAMA A RACIST? By Frances Rice How do we decide who is a racist? The dictionary tells us a racist harbors feelings of antagonism and superiority based on biological differences, such as skin color. So, what demonstrates that President Barack Obama harbors such feelings toward white people? Glimpses of Obama’s mindset can be obtained from reading his two books, “The Audacity of Hope” and “Dreams from My Father” where Obama describes his animosity toward white people. In “Dreams from My Father” Obama wrote: "I found a solace in nursing a pervasive sense of grievance and animosity...

First reactions are always telling. When a person is caught unprepared and speaks off the cuff, you can see their true beliefs. By calling the actions of Cambridge police Sgt. James Crowley "stupid," Obama showed his true feelings. He moved from being the post-racial president and revealed that counter to his election campaign protests to the contrary, he was listening to the sermons of hate-mongering Rev. Jeremiah Wright. But even more troubling, Obama demonstrated his arrogance, a very dangerous character flaw for a president to possess. Near the end of his primetime news conference, Obama cavalierly answered a question on...

We’ve heard a lot about Henry Louis Gates, Jr’s, arrest in Cambridge last week. Why? Because President Obama wedged his way into the incident. Michelle Malkin asserts that Obama weighed in on Gatesgate because he’s a “racial opportunist” (“Today Show,” July 29, 2009). The president will soon be playing bartender to fix his gaffe – but the truth is that even after the Obama-Gates-Sgt. Crowley summit, Gatesgate will continue to draw attention from more pressing matters. Let’s not forget that an American soldier is still being held hostage in Afghanistan and seven men were recently arrested in North Carolina for...

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama must once again hit the pause button in his drive to overhaul health care to revisit the racially charged issue that stole the spotlight from his top legislative priority - the arrest of his Harvard professor friend. Obama, Cambridge, Mass., police Sgt. James Crowley and Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr., will meet at the White House on Thursday, each one drinking his favorite beer, in a public attempt to move past the emotional event.

Towards the end of this transcript, the supervisor explains that the "Your Moma" comment was obscene. Crowley talked to this guy a ferw hours after the incident. The video is also on FoxNews -- On the Record videos.

Yesterday on MSNBC’s Hardball, Republican Congressman Thaddeus McCotter of Michigan told Chris Matthews why he has called for a formal act of Congress telling Barack Obama to apologize for saying that Cambridge Police Sergeant Jim Crowley had “acted stupidly” in arresting Henry Louis Gates two weeks ago. (Snip) While apologizing to Crowley and to the Cambridge police would indeed be an appropriate thing for Obama to do, an act of far greater significance would be for him to retract another portion of his statement – his claim that the arrest of Gates was emblematic of the “long history in this...

A few minutes into the police encounter that ended with his arrest for disorderly conduct, Henry Louis Gates Jr. reportedly exclaimed, "This is what happens to black men in America!" It would be more accurate to say this is what can happen to anyone who makes the mistake of annoying a cop. Whether or not race played a role in the incident, Cambridge police Sgt. James Crowley clearly abused his authority, retaliating against the Harvard professor for his disrespect by hauling him away in handcuffs. The highly publicized arrest illustrates the threat posed by vague laws that give too much...

The professor, the policeman and the president are ready to share a beer - and maybe a few thoughts about race and law enforcement in the US. The gathering set for tomorrow evening may help President Barack Obama write a sudsy but happy ending to an arrest that triggered a fierce debate over race relations and briefly knocked him off his stride. --snip-- Crowley, who is white, arrested Gates, who is black, after an investigation into a suspected burglary found no burglars but escalated into a heated exchange between the men at Gates' home. When Obama said last Wednesday that...