Posted on 07/25/2009 7:33:08 PM PDT by Chet 99
THEY are calling it bar-stool diplomacy – a novel attempt by President Barack Obama to cool a heated racial controversy by inviting the offended parties to settle their differences over a beer at the White House.
Yet the president’s efforts to limit the fallout from a row over the arrest last week of Henry Louis Gates Jr, a black Harvard professor, may serve to extend a furore that has shaken the White House and raised questions about Obama’s vaunted leadership skills.
The row showed no sign of diminishing yesterday as Massachusetts media pressed for the release of police tapes that could shed new light on the angry exchanges between Gates and Sergeant James Crowley, a white officer who arrived at the professor’s Cambridge home to investigate a report of a break-in.
The incident led to a rare breakdown of Obama’s previously impressive political judgment. Having spent much of the past two years steering clear of racial controversy and nurturing an image of so-called “postracial” conciliation, the president plunged unexpectedly into the Gates affair.
He declared on Wednesday, when it was still far from clear what had happened, that the Massachusetts police had “acted stupidly” by arresting Gates, whom Obama described as a personal friend.
By Friday evening, Obama was back-pedalling furiously and his invitation to Gates and Crowley to join him for a beer was interpreted as an acknowledgment by the president that he had spoken too hastily in “maligning” the police. “I could have calibrated those words differently,” he said.
Yet the move also ensured that a story he desperately wants to go away will continue to overshadow his domestic political agenda. No beer-drinkers are likely to make as many headlines as the president, the professor and the policeman.
(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...
This isn’t going away, no matter what “Crisis” he manufactures
http://dougpowers.com/2009/07/25/obama-invites-gates-crowley-over-for-beer-and-racial-sensitivity-training/
BRAVO !!!!!!!!!!
That is a keeper.
Bingo
Let the public hear for themselves Professor Gates using his vast intellect and superior vocabulary as he calmly and eloquently responded to the threats and intimidation of the jack-booted thugs.
"In the name of justice -- RELEASE THE TAPES!"
obama would probably offer him a Billy Beer, Black Butte beer or Tusker beer made in Kenya.
If I was Sgt. Crowley I would tell both Obama and Gates to take a flying leap off a short pier.
Pistols at 20 paces on the WH lawn.
much better off with Hillary. She is a radical leftist but would not have the slavish media support that Obama has.
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I wish he would just party non stop until 2013. He’d do far less harm to the country that way.
I don’t think Kumbaya is a very good drinking song.
Hehehe!
Set up.
Obama is encouraging Gates and Crowley to meet and talk in a situation where alcohol will be involved. I guarantee you that the WHite House Staff and the MSM will make sure that Crowley will not come out of this looking good if he says ANYTHING after having had an alcoholic beverage. And he WILL be compelled by both of them to say something immediately after imbibing.
It’s not a question about holding liquor. It’s about having alcohol involved at all.
If I were Crowley and there were no good way to avoid a meeting with the two of them, I’d say that I’d be happy to meet and Obama and Gates over drinks, but that I’m drinking water, if you don’t mind, thanks.
It was OBAMA that STARTED the CONTROVERSY...not anyone else. Wish the news would report the truth.
It was OBAMA that STARTED the CONTROVERSY...not anyone else. Wish the news would report the truth.
vaudine
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