They're both a couple a morans....

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

Gates: You don't recognize me?! I'm HENRY LOUIS GATES!!!!
Cop: Whatever. I'm going to arrest you for disorderly conduct in your OWN HOUSE.

Knock their heads together and call it a day, says I.

[BlooInBloo]

1. Gotta love false equivalences, one side of which is only claimed by the other guy....

But anything to create the thinnest facade of equivalence, I suppose.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

4. I'm sure that means something, right?

[seabeyond]

2. wrong. one trampled constitution and did wrong. one did not. n/t

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

7. One threw a hissy fit. One did not.

Trampled on the constitution....Melodramatic much?

[seabeyond]

9. hissy fit not against law. arresting someone without cause is at the least a violation

of constitutional rights

[npk]

12. Um yes throwing a hissyfit is against the law

Its called disorderly conduct. In the presence of several witnesses that had stopped because of the altercation that Gates started outside his home with the police officer.

You should read the report.

[seabeyond]

15. cop asked for id, got it and then proceeded to question. cop wrong.

at the point of knowing it was his home, he should have left. then gates refused to answer questions and asked for name and id, cop refused.... hence the fight began. cop was wrong

[Cali_Democrat]

34. Indeed. n/t

[ProfessorGAC]

21. No It's Not

You need to read the statutes. There is no such thing as disorderly conduct when inside your own residence. The statutes are abundantly clear.
GAC

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

27. Not as cut-and-dried as you think.

Read on...

http://www.bostoncriminallawyerblog.com/2009/07/attorney_sams_take_arrested_in.html

[ProfessorGAC]

36. Your Cite Suggests It Is Cut and Dried

And it also suggests i was right in the first place.
GAC

[Yavin4]

30. Thank You

If that's the standard for disorderly conduct, then anyone can be arrested any time they raise their voice any where.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

32. That is just about it...its the catchall they use when then want to cuff some one

Its not limited to college profs...try filming cops from across the street during a raid...same thing.

[npk]

31. Gates came outside his house and berated the officers

Please read what I wrote.

[DefenseLawyer]

25. You damn commies and your "Constitutional Rights"

How dare anyone question the authority of someone with a badge.

[seabeyond]

26. you know... damn straight. and it is selfish reasons. i dont know how to be fuckin intimidated

so if a cop does intimidate me, i dont get intimidated which pisses them off and my ass will be on the ground cause i didnt lower eyes, tail between leg and become submissive.

i have to stand up for this or there is gonna be an old white woman experiencing the same, some time soon, i am afraid. lol

[baldguy]

3. Not quite.

"This is my home! I live here!"

"Whatever. You're a black man, you must have done something wrong."

[SemiCharmedQuark]

5. Except one guy had authority vested in him by the state that he abused to punish the other guy.

Because the other guy hurt his feelings.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

8. Punished?

Charges dropped. And Gates will make this the subject of his next book. He'll buy his retirement home with the royalties.

[BlooInBloo]

10. Ooooh! That's GENIUS!!! The cop did Gates a FAVOR!!!!

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

14. Attention all Police Officers...

You can arrest the shit out of me any time you want if I can have a six-figure book deal.

[Mrs. Overall]

13. I think you are revealing in this thread that you really think Gates is the moron.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

18. I really do...

Look. The officer is responding to a call from a citizen saying that it looks like two guys are trying to break into a house in the neighborhood. The cop arrives and finds a guy in the house and asks for some identification. Chances are the cop doesn't read the "Chronicle of Higher Education" and so he doesn't know Henry Louis Gates from Adam's Housecat.

If Gates had merely given the officer his ID and explained the situation -- followed by a "Thanks for your quick response, Officer" -- all would have gone on their merry way and nothing would have happened.

Yes. Since the 60-year-old Professor was acting like a spoiled brat, the officer should have tried to be the adult in the room.
Yes. The officer probably should have backed off and let Gates cool down for a minute.
Yes. Regardless of Gates' temper the officer shouldn't have arrested him.

But that's not racism. If a (a certified white guy) went off on a police officer like that, I'd probably end up in the backseat of a squad car, too.

[ProfessorGAC]

22. Duh!

Dumber than dirt.
GAC

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

28. Wow, Professor...

I guess you shure did get me with that one.

Lemme guess, you're a full professor at Devry Institute, right?

[ProfessorGAC]

35. Let Me Guess. You're A High School Drop Out

.

[City of Mills]

6. Yeah, maybe

This cop trains recruits at the college I work at, I don't get a gut feeling that he's racist or a racial profiler - I think he got miffed at Gates for being a "whiny librul" and decided to give him a hard time. I'm basing this on his comments to local TV where he says about Obama, "I didn't vote for him". Well, that leaves me to assume he voted for McCain/Palin or nobody, either way he came across as a bit of an uptight guy and I can see him having a problem with a left-leaning 'academic'. If I see him anytime soon, I'll be sure to ask him - though I'm sure he won't have much to say on the matter at this point.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

11. I know lots of cops...

And I'm not defending the officer. As I said, it's pretty stupid to try to arrest somebody for disorderly conduct when they're in their own house. I think Gates got in his grill and he got pissed off.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

16. And that's fine. But when you then use your authority to get even. That's not ok.

[City of Mills]

17. I agree

I think two proud men butted heads, and unfortunately neither backed down. I don't know enough about the situation to assign blame, but based on what I've read, I have to put it on this officer because ultimately, he was the one who exercised the ultimate power to decide to arrest Mr. Gates, maybe to humiliate him or 'take him down a notch'? I really feel it's less about race than it is about a personal desire of one man to exert dominance over the other. It will be interesting to see the fallout, I wonder if Sgt. Crowley's training days will come to an end?

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

19. Agreement, right back 'atcha

Being a cop is a lot about contol, specically control of the specific situation that they're in at the moment. I don't blame them for that. They're used to dealing with guys with guns and not visiting professors. But I think these were two guys who were out to see whose was bigger and the cop, because he's supposed to know better, came out looking worse.

[JI7]

20. how the fuck are those 2 things even comparable

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

23. You've caught me in the vice of your irrefutable logic...

I take it all back.

[Fuzz]

24. Although I can't stand people who say 'do you know who I am', still one had power

and a gun, the other did not.

It's not against the law to be obnoxious, if that even was the case.

I know I would have been pissed off if I were in Gates situation. With great power comes great responsibility.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

29. Absolutely...

No matter how much of an asswipe the citizen might be, unless he's physically belligerant and obstructing an investigation, a cop is supposed to be able to deal with it without resorting to handcuffs. It's this failure to be the adult in the room that leads to innocent people getting beaten, tazered, and shot by police officers who won't "take a breath and count to ten" when dealing with the public.

And Professor Gates is the public here. He's not a criminal. A prima donna, yes, but not a criminal.

[EmilyAnne]

33. Wrong. Its not a crime to be arrogant. By the time the arrest occurred, the cop had identified

Gates.

So, why was Gates arrested?