Having recently become a US citizen may be the reason for Hitch's overblown notion of his consitutional rights. No one has a right not to cooperate with cops who are investigating an actual break-in reported by an eyewitness. No search warrant is required. The police need to not only establish that the person answering the door lives there, but also that the person at the door is not responding under duress--like being held at gunpoint by a home invader.

Gates's first stupid response to the cop's saying he was there to investigate a break-in, despite Gates's actually having broken into his home, was to shout "Why? Because I'm a black man in America"? When asked to step outside to talk, he said, "I'll talk outside to your momma!" One of the reasons Obama climbed down was his apparently late discovery that his Harvard professor friend had acted, as one Fray poster aptly put it, 'like Fred Sanford,' while the cop teaches courses in dealing with racial issues.

Hitch also makes the inapt suggestion that all would have gone well if the cop had been black. Well, he was accompanied by a black officer and a Hispanic officer, which made no difference at all to Gates.

If Hitch were less of an anti-cop bigot himself, he might have read some of the things cops have been saying about this case. Most notable, is that they treat dealing with burglaries and home invasions as one of their top priorities, (even dropping their donuts), having seen the devastation that can follow such an event. They respond to such crime scenes aggressively, as they should.

Our stupid president, whose only accurate comment was that he didn't know what he was talking about, chose to pick the wrong side adding, "there is a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately." The comment was not only irrelevant to the Gates situation, where Gates was the only one who injected a racial element, it is itself an attempted justification for the racist presumptions and reactions of buffoons like Gates.

Jeremiah Wright would be proud, though.

(re-posted from general fighting words)

at the end of your long post, you still didn't answer one crucial question, why was there an arrest at all?

Gates might have acted like an ass, maybe, but the police already asserted who he was and that there was no break in, the arrest was a punitive act for his behavior, and this is not the America you or me want. Poli e shoild arrest suspected criminals, not people who don't like them.

BTW do you acknowledge this from the president

"there is a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately."

Not having been there, unlike Obama, I won't venture any judgment on the arrest. I do know that the absence of a burglary doesn't mean that Gates wasn't guilty of disorderly conduct ("his behavior" as you put it), especially since he "may have acted like an ass" outside his home as well as inside.

What the president said about "a long history" was wholly inappropriate given that this was not about a person being stopped, but police responding to a home where there had been an actual break-in. From all accounts, the only person who injected race into the situation was Gates, who did so from the start.

<BTW do you acknowledge this from the president

"there is a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately." >

Do you acknowledge that (per capita) African-Americans and Latinos commit more crimes than whites? Or should that fact be consigned to the PC memory hole? ...probably just framed by mean old white cops like OJ was.

A crime is only a crime if a police officer makes an arrest.

Part of the reason that AAs and Latinos are stopped is because yes, per/100 they commit more crimes, but part of the reason they commit more crimes is b/c they are arrested more, most of which is legit but a large minority of arrests arent.

A 9 yr old boy was arrested for stealing his neighbor's bicycle recently in rather silly circumstances tho he clearly intended just to use it rather than possess it...this boy was black (cant be bothered to post it here, look it up if ur interested)

I know, this guy Varian has to be a cop. You know, Hitchens is an anti-cop bigot and the POTUS is an stupid. And more, Hitchens just recently become a US citizen. Still more, overblown notion of constitutional rights. Overblown notions of constitutional rights! Duh, I'm just overblown myself with the logic of this nazi aprentice.

"Hitch also makes the inapt suggestion that all would have gone well if the cop had been black."

Did you read the piece? Hitch acknoledges early on that the responding officer was black. The whole point of his essay is that this is not a race-motivated arrest, but rather Gates was arrested for yelling at Police from the porch of his house.

Dhalgren:

What Hitch actually wrote was: " And I can equally easily visualize a thuggish or oversensitive black cop answering the call. And I can also see how long it might take the misunderstanding to dawn on both parties. (emphasis added)

What Hitch is saying is that he imagines that if the cop had been black, even "a thuggish or oversensitive black cop," the "misunderstanding" would have been quickly resolved.

In a addition to poor reading skills, are you the only person who doesn't know that the cop was white?

based on skin color and chosen profession.

If you’re from Russia, China or some other third world country then you probably see our cops as relatively benign.

But they're not: <link>

NOBODY should be arrested for telling a cop to fuck off after they have already shown proper ID to be in their own home.

Arrest is a serious step in the legal process, one that gives a person a permanent record, and WRONGFULL arrest is a crime within itself.

It's a shame they gave citizenship to someone that is too stupid to differentiate between discrimination based on skin color and chosen profession.

If you’re from Russia, China or some other third world country then you probably see our cops as relatively benign.

But they're not: <link>

NOBODY should be arrested for telling a cop to fuck off after they have already shown proper ID to be in their own home.

Arrest is a serious step in the legal process, one that gives a person a permanent record, and WRONGFULL arrest is a crime within itself.

So you are one who holds that laws are for people of selected colors and not for everyone.....

If someone was standing on their pourch yelling racialy loaded comments at someone who was black you would say that they were guilty of a hate crime, disturbing the peace etc...

But if someone does the same to some one who is white it is free speach.....

Your insinuations are stupid TruettCollins.

To ignore the history of white on black violence versus the opposite is folly indeed.

But personally, I would support both cases and I suspect the same is true of most Americans.

Stop creating a false straw man