Obama Addresses Gates At Briefing, Says He Called Officeri3.ytimg.com
Obama Addresses Gates At Briefing, Says He Called Officer
Made popular 1425 days ago in Society & Religion
nytimes.com — In an unusual appearance at the White House daily news briefing on Friday, President Barack Obama sought to put out a raging controversy that he conceded he helped fuel with comments he made two nights earlier, saying that he had not intended to malign the Cambridge, Mass., police department over the arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr., a Harvard scholar, on July 16.

President Obama said that he called the Cambridge police officer who arrested Professor Gates, Sgt. James Crowley, on Friday afternoon, and after the five-minute conversation he concluded that both the police and the professor had overreacted. But he also admitted that his choice of words - that the Cambridge police had "acted stupidly" - contributed to a "media frenzy" and could have been "calibrated" differently.

"Because this has been ratcheting up - and I obviously helped to contribute ratcheting up - I want to make clear that in my choice of words, I unfortunately gave an impression that I was maligning the Cambridge police department and Sergeant Crowley, specifically" he said. "And I could have calibrated those words differently. And I told this to Sergeant Crowley.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehvSP9zca1Y
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Posted by McNaab
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Did Obama successfully put the Gates / Crowley case to rest?
Yes
26%
No
74%
This is not a scientific survey, click here to learn more. Results may not total 100% due to rounding and voting descrepencies.
User Comments
PollM
Posted 1425 days ago
0 up votes, 0 down votes
He handled it very well. That's one good thing about him, he knows when to take accede to his mistakes.
james2044
Posted 1425 days ago
0 up votes, 0 down votes
What did he handle well? After America called him to task, Obama caved in and crawled away. If he thought he was right why did he cave in? If he knew he was wrong why did he he attack the police in the first place?

We have a fool for President and it just keeps getting worse.
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