In the first case, the President declares that law enforcement officers in the Gates case, "acted stupidly" then he hosts an awkward reconciliation meeting over beers on the White House lawn.
In the second case, the President demurs when asked to share his opinion about the ACORN workers and Congressional action to stop federal funding for their organization. President Obama did say that actions he viewed on the ACORN videotape were "inappropriate" and deserved to be investigated, but then he added...
"This is not the biggest issue facing the country. It is not something I'm paying a lot of attention to."
Nor should he have paid much attention to a civil disturbance involving one man in Cambridge, Massachusetts...but he did. Mr. Gates, for his part, could have had the last laugh and made buffoons of the Cambridge police, by maintaining his cool. Instead while being questioned, he ranted as though he had been robbed of his human dignity and got himself arrested. That was the whole "news" story.
Back to the President. At the time he uttered the "acted stupidly" remark, I had the feeling he was reacting as a man who had felt the sting of racism himself, possibly conjured by painful episodes from his past.
Let's say hypothetically that 25 years ago, citizen Barack Obama attracted the suspicions of some dim-witted person for no other reason than he was black and in the wrong place at the wrong time. Arousing suspicion for these reasons alone is completely unfair, but it happens and I bet it hurts like hell and leaves one justifiably angry.
I get it, but candidate Obama ran his campaign as the "post-racial" choice. Some people who've grown weary of bitter and endless racial debates are also attracted to a person of color that espouses a color-blind agenda. However, acting with complete indifference to race is much easier said than done.
The President would have been well-advised to say as little about the Gates matter as he said about ACORN. To be fair, Mr. Obama wisely distanced himself from the race mongering recently exhibited by former President Jimmy Carter. Sometimes, even racism -- or reverse racism -- is colorblind.
