I was a little taken back by the comments of President Obama at a press conference recently.

“I think it’s fair to say, number one, any of us would be pretty angry; number two, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home; and, number three, what I think we know separate and apart from this incident is that there’s a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately,’’ the president said. “That’s just a fact.’’

It remarkable that even though he “didn’t know all of the facts”, his gut reaction is to bring the police officer into question. So without even looking into the events of the incident, he is willing to further widen the racial chasm by faulting police (a white man) instead of staying neutral and letting local officials get the facts.

I don’t know the facts either, but I didn’t blame Gates for his actions. It would be easy to say that he (Gates) was obviously at fault, but I just don’t have all of the facts. I do know that I was in the exact position as Gates found himself though and I found it wise to not make any fast moments and carefully, calmly show proof of my identification. Of course, that was my own reaction because I didn’t want to get shot. I didn’t even care what the race of the police officers where. In fact, I don’t even remember.

I find the Presidents behavior rather disappointing.

Update: I see that President Obama issued a statement that he could have chosen his words more carefully. It’s not really an apology and it doesn’t change the fact that he conveyed his “true” feelings to his listeners.

Another Update: It seems as though the situation has calmed down quite a bit. Part of that is due to fellow officers (multiple races) coming forward to support the police officer. Of course, the two sides of the story certainly clash so I expect them to remain at odds unless new information comes out.