GUESS WHAT? HENRY LOUIS GATES' NEIGHBOR NEVER MENTIONED RACE WHEN CALLING 9-1-1! THE POLICE REPORT DID, THOUGH!

Let us repeat what we said in the last article we posted here: In truth, while bad cops are a problem, a bigger one can be found among the scores of conservative loudmouths who feel they need to score some points of some kind. If it wasn’t apparent before it most certainly is now. First this crowd goes after Barack Obama for commenting on the arrest of Henry Louis Gates “without knowing all the facts”. As DLJ said to Lou Dobbs when he managed to call in to his radio show Friday, these same conservatives had the same facts as Obama – and probably even less of them given he’s the President and all, but yet they were able to comment and determine that Henry Louis Gates was the bad guy here who made the arrest a racial incident. Not only that, but they completely discounted and refused to even mention Prof. Gates’ account of the incident preferring to go by the official police report, written by Officer James Crowley, the officer these same conservatives are trying to beautify. Well, now they have a problem. In that report, Off. Crowley noted that Prof. Gates’ neighbor saw “what appeared to be two black males with backpacks” trying to break in. Apparently this is news to the neighbor, who had spent the past week getting ripped to shreds by people who painted her as someone who is suspicious of “those people” in her neighborhood. She is telling people that she never mentioned the race of the people she saw. The 9-1-1 tapes have also been released, and it backs her up. She even said she wasn’t sure what was going on, that the two people she saw were in the house and had suitcases on the porch and just wanted someone to check it out. Now conservative talk radio has to do damage control. We heard Sean Hannity’s spin on it already. Somehow this backs up the officer! Oh, and he is using old speeches where Gates is critical of Clarence Thomas, supports affirmative action, and talks of how his mother hated white people – in 1959 – to justify calling him a radical. What do you expect from the crowd that keeps advancing that Birther crap? If responsible right wingers – if there is such a thing – don’t get a handle on this nonsense within their camp, they should brace themselves for a little teaching momment real soon.

USA Today

The woman who made the 911 call that sent police to the home of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. did not mention race in her call and is “personally devastated” that media accounts said that she did, according to her lawyer, The Boston Globe reports.

The newspaper quotes Wendy Murphy, a lawyer for Lucia Whalen, as saying she only saw the backs of both men outside Gates’ house and did not know their race. Murphy says Whalen works at a Harvard office about 100 yards from where  Gates lives.

The Globe also says the Cambridge police commissioner confirms that account, although the police report says Whalen observed “what appeared to be two black males with backpacks on the front porch’’ of the house.

The commissioner tells the paper that the report was a summary of all information gained during the police inquiry, and not just the 911 call.

The incident sparked charges of racial profiling that mushroomed into a national debate after President Obama weighed in on the issue. The president has invited Gates and the officer to have a beer at the White House. That could happen as soon as this week, according to White House spokesman Robert Gibbs.