Recalibration

The Gates vs. Crowley vs. Obama vs. Chick who called it in vs. the racist police officer thing is getting way, way out of hand. What a bunch of crazy aholes. This whole thing has been blown out of proportion from the get go, and EVERYBODY involved has been quick to "clarify" their behavior. Here's what they'll have you believe:

Gates didn't mean to play the race card 0.1 seconds after he saw a cop standing at his front door. Instead, he was irritated that he broke his front door. Plus he just got back from a long trip and was holding in a mean dump since Logan Airport. When he saw the honkey cop, it sent him over the edge.

Crowley didn't mean to be the bully cop whose ego may have been bruised when the nerdy black guy was ripping him in front of his fellow officers. Instead, he was just protecting and serving. He was very concerned for the good people of Cambridge and his beautiful family at home. He saw an angry old black dude, excuse me, an angry old dude wielding a cane. The streets of Cambridge are safer with that lunatic behind bars.

The chick who called the thing in, never, ever said race was a factor behind the call, even though she described one of the dudes as "Hispanic". She didn't say "Hispanic" she said, "I panicked!" Der, she doesn't see colors. She is color blind. Yet she has a color television? Very suspect.

Obama clearly could've "recalibrated" his comments about the Cambridge police department and in no way meant to criticize the CPD by saying they acted "stupidly". He easily could've tweaked his verbiage to something like "the CPD acted unintelligently". No, that's no good. Too blunt. Let's see, let's try "the CPD acted haphazardly". Mmmmm, that's okay, but still a bit abrasive. How about "the CPD acted hastily". Bingo! Recalibrate that!

And finally, the best for last, the racist police officer meant absolutely zero malice when writing that had he "been the officer he verbally assaulted like a banana-eating jungle monkey, I would have sprayed him in the face with OC (oleoresin capsicum, or pepper spray) deserving of his belligerent non-compliance." Clearly he meant it in a funny, cuddly manner, completely out of context.

As you can see, this debacle was just a complete misunderstanding that snowballed. The situation was a volatile mix of misinterpretations, but aside from the racist cop, NONE of the participants have apologized for their actions, but rather just clarified that they meant no harm. Clearly we have all learned something from this, now let's have an appletini and move on.