"Barry vs. Cop"

I usually don't write about politics, yet current flap over Obama and his remarks about the Cambridge police can't be ignored..

I remember wincing when that last question came up at the Press Conference and President Barak Obama-- whom some people think it hip to call "Barry"-- made his famous remark about the actions of the police being stupid. Oh, no, I thought, this is going to be trouble...

Have known a good number of cops -- this sounds like a mammoth cliche, but some of them were very admirable people and others were very much less than admirable...

Response of right wing radio is so predictable, and it is sickening how angry mood of American people is being channeled into to the issue of Obama's remark.

Totally ignored, as has been repeatedly noted, is the issue of health care reform-- and how pharmaceutical companies and insurance companies are once more getting their way to the detriment of the people as a whole.

"Lack of respect for cop" is one of the worst sins "civilians" can make as far as most cops are concerned... many cops have martyred feeling they are hampered from doing their job by a coddling of criminals.

And huge numbers of people in middle America agree with them. This is an event just made for the demagogues of right wing radio..

Can all this be settled with a "beer summit" and everyone be satisfied? Probably not.

Someone made the trenchant remark that " Americans have just realized that they really do have a black president."

Myself, I think both the professor in question and the cops over-reacted-- in a way, again, that seems like cliche behavior. 

My biggest anger is first at the media for mining this for all its worst aspects and secondly for the broad mass of Americans who are letting their frustrations take an easy and unproductive avenue of expression...

Luckily, people like Al Sharpton --who I do not like-- are not involved in this. 

But how long do we have to endure right wing radio foaming at the mouth that "Obama hates white people and white culture" and all that rubbish? For a long time, I suppose.

The old saying holds true that you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink....  Americans are going to have to start facing up to realities of the environment, energy sources and the wars we are fighting as well the out-of-control capitalism that has gotten us into an incredible mess.