Rick Bayan (9):

Sure, Gates made an ass of himself by immediately playing the race card. But why did the cop continue to question the Eminent Professor once he furnished his ID?

Mark Levin covered this pretty well on his radio show last night.
1) The neighbor calls the cops to say that two men (in sweatshirts, not suits and ties) were breaking into the house next door.
2) The police cruiser responds, knocks on the door, and asks the person who answers for ID.
3) Gates did not furnish a picture ID, but rather his Harvard ID, which did not have a picture or an address on it.
4) Things get out of hand, as described.

Now let’s switch things around and suppose that the men in the house had been burglers. [This is what the police must assume is going on, since they don't know Prof. Gates by sight.] They enter the house (the police not knowing that Prof. Gates’ driver had gone home must assume that the second person could still be in there) and are looking around for goodies when the cruiser shows up. The police knock at the door and one of the burglers, deciding to brazen it out, answers. When asked for ID he looks around and grabs the first ID that he can find which (hypothetically) the occupent left lying on his dresser.

Now when a cop asks me for an ID, I make bloody sure that I hand him my driver’s license with a picture and an address on it; not something that could be anybody’s. First strike against Prof. Gates. Remember, the police don’t know him from Joe the cat burgler. Strike 1 against Prof Gates.

Also, being a law abiding citizen and sane, I have a rule which I have always impressed on my children: always be courteous to police and soldiers, especially when they have guns. Even, perhaps especially, if there is a misunderstanding being rude only makes the situation worse. Strike 2 against Prof. Gates.

Again: what would our hypothetical burgler do? He would kick, scream, and try to brazen out the situation. The police knew this and acted accordingly.

Finally strike 3 against Prof Gates: never, never (even when confronted by a policeman of another race) play the race card. That will only serve to really piss them off. What are the odds that a police cruiser will respond in a timely fashion to Prof Gates residence in the future? I would think that every cop in town has his picture on the dashboard of their car with a note on it to “avoid this idiot at all costs.”