What a White House Beer Says About Race and Politics

What a White House Beer Says About Race and Politics

By Peter Baker, Helene Cooper AND Jeff Zeleny

Stephen Crowley/The New York Times President Obama and Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. met with Henry Louis Gates Jr. and the police officer who arrested him, Sgt. James Crowley, at the White House on Thursday.

New York Times reporters Helene Cooper, Peter Baker and Jeff Zeleny live-blogged the so-called beer summit of President Obama, Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and the officer who arrested him in Cambridge nearly two weeks ago, Sgt. James Crowley. While the meeting is going on, the reporters took questions from readers, and Helene Cooper reported live from the White House.

Gates Says Another Meeting Is Planned | 11:24 p.m.

In a telephone interview with The Times’s Abby Goodnough after leaving the White House, Professor Gates spoke enthusiastically about meeting Sergeant Crowley and said the story was not over, because the two of them would get together again soon in Cambridge.

He said that he had brought his 96-year-old father to the White House, along with his two grown daughters, his brother and his fiancée. The Gates and Crowley families were taken on separate tours of the White House but met up in the library, Professor Gates said.

“Nobody knew what to do,” he said, “so I walked over, stuck up my hand and said, ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you.’ That broke the awkwardness.”

At that point, the professor said, he made a proposal: that he and Sergeant Crowley meet for lunch at River Gods, a popular Cambridge pub, some time in the near future. The sergeant accepted the invitation, he said.

“I said we both had been cast as characters in other peoples’ narratives that we couldn’t control,” Professor Gates said. “If we take control of our own stories, we can take control of narrative.”

When the two men walked into their meeting with Mr. Obama, he said, they immediately told him of their plans to lunch together.

“We told him about the progress we’d already made,” Professor Gates said, “and he was very pleased.”

He said that by arranging the meeting, Mr. Obama had “allowed us to begin to bridge our divide and make a larger contribution to American society.”

“Only he could have done that,” Professor Gates said before catching a flight back to Boston. “I don’t think anybody but Barack Obama would have thought about bringing us together.”

Professor Gates added, “He thought what Crowley and I had discussed was just right on target. The president was great — he was very wise, very sage, very Solomonic.”

Asked whether he had asked for or received an apology, Professor Gates said: “We didn’t go there. The president didn’t ask us to apologize. I think probably as we get to know each other, sooner or later we will revisit his perceptions of what happened that day and my perceptions. This wasn’t the time or place to do that. We’ll do it one on one.”

He said that over the last week, he had thought a lot about “the contributions the police make” and had come to appreciate them more.

“The most important thing I learned, I learned about police officers the stresses and realities of the excellent job the police do every day,” he said. “At the same time, racial profiling is a very dangerous thing with a long history, and we have to make Americans more sensitive to the realities of racial profiling.”

The professor, a prolific writer, did not miss an opportunity to promote his 1994 memoir, “Colored People.” He gave Sergeant Crowley a signed copy, he said, with the inscription, “Linked together forever in history.”

“Through an accident of fate this guy and I are linked together,” he said, “and the question is how can he help end racial profiling and how can I help members of my community be sensitive to the concerns of the police? If we can do that, then James Crowley and I will have taken control of our lives and our peculiar experience together and move it out of a Tom Wolfe novel and into a positive impact.”

He said that instead of his usual Red Stripe, he drank a Sam Adams at the meeting in honor of an ancestor who fought in the American Revolution.

Professor Gates, who is 5-foot-7, said that upon meeting Sergeant Crowley, he told him, “I could have sworn you were about a foot taller.”

“We hit it off right from the very beginning,” Professor Gates said. Laughing, he added, “When he’s not arresting you, Sergeant Crowley is a really likable guy.”

Crowley’s News Conference | 7:30 p.m.

During his short opening remarks, Sgt. Crowley said that he had a “cordial and productive discussion” with President Obama, Mr. Biden and Mr. Gates. He also said that he and Mr. Gates planned to have a telephone conversation in the future.

Afterwards, Sgt. Crowley took several questions from reporters. He declined to go into specifics of what was discussed during the event but did say that there was “no tension” between him and Mr. Gates.

And with that, we are wrapping up this blog post. Thanks, as always, for reading and commenting.

Head’s Up, They Headed Out | 7:25 p.m.

The latest pool report tells us that Mr. Gates and Sgt. Crowley have left the White House. Sgt. Crowley will host a news conference in several minutes.

“Race is not the only issue. Class is an issue as well.”

— singingwater

Obama’s Statement | 7:16 p.m.

The president’s statement, released just now, noted that Mr. Gates and Sgt. Crowley had met earlier:

“I am thankful to Professor Gates and Sergeant Crowley for joining me at the White House this evening for a friendly, thoughtful conversation. Even before we sat down for the beer, I learned that the two gentlemen spent some time together listening to one another, which is a testament to them. I have always believed that what brings us together is stronger than what pulls us apart. I am confident that has happened here tonight, and I am hopeful that all of us are able to draw this positive lesson from this episode.”

The President and Race | 6:53 p.m.

Peter Baker weighs in on what the incident tells us about the president and his approach to race:

One thing we’ve learned is that President Obama has yet to always find sure footing when it comes to race. His critics remember the incendiary rhetoric of his former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, as well as Mr. Obama’s comments last year about rural Americans clinging to guns and religion, his position in the racially charged incident in Jena, Louisiana, and his reference to his grandmother as “a typical white person” because she was nervous when approached by a black man on the street. (See this piece in National Review.)

At the same time, supporters invest great faith in Mr. Obama that he can move the country beyond old divisions on race, and he has benefited from the perception that he is by nature someone who wants to build a new paradigm. The Gates incident shows that he has the capacity to inflame, intentionally or not, partly just by virtue of who he is, and that he has an instinct to try to mediate, as with this beer at the picnic table, something I can’t picture any previous president doing. How he will reconcile these in the future is something to watch.

The Media Attention | 6:50 p.m.

“I would like to ask this panel if they are aware that they, and the rest of the media, are being played like a fiddle by the most savvy politician that any of them will ever know?” — Jack Cohen

Jeff Zeleny: That’s a good question.

“Now that the three main players in the drama are getting together, it’s time to filter out the noise and listen to them directly.”

— Sam Katz

This controversy has certainly overtaken – or at least competed strongly against – the administration’s health care proposals. In that case, at least, perhaps all the extraneous chatter about the afternoon beer has been a good thing for the president. But that’s almost certainly where the upside ends. There was little advantage, aides believe, for the president to become entangled in a national discussion over race. The media has certainly reacted – and, it could accurately be argued, overreacted – to the brouhaha. But for politicians, there are considerable drawbacks to playing a game of “three dimensional chess.” Why? It is difficult, if not impossible, to walk away pleasing the viewpoints from all sides. So if likeability is one of Mr. Obama’s biggest selling points, it’s a dicey strategy to wade into terrain like this on purpose, simply to play the media.

Finally! | 6:38 p.m.
With the pool report, we finally have the answer to the most pressing question of the day: What are they drinking? Well, for those who believed Bud Lite would be the drink of choice for Mr. Obama, they are in luck, as are those who thought Sgt. Crowley would stay with Blue Moon. Mr. Gates drank Sam Adams Light (a Massachusetts-based brew), and Mr. Biden chose a Buckler, a non-alcohol beer.

Maybe Mr. Biden has to drive home? No, he doesn’t drink alcohol.

It’s Begun | 6:24 p.m.

Helene Cooper: At 6:12, reporters and photographers were allowed in for a scant 40 seconds, where they could view the four men sitting around a table drinking out of frosty beer mugs. Four men, you ask? Weren’t there supposed to be three—President Obama, Professor Gates, and Sgt. Crowley?

And Vice President Joseph Biden! He was there too. In fact, during the brief time that the press could watch the goings-on, Mr. Biden leaned across the table towards Sgt. Crowley and said something. At another point, Sgt. Crowley gesturing with his hands, said something to Professor Gates.

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