President Obama is really in a tough spot over Ferguson.
As a Black male, I’m sure he wants to speak out against any perceived injustice, similar to how he responded after the Trayvon Martin shooting two years ago.
The facts were a bit clearer with the tragic death of Trayvon, which compelled the President to speak as opposed to the Michael Brown shooting where the facts, although still coming in, are a bit blurred.
This shooting is more complicated because the FBI, the Department of Justice and other law enforcement officials are still trying to gather all of the facts, which could take weeks,or months.
Nevertheless, President Obama I’m sure is conflicted as he is both the President and a Black male and intellectually, both sides are in conflict.
As a Black male, President Obama wants to respond with his own thoughts about this because he’s human, has had, by his own account been profiled by police officers and is very sensitive to matters of race.
Recall, he spoke out not only about Trayvon Martin, but also about Shirley Sherrod, a former Department of Agriculture official, who allegedly made racial comments, which proved to be untrue, and the 2009 arrest of Harvard University professor Henry Louis “Skip” Gates who was wrongly accused of breaking into his own home. All of these incidents occurred while Obama was President and after each presidential news conference there was a significant and loud backlash from everyone to presidential historians to ordinary Americans.
Most thought it was inappropriate for a president to comment on an ongoing investigation, and others thought is was beneath the office the presidency to comment on local issues.
I suspect the President could care less about the latter, but is sensitive to the former and I have confidence the President will get this one right. Not just because he’s Black, but because he knows that history will judge him if he gets it wrong.
(Contact Robert Traynham @roberttraynham.)
(Reprinted from the Philadelphia Tribune)
