Obama faults media for anti-cop rhetoric
President Obama (Image: WhiteHouse.gov)
President Obama in Chicago ignored accusations of his own administration’s anti-police bias and said to a crowd of International Association of Chiefs of Police attendees: The media’s to blame for much of the community–cop division tearing at the nation in recent months.
He also called attention to the problems with social media, saying the instant messaging and photo–posting qualities of the medium have really ratcheted attacks on police – whom he described as just trying to “do your jobs” in the face of many challenges.
“Too often, law enforcement gets scapegoated for the broader failures of our society and our criminal justice system. And I know you do your jobs with distinctioon no matter the challenges you face,” Obama said, then blaming cable news outlets and social media for fanning the flames of racial discord between police and the minority communities they servce, the Chicago Sun–Times reported. “I reject any narrative that seeks to divide police and communities that they serve.”
He went on, criticizing news outlets for going after ratings, rather than truth.
“I reject a storyline that says when it comes to public safety there’s an ‘us’ and a ‘them’ – a narrative that too often gets served up to us by news stations seeking ratings, or tweets seeking retweets, or political candidates seeking some attention,” Obama said, the Chicago Sun–Times reported. “I know that’s shocking that political candidates do that. Because your work and your service really has helped make America safer than it’s been in decades, and that’s something for which every American should be proud.”
His comments come on the heels of widespread criticisms against Obama and his administration, particularly his Justice Department, for issuing rhetoric that seems to paint police far too often as the aggressor and the suspects they arrest as the victims.
In September, for example, the New England Police Benevolent Association, a consortium of unionized officers, called for a boycott against Obama’s Labor Day speech in Boston. Jerry Flynn, the executive director of the organization, wrote in a letter printed by the Boston Herald: “Our members are enraged at [Obama's] lack of support of law enforcement. It’s clear that he has an agenda and unfortunately, the police are not part of his agenda,” as WND previously reported.
Obama’s also moved to place all police departments in the nation under federal control, an action he sees as necessary to counter what he calls unfair law enforcement practices and policies against those in minority communities.
And as far back as 2009, Obama publicly called out police for “acting stupidly” when they responded to a call of a break–in at the home of an individual who turned out to be one of the president’s friends, Harvard professor Henry Gates. Then, Obama admitted he didn’t know the facts of the case but still insisted: Police were out of line and “there’s a long history in this country of African–Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately,” as the Hill reported.
In Ferguson, when white officer Darren Wilson was found not guilty of wrongdoing by a grand jury in the shooting death of black teenage Michael Brown, Obama tasked his Justice Department to launch an investigation – which similarly concluded the policeman did nothing wrong. And in Baltimore, when mostly black protesters raged through the streets and caused massive property damage after a black man was injured during an arrest by several officers, Obama once again called on the Justice Department to step in and investigate, this time tasking the newly appointed Attorney General Loretta Lynch to devise a plan for better policing policies in the city and around the nation.
In Chicago, Obama doubled down on his vow to reform police departments in the country.
He said criminal justice would stay front and center “for the remainder of the time that I am in this office, and then as a private citizen,” the Chicago Sun–Times reported.
Obama also made this somewhat curious statement, furthering his mantra to get guns off the streets and clamp down on Second Amendment rights: “To make our communities safer and to make our officers safer, we’ve got to make it harder for criminals to cause chaos by getting their hands on deadly firearms. A gun is a powerful instrument … [and it remains] too easy for criminals to buy guns.” … You know that more guns on the streets does not make your or your communities safer. … It is easier for a lot of young people in this city and [communities natiowide] to buy a gun than buy a book,” Breitbart reported.
Breitbart reported Obama also said this: “It is easier to find a gun than it is to find some fresh vegetables.”
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