The Start of a "National Civilian Militia"?

Tonight will mark the most hyped White House beer meeting in recent memory. The "teacher," President Barack Obama, will assemble his "pupils," Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr and Sergeant James Crowley, to prove to the country that his racial profiling comments last week were, in fact, legitimate. Yet in the case of President Obama's prime-time news conference last Wednesday - his statements regarding Gates' disorderly conduct arrest demanded an apology for a gross misrepresentation of the situation and a monumental collapse in judgement. Yet no apology has come from the man who occupies the highest office in the land.

However, what's at stake here are the last-remaining pillars which separate the federal government from state jurisdictions. President Obama's words, which were not publicly retracted through an apology, served as a vicious warning for all police departments around the country. The President of the United States - in theory, the most powerful man in the world - condemned a local operation based on his own interpretation of the shady facts given at the time; he sided with the man accused (at the time) of wrongdoing, instead of police officers who daily put their lives on the line, attempting to support the rights of the people around them.

As a result, the effect of the message of Obama's words is simple: "either you're (the police) with me, or you're against me!" If an apology is not issued by the Commander in Chief, his words will have served for the foundation of a "national civilian militia" (the phrase Obama used during his 2008 campaign). If an apology is not forced from Obama, he might find it easier to interfere in police affairs, thus instituting his policies in already-existing departments; or the police might do whatever they can to oppose his "guidance," giving him an avenue to create his own private "militia."

It is imperative for the existence of freedom in the United States of America that President Obama be held to account for the full weight of his comments last Wednesday. Words have consequences - let's hope the consequences fall solely on President Obama, and not on the future liberties of the American people.