It's Beer Time at White House

Trio will have that beer Thursday evening

(NEWSER) - President Obama has set a date for a conciliatory beer with a Cambridge police sergeant and the Harvard professor he arrested, ABC News reports. James Crowley and Henry Louis Gates will visit the White House Thursday for a frosty brew and some racial reconciliation. On the menu, according to CNN, are Blue Moon for Crowley and Budweiser for the host. Gates, who prefers Red Stripe or Beck's, will have to make do—the White House doesn't stock imports. More»

(NEWSER) - Turns out the president was right: the beer summit was pretty boring. In fact, it wasn't even the first time Skip Gates and Officer Crowley had gotten together after the arrest. "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," said Obama in a statement. Crowley called today's meeting "cordial and productive" and said that while he and Gates "agreed to disagree," they also plan to talk again, the Boston Globe reports. More»

Prez: I could have 'calibrated' remarks on Gates arrest differently

(NEWSER) - President Obama today backpedaled from his comment that the Massachusetts police who arrested Henry Louis Gates Jr. “acted stupidly,” the New York Times reports. In an unannounced appearance at the daily White House briefing, Obama said he “could have calibrated” his words more carefully in speaking on the incident, adding that he’d expressed his regrets in a call to Sgt. James Crowley earlier today. More»

(NEWSER) - President Obama's next round of peacemaking beers at the White House might have to include US brewery owners, reports the Wall Street Journal. The cooling off confab today will be providing busted Harvard Prof. Henry Louis Gates and cop James Crowley's favorite brews Red Stripe and Blue Moon, and some Bud Light for the president. All three, American brewers grumble, are made by foreign-owned companies. More»

Pair at center of racial incident spotted at Cambridge bar

(NEWSER) - The black college professor and the white cop at the center of a racial firestorm this summer, and who later famously had beers on the White House, were spotted last night having a round at a bar in Cambridge, Mass. Henry Louis Gates and Sgt. James Crowley chatted over suds for about an hour in a booth at a pub not far from Harvard, WBZ-TV reports. More»