Renowned law professor and author Stanley Fish, in a New York Times article , compares Prof. Henry Louis Gates’ tenure at Duke University to the recent Gates/Police incident, and the so-called “birthers”’ weird obsession with Pres. Obama’s birth certificate. It sheds some light on a situation that has become a national mirror, so it’s worth your time to check it out — especially since what we’re seeing in the mirror ain’t pretty.

A few observations: Both men involved in the Cambridge incident could have handled themselves better, but with that said, here is the basic fact that sticks in my craw: No matter how angry Gates became, this is a smallish man who walks with a cane who was standing in his own home legally, and who had shown the policeman his driver’s license as well as his Harvard I.D. Police officers are capable of walking away from a situation in which there's been a mistake. The policeman would have been much wiser to drop the matter, maybe tell Gates, “Your shouting is out of line and disorderly, but this is obviously your home, so we’re just going to be on our way.” That’s the “no harm, no foul” attitude that can often take the heat out of situations.

Prof. Fish, in the NY Times article, says Gates was guilty of being in a nice house while black. That could have played a part in the incident, but considering the officer’s history of teaching other officers to avoid racial profiling, my guess is that Gates’ arrest was, as Bill Maher suggested on CNN yesterday, less of a racial problem than “a police problem. . . Gates was arrested for the crime of not kissing the behind of the police officer.” These days, it’s an open secret that most police officers expect complete submission from anyone they’re speaking to, at all times, which is, to be blunt, a tyrannical attitude. Yes, I know, police work is hard and dangerous every day all day long, etc., etc., but somehow that danger has become an excuse to treat most citizens like scum. When the British routinely acted that way toward colonists in, yes, Boston and Cambridge, it was considered reason enough to revolt. Today, though, in our high-strung society, it’s somehow accepted that if you appear to be angry with a cop, you can expect to go to jail, no matter who is right or wrong. Plainly and simply, that stinks, and needs to be changed.

• Dangerous criminal Henry Louis Gates