The nation is in an uproar. But by now everybody has heard about the Los Angeles police who were videotaped beating a black motorist.

One of the latest bits of info in the case is that L.A. Mayor Tom Bradley wants the Police Chief Daryl Gates to resign. Gates said no.

Gates said the officers on the force expect him to stay and be the leader that they need and that there is no reason for him to step down. “It’s unnecessary, totally unnecessary.”

Well, Gates must be a heck of a leader if he thinks the people are willing to let him slide by this one unscathed. But his self-made pedestal isn’t as impressive as he would like to think.

Any leader who finds a problem with the people he is in charge of and doesn’t try to solve that problem is not a leader to write home about.

Unfortunately, the mayor can’t fire Gates because he is protected by civil service regulations, and the police chief is using this to his advantage.

It’s the typical game of politics that’s been seeping through the cracks of society’s ignorance.

First, a cushy job is created for someone who’s patted a few people on the back. Next, that job is given security—in this case, no one thought about trying to keep the police chief on a leash.

More problems come into play when the person who gets the cushy job decides to use that to his advantage. Only natural, right? Unfortunately, yes.

This lets the person do just about any nasty little thing he so desires as long as he doesn’t get caught by the public. But even if this happens, there is no guarantee there will be trouble.

Take Gates. He sluffs off this videotaped beating and the radio conversations afterward as an “abberation” and does little else.

Now he gives the mayor a big raspberry and waits until his time is up before worrying about what the people have to say. Next comes the ooze seeping into society that will let Gates get away with it.

All he has to do is wait. By the time he needs to worry about what the people think of him, they will have forgotten all about the videotape.

Ronald Reagan is a classic example. Throughout the entire Iran/Contra affair, he pleaded ignorance. People looked at Bonzo’s lesser half and accepted the banana thrown to them.

President George Bush certainly follows this trend. Take for instance his part in the Noriega situation. Of course, no president of ours would ever shake hands with a known drug dealer or other such riff raff. (Who did we make our ally in the Persian Gulf? Some Syrian guy? … hmmm.)

It’s not so much what Bush did, but that he expected people to let it slide and eventually forget. What’s even more frustrating is we let him do it.

This is what Gates is depending on. He knows that if he plays his cards right, a few years down the line people will remember him as the police chief, not the guy who didn’t care about some black guy getting beat up.

And that’s why the political game is so popular. It works.