The thoughts expressed in this column are solely those of the writer.

Question: when it comes to the Henry Louis Gates Jr./Cambridge Police incident , which stupid are you with?

Correct Answer? All of them. From the White House, on down.

The really operative question, though, which applies to all the principals, is the time-honored, crisis-tested (and frequently failed) -- what were you thinking??

To be sure, who can’t feel for Mr. Gates? You get home from a long trip, shlepping bags out of a cab, you’re tired, you’re grumpy, and … your door won’t open. That’s always fun to come home to.

Naturally, it’s about getting in now, so you try and force it open, even if you damage it. I have done it myself (taking a hammer to a garage door window).

And guess what? No one called the police on hearing that suspicious sound. (I could not be seen, only heard, by the way.)

Which brings up the one, single non-stupid person in this thing -- the witness who called the police on seeing two people trying to force the door open. While everyone has focused on who deserves an apology, the person who alerted the police may be the one person who instead deserves a “thank you.”

I can only hope that if one of my neighbors saw or, hint, hint -- heard -- something suspicious, they would do the same.

After all, let’s remember that other neighbors elsewhere and at other times have failed to stir themselves to get involved even when witnessing or hearing a more obvious crime in progress. Like murder .

And who can’t feel for Cambridge Police Sgt. James Crowley? By all accounts a reasonable, respected officer, he quite likely does not relish the position he finds himself in. And he appears to have done everything by the book. Right up to the point he realized that Gates was in fact in his own home.

I mean, c’mon. At some point it must have dawned on the police at the scene that this was quite likely not a break-in. At that point, the officers probably should have backed off. And out. And even while refusing to apologize to Gates, Sgt. Crowley would nonetheless quite likely take a do-over now if he could.

And Gates? For a very, very smart man, he did a very, very stupid thing. No matter how tired, how frustrated, how much you feel vindicated, there is never any percentage in anyone, anywhere, anytime fronting off with a cop. I mean, hello?

Not that it can’t be tempting.

Years ago, I was driving to work in the morning when I encountered some road construction in Lexington. A cop had one hand up to stop, and with the other, seemed to motion for me to proceed. Naturally, I was a bit confused, and hit the brakes.

He walked up to me, motioned for me to roll down my window, and said, “In this country, pal, this motion means, ‘go.’” I politely explained that I was confused that he was also motioning me to stop at the same time. “Oh,” he said, “So we also took a stupid pill this morning?”

I looked quickly ahead and behind me to gauge how safe it was going to be to give him an energetic one-finger salute as I drove off. Dicey. I gave him a regular military-style salute instead and continued on.

Sometimes, no matter how right you are, no matter how big you are, no matter how mad, you still gotta eat it.

And lastly, who can’t feel for President Obama? Your friend is arrested, there’s a racial tinge to it, you relate, you want to say something, you….don’t say what you said

Obama, like Gates (like Crowley, too, for all I know), is a very intelligent man. So he (a lawyer, no less) should know that you never begin a sentence with, “I don’t know all the facts,” and then venture an opinion anyway. The President probably had it better in saying that “cooler heads” all around should have prevailed. Including his own.

Was there some racial bias involved on Henry Louis Gates’ porch in Cambridge? Maybe there was. Gates can certainly be forgiven for thinking that. But we will never know for sure. Was there stupidity all across the racial boundaries and right down the Northeast Corridor? That is abundantly clear.

My friend, Peter, himself a lawyer (and former Cambridge resident), puts it perhaps more succinctly. “A couple of stubborn guys with lots of baggage collided in Cambridge and we’ll be reading about it for decades.”

Couldn’t have said it better myself. So I didn’t.