At the end of his press conference last night, President Barack Obama discussed the arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. The president said the cops "acted stupidly" in their decision to arrest the nation's preeminent African American studies scholar when he was questioned about a possible break-in at his own home. Law enforcement officers receive sensitivity training in dealing with racial profiling. So why do these incidents continue to happen? Joining The Takeaway to discuss the issue is Phillip Atiba Goff, Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Los Angeles, and Executive Director of Research for the Consortium for Police Leadership in Equity, and Rick Weger, a lieutenant in charge of training at the San Jose Police Department.

For more, listen to The Takeaway's story, America, Still Not 'Post-Racial' and read Takeaway Contributor David Wall Rice's essay, Professor Gates Arrested? No Surprise.

New York Times' Police Bureau Chief Al Baker joins The Takeaway with an update on the unfolding terrorism story in New York City. Four men were arrested Wednesday night in what the authorities said was a plot to bomb two synagogues in the Bronx and shoot down military planes at an Air National Guard base in Newburgh, N.Y. Three of the men are American citizens. Officials say that local citizens were not at risk because the group was infiltrated by law enforcement early on, long before the plot could come to fruition.

For more, read Al Baker's article, 4 Accused of Bombing Plot at Bronx Synagogues in the New York Times.

Here Joe Demarest of the FBI discusses the arrest of the four men accused of terrorism in New York:

In 2000, in the tiny Central Texas town of Hearne, a military-style drug sweep sent 27 people to jail on felony charges of distributing crack cocaine. Nearly all of them were African American. One of them was Regina Kelly, who at the time was a 24-year-old waitress and single mother of four who refused to plead guilty. The film American Violet, a dramatization of the events in Hearne, will be released next week. The Takeaway talks to Bill Haney, the writer and producer of the film, and Nicole Beharie who stars in the movie.

Want to see the trailer? Here it is:

Dozens of people are dead in Lahore, Pakistan this morning after gunmen attacked a police training center. Pakistani troops have now taken control of the academy after gunmen seized a number of hostages. For more on this disturbing situation, we talk to BBC Correspondent Jill McGivering in Lahore.

The man who committed perhaps the largest fraud in the history of Wall Street could now spend the rest of his life in prison. Bernard L. Madoff will likely plead guilty tomorrow to all the criminal charges filed against him by federal prosecutors. After nearly 20 years of running a Ponzi scheme that consumed billions of dollars of other people's money, those spurned want their day in court. The Takeaway talks to Diana Henriques, New York Times senior financial writer about the new details that have emerged in the case and what victims want.
For more, read her article Madoff Will Plead Guilty; Faces Life for Vast Swindle in the New York Times.

All week, we’ve been taking a look at the U.S.-Mexico border, where violence has soared as Mexico’s army battles powerful drug cartels. Today, we turn to a place you may not have heard of: Brownsville, Texas. It’s a small city where most people have family right across the border in Matamoros, Mexico. And they have learned that what happens in Texas can’t be separated from what happens in Mexico. The Takeaway talks to Brownsville judge Carlos Cascos and Brownsville Herald crime reporter Ildefonso Ortiz for their take on life on the border.

For more stories from the border, click here.

In recent weeks, much of northern Mexico has been gripped by anarchic violence as President Felipe Calderon takes on powerful drug cartels. The cartels' tactics are simple: use brute force to get what you want. The problem is—it's working. And increasingly, that violence is spilling across Mexico’s border into U.S. cities like El Paso and Phoenix. The Takeaway is joined by Sam Quinones, a reporter for the Los Angeles Times, and Tracy Wilkinson, Mexico Bureau Chief for the same paper. Both have been providing coverage for the paper’s series: “Mexico Under Siege.”

For more, follow the series, Mexico Under Siege, in the Los Angeles Times.