But Some of My Best Friends Are Black

It's a few days old now, but ATK-haunter John R sent me an email link to Wonkette. In this particular post, she highlighted some emails from Republican offices in Washington that she has subjectively branded as "racist."

Gotta say, I'd pretty well brand it that way too.

The point that I see is that it will be difficult for Republicans in the future to attract and retain minorities in their own party when so many people in leadership roles keep sending out racist stuff. You can't say you're not a racist and then send out pictures like the one at the top of this Wonkette post. From Newscoma on the picture in question: "When I asked her if she understood the controversial nature of the photo, Goforth [the staffer who sent the picture]would only say she felt very bad about accidentally sending it to the wrong list. When I gave her a second chance to address the controversial nature of the email, she again repeated that she only felt bad about sending it to the wrong list of people." Seriously...you're sorry you sent it to the wrong list? Not sorry for being an asshole. Not sorry for offending the entire black caucus. Not sorry for a tasteless joke. No, sorry only that you meant to send it to your other dickhead friends, but hit the wrong button.

Then there's the South Carolina GOP Senate candidate who said, in a comment on a Facebook post of an escaped gorilla "I’m sure it’s just one of Michelle’s ancestors — probably harmless..."[meaning Michelle Obama]. He later apologized "if" he offended anyone.

In fact, Wonkette has a whole collection of various email gaffes here. Click the link, as otherwise I would be here all day copying what she has already done. To quote:

So, we’ve had the GOP county leader gal who sent out the “Obama Bucks” watermelon-chicken food stamps, the Southern California suburban Republican mayor who sent out the hilarious White House-watermelon garden email, the Florida state committee-woman GOP gal who sent out that “So how did black people travel in airplanes to Obama’s inauguration when they couldn’t get out of New Orleans during Katrina?” email comedy, the Republican mayor in South Carolina forwarding his “just out of curiosity” musings about the Muslim Barack Obama being maybe a character in the Bible (the Devil, in fact), and the Republican mayor of some Georgia town typing a hilarious Facebook status message suggesting Barack Obama should give the Queen of England some typical black-person snacks such as cigarettes and malt liquor.

The paragraph above is actually full of links, and if I get a chance I'll fill them all back in as well. Or, just go to the link above the quote and check it out yourself.

One of my favorite "excuses" from a linked article was how a local GOP leader was that "she doesn’t think in racist terms, pointing out she once supported Republican Alan Keyes."

Look. The face of the party simply cannot change when even people in leadership positions, local and national, act like insane racists. How "log cabin" Republicans have stuck around is a bit of a mystery to me. But this is the kind of shit that chases everyone else away.