Salon
MONDAY, AUG 1, 2011 17:01 ET
Rep. Lamborn likens Obama to a "tar baby"
BY DAVID SIROTA

"Tar Baby" -- from time to time, this ugly racially charged phrase has come up in our political discourse. Most often, the term is applied to a situation or a thing. John McCain, for example, used it to describe divorces. Likewise, Mitt Romney used it to describe the Big Dig. In both instances, the Republican leaders apologized for using such a loaded word -- even though they hadn't used it to describe an actual person.

The same cannot be said for Representative Doug Lamborn (R-CO), who used the term to describe President Obama in a statewide radio interview on Friday. You can listen to that interview here, which we examined on my KKZN-AM760 radio show this morning. Here's the key excerpt:

LAMBORN: Even if some people say "well, the Republicans should have done this, or should have done that," they will hold the President responsible. Now, I don't even want to be associated with him, it's like touching a, a tar baby and you get it...you know you're stuck and you're part of the problem and you can't get away.

It has been questioned whether the term "tar baby" is always a racist term. In 2006, Ta-Nehisi Coates explored this issue in Time magazine. "Is tar baby a racist term?" he asked. "Like most elements of language, that depends on context. Calling the Big Dig a tar baby is a lot different than calling a person one." In this case, that context is quite clear.

This, of course, doesn't absolve McCain and Romney, who plead ignorance to the term's racial implications and then promptly apologized. But it is to say that in Lamborn's case, the ignorance plea would be absurd because he explicitly used the term to describe a black person.

Tellingly, this openly derogatory epithet comes from not just any old politician. Lamborn is a United States congressman from Colorado Springs -- one of the most conservative Tea-Party-loving districts in America. In the hard-core right-wing political circles he runs in, describing a black person as a "tar baby" is probably more than acceptable -- it may even be celebrated, especially when aimed at a political opponent like President Obama.

Holy fucking shit!? Is this dumb fuck moron for real or did some leftist propaganda machine make this shit up? What kind of human being would make such a statement in this day and age? On top of it, he writes a letter to the president that is so shallow and pseudo apologetic it's pitiful:

He said he “apologized for using a term some find insensitive,” Hey scumbag! Most find it horrendous. Almost all would find it offensive except for a tiny percentage of extreme backwoods teabagging butt fucking assholes like you.

Then he said that he meant to use the term to indicate a "Quagmire" and he was sorry he didn't use the term "quagmire" instead. Listen up you inbred dickwad, you used the term "tar baby." You called the President of the United States of america, who is a black man a "tar baby." You referred to not wanting to touch the President of the United States, who is a black man, because it would be like touching a "tar baby." You are vile racist piece of shit. Nothing more and nothing less.

This isn't like bubba down the road saying something ignorant and stupid like "that tar baby in Warshinton." This is a member of the United States House of Representatives making public commentary. This is the voice of someone whose constituency judges and guages as a norm. This is the voice of someone who has influence over people, places and things in this country on a broad scale. This is a voice that needs to be censured in the United States House of Representatives. Otherwise, the entire body will be judged by his comments.