That line probably gets lots of laughs at Tea Parties, but over Denver airwaves, Congressman Doug Lamborn’s likening President Obama to a “Tar Baby” got, I’ll say it, sticky. Yeah, the expression meant “intractable quagmire” when Mitt Romney used it to describe an cost-prohibitive subway project, but Tar Baby’s primary allusion to a negative African-American stereotype got Romney in trouble. Now like a banana peel gag irresistible to Republicans, “Tar Baby” is how Doug Lamborn chose to describe, not a hole in the ground into which you pour money, not a trap set by a clever fox to lure the Uncle Remus progenitor of Bugs Bunny, but to describe his Teabag constituents’ poster child usurper, risen from America’s untouchable class, our first black president.
 
You dopey Tea Party Klan jester, you won’t shake Barack Obama’s hand because it’s black. You’re a racist sneak, unfortunately egged on by the bigots endemic to your backwater district. I hope you find that the rest of Colorado will make your “Tar Baby” remark a real tar baby for you.

Lamborn says he meant “quagmire” and a supportive media is referencing the dictionary to assert his usage was correct. But the instances for which Romney and John McCain apologized were quagmires, not personifications, least of all OF Obama. A physicist can say he’s got a problem that’s real bitch, but not if he’s talking about his wife.

I think it’s fairly disingenuous to say the primary definition of Tar Baby is a quagmire. That’s like concluding Fag is a cigarette. Yes, but that’s when neither are used to describe a person.

Curiously the local media helpfully mention that “Tar Baby” was a plot device in Uncle Remus, popularized by Disney in Song of the South. No mention that it’s the only animation that has not been reissued, because it’s widely regarded as offensive on racist grounds.

Lamborn has apologized to President Obama and assures interviewers that he’s confident his apology will be accepted. Isn’t it ironic that he won’t touch Obama with a ten foot pole, yet can count on the man’s magnanimity? Of course he’s right, the president opposes nothing, why take issue with racism?

But I believe Lamborn will have lost his value to even his Tea Party Klan associates. Having his apology accepted, it’s going to be impossible for Lamborn to belittle Obama with even a pea-brain pretense of credibility.