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The Washington Post's Richard Cohen outed himself as a racist this morning to everyone who read his column, except his editor and the publisher of The Washington Post, where there was a slight discrepancy from the popular conclusion.
Tuesday morning, a new Cohen opinion column about Chris Christie and the Tea Party appeared, and in it he writes interracial marriages make "people with conventional views... repress a gag reflex." Most reasonable people were shocked and outraged by Cohen's line, and called him out for being a racist schmuck. Others figured Jeff Bezos, the Post's new billionaire owner, might finally fire Cohen. After all, the veteran columnist does have a long history of letting racially charged statements into his column. (He also historically mentions his gag reflex in his writing.) But Cohen stands tall late Tuesday, a little hurt, but not deterred thanks to a little support from his friends.
Here's the quote from his column, in full:
People with conventional views must repress a gag reflex when considering the mayor-elect of New York — a white man married to a black woman and with two biracial children. (Should I mention that Bill de Blasio's wife, Chirlane McCray, used to be a lesbian?) This family represents the cultural changes that have enveloped parts — but not all — of America. To cultural conservatives, this doesn't look like their country at all.
One of the first defenders from the Post was outgoing publisher Katherine Weymouth, who simply called the column "brilliant," on Twitter. Slowly but surely, more came out of the woodwork, including Opinions editor Fred Hiatt. In an interview with The Wrap, Hiatt acknowledged he should have edited the gag reflex line "more carefully," but stopped short of calling his columnist a racist.