Maine's GOP Chair Now Says He's Not Racist Because He Plays Basketball with a Black Guy

This week we were introduced to the ramblings of Maine's outgoing GOP Chairman Charlie Webster who said was voter fraud being committed in Maine because "dozens, dozens of black people who came in and voted on Election Day," he said. Today he told Talking Points Memo: "I know black people. I play basketball every Sunday with a black guy."

This week we were introduced to the ramblings of Maine's outgoing GOP Chairman Charlie Webster who said was voter fraud being committed in Maine because "dozens, dozens of black people who came in and voted on Election Day," he said. Today he told Talking Points Memo: "I know black people. I play basketball every Sunday with a black guy."

Yes, we're completely serious. Even though it's now common knowledge that "Some of my best friends are    (insert minority here)   " does not absolve you of racism/homophobia/misogyny, that's what Webster went with in trying to clear up his comments from earlier this week about equating black voters with voter fraud: "Everybody has the right to vote, but nobody in town knows anybody that's black -- how did that happen? I don't know. We're going to find out," he told WCHS television. His explanation today isn't much better.:

There’s nothing about me that would be discriminatory. I know black people. I play basketball every Sunday with a black guy. He’s a great friend of mine. Nobody would ever accuse me of suggesting anything .... What I do suggest is that same-day voter registration without voter ID is pretty hard to police, and it’s odd that hundreds of people in a small town would show up.

Apparently, in Charlie Webster's Maine, PR teams, like black people, do not exist. And that's the golden quote of the TPM interview. And it's already getting some play in the Twitter stream for its "just-too-stupid-to-be-true" factor. Here's the first few reactions we found:

And now, well, he's unfortunately thrown in Chinese people into the mix too and explains how he fields calls from concerned Mainers when they see Asians on the street:

If you live in a town of a few hundred people and you go to the post office every day, if there’s someone who doesn’t look like you, you usually know that ... And that’s why when folks called me and said, ‘Where did this Chinese man come from? We don’t have any Chinese people here. Where did they come from?' Well, I don’t know! It’s a good point.

It's not really a good point Charlie, it isn't.