Virginia GOP Chairman Defends Comparison To Bin Laden

Remember Jeff Frederick, the Virginia GOP chairman who told McCain canvassers to compare Barack Obama to Osama Bin Laden? Well Mr. Frederick is sticking to his guns. Although he concedes his remark was dumb, he's defending it as 'true.'

Va. GOP chief: Obama remark was stupid but true

Virginia's Republican chairman said Tuesday that his remark tying Democrat Barack Obama to Osama bin Laden during the presidential campaign was stupid, but he refused to apologize...

...Frederick was asked about the remark Tuesday during a discussion of the 2008 Virginia presidential campaign with a group of newspaper editors. Obama was the first Democratic presidential candidate to win Virginia in 44 years.

"It was a stupid joke I gave to somebody in a small crowd of people and that's what happens," Frederick said. "But you know, it's really unfortunate. We live in a 'gotcha' society."

Frederick said he got hate mail, angry phone calls and vicious e-mails for weeks.

Even so, he stood by the comment Tuesday, defending it as true and saying he was taking cues from Republican John McCain's campaign after running mate Sarah Palin said Obama had been "palling around with terrorists."

Notice that Frederick claimed he was just telling somebody a joke, and casts himself as a victim. But that's a load of bunk. He's no victim, and he wasn't telling a joke. Here's what actually happened, as reported in mid-October by Karen Tumulty of TIME:

With so much at stake, and time running short, Frederick did not feel he had the luxury of subtlety. He climbed atop a folding chair to give 30 campaign volunteers who were about to go canvassing door to door their talking points -- for instance, the connection between Barack Obama and Osama bin Laden: "Both have friends that bombed the Pentagon," he said. "That is scary." It is also not exactly true -- though that distorted reference to Obama's controversial association with William Ayers, a former 60s radical, was enough to get the volunteers stoked. "And he won't salute the flag," one woman added, repeating another myth about Obama. She was quickly topped by a man who called out, "We don't even know where Senator Obama was really born." Actually, we do; it's Hawaii.

This is the modern GOP. A party for extremists -- and liars.