Big Tent. A Big White Tent.

Hard to believe the GOP still can't seem to manage getting more than 2% of the black vote when they've got swell fellas like Augusta, GA Housing Board Member and Republican Party official Dave Barbee welcoming people into the tent by endorsing "making the downtown whiter."

Barbee expressed "sincere regret" for poor wording in the Aug. 7 e-mail - which urged developers to support a plan to shut down a public housing development and replace it with "high income folks who will tend to be White."

"We will be making the downtown Whiter with moving 200 whites in and moving 500 blacks out!" he wrote.

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeee!

The GOP has not asked Barbee to step down from his position as the Republican Party Chairman for the 10th Congressional District. Meanwhile, Augusta Mayor Deke Copenhaver released a statement noting that Barbee "apologizes to anyone in the Augusta community that he may have inadvertently offended." I guess all the people he advertently offended can go suck an egg.

Mayor Copenhaver's statement also noted that he has accepted Barbee's apology and "with God's help, may we forgive and move forward as a community of trust and hope." Yeah, God's help…and maybe the help of a diversity seminar.

[H/T Steve Benen.]