Rep. Steve Scalise--Clueless in Louisana?

In January, Representative Steve Scalise (R-Louisiana), who has been a member of the U.S. House since 2008, will be the House Majority Whip.  This makes him the #3 man in the Republican leadership.

In 1999, as a potential candidate for Louisiana's state legislature, Mr. Scalise told Roll Call that he embraced many of the same "conservative" views as David Duke, former head of the Ku Klux Klan, but that he believed himself to be more electable.  "The voters in this district are smart enough to realize that they need to get behind someone who not only believes in the issues they care about, but also can get elected.  Duke has proven that he can't get elected, and that's the first and most important thing."

In 2002, while still a member of Louisiana's state legislature, Mr. Scalise spoke at a meeting of the European-American Unity and Rights Organization, a group of white supremacists and neo-Nazis founded by David Duke.

The transcript of that speech is not available, but one attendee who heard the speech described it at the time as "productive," adding that Mr. Scalise "brought into sharp focus...an apparent (House and Urban Development Fund) giveaway to a selective group based on race."

In 2004, a Stormfront blog post identified Mr. Scalise as a man who had offered "his support for issues that are of concern to us."  Stormfront.org identifies itself as a "community of racial realists and idealists.  We are White Nationalists..."

what eye thynk:    In just a few weeks, the GOP will head to Washington holding the majority in both houses of Congress.  They promise to prove they are capable of governing fairly and equally with the further hope that they can win the minority vote in the 2016 presidential election. 

Yes, Mr. Scalise is only one man, but his association with David Duke and his racist organization would seem to be at odds with his party's promise; and fellow Republicans have been noticeably silent on the issue.

Yesterday, in an apparent attempt to halt the controversy, Mr. Scalise told the Times-Picayune that "If I knew today what they were about, I wouldn't go."  He did not issue an apology for his appearance as a speaker at the racist gathering, but instead justified it by explaining "I was without the advantages of a tool like Google."

This excuse is so weak it is laughable.  Search engines have existed in some form since 1993, and, by 1996, NetScape had brought a mainstream sensibility to web surfing.  Google came into existence in 1998--four years prior to Mr. Scalise's appearance before David Duke's organization.  As a matter of fact, in 2002, when Mr. Scalise spoke there, Mr. Duke's European-American Unity and Rights Organization had a website listing: WhiteCivilRights.com. 

So basically, in 1999, being fully aware of who David Duke was and what he stood for,  Mr. Scalise was proud to talk of possessing the same kind of conservative values.  In 2004, two years after his speech, Mr. Scalise continued to have the backing of Stormfront.  But today he wants us to believe that he was completely in the dark about the make-up or purpose of David Duke's signature organization when he spoke there.

Either Mr. Scalise is blatantly lying in order to save his own political butt or he is fundamentally stupid.  Either way, he isn't someone I'd want representing me in Congress--but then, I'm not a Republican.