(h/t FDL)

You knew it was coming. To the conservatives that populate pollute the airwaves, Colin Powell's endorsement of Barack Obama could only be because he is black:

STEPHANOPOULOS: We just found out that former Secretary of State General Colin Powell has said he's going to vote for Barack Obama. Big impact?

WILL: Some impact. And I think this adds to my calculation -- this is very hard to measure -- but it seems to me if we had the tools to measure we'd find that Barack Obama gets two votes because he's black for every one he loses because he's black because so much of this country is so eager, a) to feel good about itself by doing this, but more than that to put paid to the whole Al Sharpton/Jesse Jackson game of political rhetoric.

First, I'm not even sure what "put paid to the whole Al Sharpton/Jesse Jackson game of political rhetoric" means. And what do either of them have to do with Powell's endorsement?

Is Will trying to suggest that Powell has some variation of "white man's guilt" and is seeking to mollify it by endorsing Obama? Clearly, Will does think that the endorsement is more based on skin color than anything else, a projection that I find more illustrative of the simple-minded Republican groupthink support than anything else. It shows just how insulated and isolated the GOP is from the real world, where people look at more than just how much someone looks like you and considers larger issues.

Just as predictably, Rush Limbaugh chimes in as well:

Rush Limbaugh said Colin Powell's decision to get behind Barack Obama appeared to be very much tied to Obama's status as the first African-American with a chance to become president.

"Secretary Powell says his endorsement is not about race," Limbaugh

wrote in an email. "OK, fine. I am now researching his past endorsements to see if I can find all the inexperienced, very liberal, white candidates he has endorsed. I'll let you know what I come up with."

Um...hey Rush, how about George W. Bush in 2000? Maybe he wasn't "very liberal" (although he certainly portrayed himself as more centrist than he is in actuality), but he was definitely considered inexperienced on the national scene and you don't get much whiter than the Bush clan. Rush continues:

"I guess he also regrets Reagan and Bush making him a four-star [General] and Secretary of State and appointing his son to head the FCC. Yes, let's hear it for transformational figures."

Really, you want to go diving into that "how ungrateful that black man is for all the white men have done for him" abyss? It's frightening to me how these conservatives don't to even try to hide their white hoods any more. Rush, I know that conservatives value ignorance, but you have to know that becoming a four-star General is not a political appointment. Powell earned that rank, and to suggest otherwise now because he doesn't agree with your water-carrying is just more of the Republicans' sick tactic of smearing the messenger.