'IT’S LYNCHING TIME': GOP candidate apologizes for pro-Confederacy, anti-Obama Facebook posts

The Party of Lincoln may soon have someone who hates Abraham Lincoln representing it in the Minnesota House of Representatives.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that Nolan West, a Republican legislative aide who is now running for an open seat in the Minnesota state legislature, has apologized for posting several messages on Facebook that praised the Confederacy and trashed Abraham Lincoln.

"I apologize for posting insensitive material," West said in an e-mail to the Star Tribune. "I've taken those posts down because they do not reflect who I am or what I believe."

And it seems there was a lot of insensitive material.

For example, to mark the 150th anniversary of Confederate President Jefferson Davis resigning from his post in the U.S. Senate, West posted a message attacking Lincoln as "the single worst president this country has ever seen."

West even posted a message that read, "IT'S LYNCHING TIME!" on the eve of President Obama's election in 2008.

The Star Tribune also notes that West "posted derogatory comments about women and gays," which shouldn't be surprising -- after all, if you're the kind of person who celebrates the existence of a slave state, you're probably not all that sensitive to women's and LGBT issues either.

West has since removed the posts from his Facebook feed, although he has signaled no willingness to drop out of the race at this point.