PRESS RELEASE: Republican Party Issues Apology For Future Racism Using Future Technology

JUNE 16, 2009 (Washington, D.C.) - Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele today issued the following statement concerning the GOP's use of technologies, past, present and future:

Recently, the Grand Old Party has found itself at the center of numerous controversies surrounding its usage of technology and social media. Our desire to become a trendsetting organization, using the latest and greatest technology to reach out to the majority of Americans who agree with our core values of low taxes, a strong national defense and American prosperity, has led Republicans around the nation to embrace cutting-edge methods of reaching out to and organizing our supporters. From YouTube videos to Facebook events, Twitter feeds to whatever Digg does, the Republican Party is fully committed to using every technological means at its disposal to build and broaden a conservative coalition to shape and guide our nation's future.

Unfortunately, some within the Republican Party have chosen to use technology to spreadoffensivemessages, messages which, but for the Republican Party's forward-looking embrace of technology, would never have reached as wide of an audience as the one which the messages offended. Although the Republican Party does not approve of the content of the messages, the fact that everyone knows what we did is really something.

On behalf of the Republican National Committee, I apologize for the acts of individual Republican malefactors. Their racist e-mails, tweets, comments, videos, link lists, Flash games, chat statuses, DVR and Netflix queues, message board posts, RSS feeds, Wiki entries, virtual avatars, pictures and music do not represent the core values that drive the Republican Party. I also apologize preemptively for any future racism that Republicans engage in using any technologies that are yet to be developed, including - but not limited to - GPS-based friend-trackers, "four dimensional" media, agglomerated social media tracking services, 'smell-o-vision' and Webkinz 2.0.

The RNC is also instituting the following policies immediately:

- The #jiggaboo, #kikeslap and #beanswiththat tags will be immediately retired from Twitter.

- Photoshop and other photo-altering technologies will only be used to lighten pictures rather than darken them.

- The only fruits that will be referenced with respect to any member of the Obama family will be apples, oranges and strawberries. Under no circumstances will bananas or watermelons be used in reference to any member of their family, whether immediate or extended.

- All e-mail programs in Republican campaign offices will have the "Reply All" feature permanently disabled.

It is our hope that these measures will once and for all purge the Republican Party of the racism which has unfairly and unduly plagued it for so long. We remain committed to a diverse, inclusive and welcoming GOP that represents the interests of all Americans regardless of race or ethnicity. We do not believe that some Americans are jungle monkeys, others lazy wetbacks and yet others chop socky wontons. It would be despicable to say that one person's country of origin makes them a sand roach, while another's makes them a hook-nosed overlord of the purgatory of cannibalized Christian babies. It would be beyond all comprehension to make light - in any way - of Barack Obama's next foreign trip requiring the country in question to hide all of its fertile white women.

So that, my friends, we will not do.

Michael Steele, Republican National Committee Chairman