Doesn't anybody ever remember anything in politics?

I know I'm reaching the age where I can't really say I'm "young" anymore, but really, 1990 wasn't that long ago. Every now and then, though, I'm reminded that for people who depend entirely on the Internet for political news and history, it might as well be 1890.

I just experienced one such moment when I read about this on Daily Kos. Ol' Claytie Williams and his "rape joke" were huge news at the time. How on earth could that have escaped the attention of everybody in the McCain campaign who could have put a stop to it? I don't get it. Some of you are probably expecting me to argue that Republicans in general must not find rape jokes offensive, but my opinion of the party overall isn't as low as my friends tend to think. They're not all that bad. Which makes me wonder how they could have let the ball drop on this one. But that link has McCain's spokesman saying the campaign "was unaware" of the notorious remark.

Sadly, I do find I can believe that McCain himself wouldn't find Williams' "joke" all that bad. He might not have really said "At least I don't plaster on the makeup like a trollop, you c**t" to his wife in public (I admit I find it suspicious that word didn't get out for sixteen years and then three people were willing to come forward at the same time), but then he might have. He did make that tasteless joke about Janet Reno being Chelsea Clinton's father about ten years ago (and, to his credit, he apologized...but still, he said it). This fits that pattern all too well.

By the way, another thing I remember - but which that link fails to mention - is that Williams' loss to Ann Richards was not because of the rape joke. He continued to lead in the polls for months after making the joke, and Richards pulled ahead of him only after he refused to shake her hand at a debate. Apparently it was okay to make light of violence against women in general in Texas, but you still had to treat an individual lady like a lady. That makes it just a little bit easier to understand why their next governor after Richards was who he was, doesn't it?