The Kansas-based Republican made the off-color remark during a town hall last week, when she implored fellow conservative not to lose faith in the GOP, for they can — and will! — find someone to lead them out of the dark Obama days. From the horse's mouth:

Republicans are struggling right now to find the great white hope. I suggest to any of you who are concerned about that, who are Republican, there are some great young Republican minds in Washington.

The phrase "great white hope" traces its origins back to 1908, when racist whites called on James J. Jeffries to beat the great, black boxing champion Jack Johnson. Jeffries ended up throwing in the towel. But, nevermind.

Since then, the phrase has become quite common, and we can definitely see how someone like Jenkins — or anyone — would use it in a ra-ra speech. So, we're not going to call her a racist, but we will wrinkle our forehead in wonder.

Jenkins isn't totally unaware of her comment's objectionable subtext. Her office insists she didn't mean to be offensive and issued an apology. It was, we're sure, from the heart, not a reaction to outraged masses.

Sebelius, a Democrat in a crazy conservative heartland state, did try her darndest to expand health coverage for Kansans, but Kansans didn't want to pay more cigarette taxes (which is understandable—why don't we tax something else for a change) and Republicans wanted a more "market-based approach" because they don't even bother to propose solutions based in anything other than buzzwords anymore, so she just kinda gave up after she signed Kansas up for that program that lets Americans buy drugs from American pharmaceutical companies but via nations with socialized health care so the drugs are much cheaper than they'd be in a marker-based system.

There is some scandal involving her once having a party for an abortionist, but we are more curious to see if anyone in the senate brings up her son's racist RISD "prison rape board game" project during the confirmation.

Remember that? So funny!