The Right Savages Keyes:

Alan Keyes’s senate campaign is off to a disastrous start. His endorsement of reparations is far likelier to alienate his right-wing supporters than it is to attract votes from the constituency that supports reparations. Moreover, as other bloggers have noted, it makes him look like a waffler.

This is from a piece from Frontpagemag savaging Keyes:

Mark your calendars: this is the earliest point at which Keyes has resorted to racial demagoguery, a staple of Keyes’ media appearances for nearly 20 years. When Keyes left the State Department in the late 1980s, he blamed his stalled career on a biased superior. Keyes referred to his inability to attract media attention during the 1996 presidential primaries as “a blackout, which means you keep the black out.” (Keyes last cited his racially charged dictionary in 1992, when he told Republicans they had gone colorblind, which “means that when a colored person walks in, you suddenly go blind.”) In 2000, the single-digit candidate accused the New Hampshire press corps of racism for not covering his presidential campaign to his satisfaction.

Beyond stirring ethnic animosities, Keyes also has a habit of engaging in genuinely neurotic behavior. Keyes chained himself to an Atlanta TV station in 1996, then went on a hunger strike to protest his exclusion from a televised debate. He deliberately provided fodder for Michael Moore’s camera during the 2000 primaries, body surfing the crowd at an alternative rock concert in return for Moore’s promised endorsement. (Moore predictably reneged.) Will this man convince Illinois voters that he’s the steady hand they want at the nation’s helm during a time of war?

Still, for some reason, I am greatly looking forward to the debates! (As nutty as he is, Keyes is fun to watch speak.)