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In case you missed it, Dylann Roof openly admitted that the Council of Conservative Citizens, a racist group that is essentially a polite version of the Ku Klux Klan, inspired him to go on the path that led him to murder nine people at a historic black church in Charleston. Well, on Sunday, the CofCC responded in a way that proves “polite racism” is an oxymoron. In a nutshell, the CofCC conceded that Roof had committed a despicable crime, but had good reasons to be angry at blacks.

The CofCC said that while it “unequivocally condemns Roof’s murderous actions,” the massacre at Emmanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church should not “detract in the slightest” from the fact that Roof had very real concerns about a supposed epidemic of white-on-black crime. To the CofCC’s mind, “ignoring legitimate grievances is dangerous.” The emphasis is in the original.

In his racist manifesto, Roof said that he became a white nationalist in part due to reading about the CofCC’s reports about white-on-black crime. According to the CofCC, society ignores white-on-black crime–including sexual assaults of white women by black men–at its peril. The CofCC thinks that such complacency “only increases the anger of people like Dylann Roof” and “only makes acts of murderous frustration more likely” (emphasis in the original)–especially considering the attention racially motivated crimes by whites receives in the press. As if the CofCC didn’t make itself clear enough, president Earl Holt added a personal note saying that while the CofCC was “hardly responsible” for the crimes that Roof committed, the media has to own up to “spiking” stories about violent black-on-white crime.

The minute the CofCC blew a dog whistle into a megaphone by ranting about white women being raped by black men, this sorry attempt at a response loses any credibility. Admittedly, that isn’t saying a whole lot, considering that we are talking about “polite” racists. But even if there was something to the CofCC’s hand-wringing about black-on-white crime, there is never a defensible reason to kill innocent people. Period, full stop. Any attempt to even suggest that this racist thug had any “legitimate grievances” that justified such a barbaric crime is an insult to the victims and their families. Riddle me this, Earl–would you or anyone else from the CofCC have the guts to make a statement like this to the faces of any of the victims’ families, rather than from the comfort of your office in St. Louis? As big as St. Louis is, I doubt there’s a store in that area that sells guts that big.

By the “logic” that Holt and the CofCC are using, the Tsarnaev brothers committed a barbaric crime, but had “legitimate grievances” about how the United States was mistreating their fellow Muslims when they slipped their pressure-cooker bombs at the Boston Marathon finish line. The Unabomber terrorized this country for the better part of two decades, but had “legitimate grievances” about the influence of technology. And Tim McVeigh committed a barbaric crime, but had “legitimate grievances” about government control when he drove his truck into the Murrah Building. Etc., etc., ad nauseum.

A number of Republicans who took money from the CofCC in the past have scrambled to return that money. There really was no defensible reason even before then for any politician to take one penny from an organization that openly declares its opposition to “all efforts to mix the races of mankind.” It shouldn’t have taken the discovery that Roof committed his heinous acts in part due to reading material from said organization to make the likes of Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, and Rick Santorum return past CofCC donations. But let it be said here straight, clear, and in no uncertain terms–after this, if any elected official gives the CofCC the time of day, it should be prima facie evidence that official is morally unfit for office.