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1. In 1976, James Bostic, the only black man in the political hierarchy at the Department of Agriculture, defended recently resigned Sec. Earl Butz, saying “he doesn’t have a racist bone in his body." 
2. That followed Butz telling John Dean, in an article for Rolling Stone … well, I’d rather not type it out. I’ll just let you read it for yourself, and contemplate Butz’s actual osteological makeup.
3. I wasn’t the first time I’ve seen the “not a racist bone in his body” defense used, but it’s the first I can find deployed to protect a national-level official from the plain meaning of his words or deeds. And it grows more routine during the Reagan administration.
