Reid apologises to Obama over ‘negro dialect’ remark

SENATE Democratic leader Harry Reid has apologised for saying the race of Barack Obama – whom he described as a “light skinned” African-American “with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one” – would help rather than hurt his eventual presidential bid.

Obama quickly accepted, saying: “As far as I am concerned, the book is closed.” Reid, facing a tough re-election bid this year, spent the day telephoning civil rights leaders and fellow Democrats in hopes of mitigating the political damage.

The revelations about Reid’s 2008 comments were included in the book “Game Change” by Time Magazine’s Mark Halperin and New York magazine’s John Heilemann. The behind-the-scenes look at the 2008 campaign that elevated Obama to the White House is based on the writers’ interviews with more than 200 sources, most of whom were granted anonymity – therefore, much of the material could not be immediately corroborated.