Cain: I Was Joking About Killer Electric Border Fence

Anyone want to make a bet as to whether this comes up at tomorrow night's GOP debate? When David Gregory asked Herman Cain yesterday about statements—made as recently as the day before—that he’d build an electrified fence to keep out illegal immigrants, Cain brushed it off. “That’s a joke,” he said. “I’ve also said America needs to get a sense of humor." But the New York Times isn’t buying it. Cain’s initial remarks were delivered as “serious commentary,” it argues, and they drew cheers, not laughs.

“We’ll have a real fence. Twenty feet high, with barbed wire, electrified, with a sign on the other side saying, ‘it will kill you,’” Cain said, adding that he was “not worried about being insensitive,” and that he’d even consider sending troops “with real guns and real bullets” to keep immigrants out. Cain has actually discussed the fence a few times—in another speech spotted by the Christian Science Monitor (video No. 3), he does indeed appear to be playing for laughs. The Times also noted another exchange in the interview in which Cain admitted that he was “not familiar” with the term “neoconservative." (More Herman Cain stories.)