Mayor Dean Grose said he was “deeply embarrassed…for any harm or hurt.”

When African-American Keyanus Price, a local businesswoman, initially responded to Grose that the email was “not nice,” Grose dismissed her concern, as “you gotta laugh every now and then. I want to see the coloring contests.”

Apparently, that was too much for Price.

After other city officials and residents created an uproar over the email, Grose responded with his apology.

The important lesson in this case, just as it was in the New York Post chimpanzee cartoon earlier, is that some delicate ground is being treaded upon. The watermelon patch in front of the White House is completely racist. There is no other interpretation for it. The cartoon with police shooting the chimpanzee is less clear. Primates have often been used as examples of buffoonery and many do think that is what the stimulus package represents. Unfortunately, the Post’s cartoonist failed to realize the connotation with African-Americans, namely President Obama. That episode was blown out of proportion because of a poorly developed cartoon, the watermelon patch, on the other hand, is all about ridiculing because of race.