Fun stuff: In an interview set to air tomorrow on "D.L. Hughley Breaks the News," Howard Dean joked about a bit of a sensitive subject: The fact that Rahm Emanuel wasn't an early fan of Dean's 50-state strategy, which helped put Emanuel's new boss in the White House.

Asked if he felt vindicated, Dean joked that he would have felt more vindicated if Obama had given him the chief of staff gig instead of giving it to Rahm:

"Rahm ended up as chief of staff to Barack Obama," Dean said, "so I don't feel too vindicated." When he was informed that he had been right, Dean cracked: "I might have been right but I'd rather be chief of staff."

DNC spokesperson Stacie Paxton emailed to assure us that Dean was kidding. "Dean was clearly joking," Paxton wrote, adding that Dean had recently praised Rahm on MSNBC as "tough," "smart," and "loyal."

"As he's said previously, Dean has a lot of respect for Rahm Emanuel and thinks he'll do a great job as Chief of Staff," Paxton said.

No doubt, but as James Thurber put it, "the humorist makes fun of himself, but in so doing" he is simply revealing people's "true nature."

The interview is set to air tomorrow night at 10 P.M.

Was this a Freudian slip, or a deliberate insult?

In an interview on NPR today, Howard Dean was asked about the increasing minority populations in the country, and he predicted it would bode well for the Democrats.

"If you look at folks of color, even women, they're more successful in the Democratic Party than they are in the white, uh, excuse me, in the (chuckles) Republican Party, because we just give more opportunity to folks who are hard-working people who are immigrants and come from members of minority groups."

RNC chairman Mike Duncan was quick to respond in a statement tonight: "Howard Dean's comments on race and gender today are disappointing and wrong. His efforts to divide Americans are an insult to all our nation's citizens and have absolutely no place in the national dialogue."

We think it was a Freudian slip -- though Dean didn't seem too embarrassed about it. The interview can be heard here, with the apparent gaffe at shortly after the seven-minute mark.

Late Update: DNC press secretary Stacie Paxton has responded in an e-mail to Election Central: "He misspoke and corrected himself immediately."