Cities aren’t their base, so Republicans in federal elective office generally don’t talk about urban affairs. In fact, they went so far as to delete the phrase from the name of the House Committee on Banking, Finance, and Urban Affairs (now the Committee on Financial Services) – in a fit of “Republican political correctness,” according to U.S. Rep. Barney Frank in the New Yorker. President-elect Barack Obama will try to redress such GOP negligence by creating a White House Office of Urban Affairs.

But since the election, Republicans have made several high-profile mentions of things urban — urban myths and legends, that is. In exit interviews, President Bush and Vice President Cheney have three times invoked the phrase “urban myth” or “urban legend” — picking up on Republican U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann’s use of “urban legend” to discount reports of her own statements, as quoted verbatim or shown in video clips, regarding anti-American attitudes in Congress.

Vice President Cheney, on Jan. 7, 2009, said about allegations that he made decisions for President Bush: “This whole notion that somehow I exceeded my authority here, was usurping his authority, is simply not true. It’s an urban legend, never happened.”

President Bush, on Dec. 17, 2008, said about torture and wiretapping: “There’s a lot of urban myths about certain decisions I have made. But when the truth comes out and people will say, ‘Oh, I see what he did.’”

President Bush, on Dec. 16, 2008, said about not listening to opinions on Iraq from outside his inner circle: “I’ve heard all kinds of voices. There’s urban myths in Washington, D.C., and, you know, of course I listened.”

U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, on Nov. 18, 2008, said about her televised statements calling for an investigation of anti-American views held by her colleagues in Congress: “It’s an urban legend that was created. That isn’t what I said at all.”