"If you think I am a spineless wuss, then how do you explain
that the GOP has put up with anything I or my Democrats want."
Posted on 06/07/2007 5:39:08 PM PDT by beaversmom
Trent Lott, Unplugged: "Are We Men Or Mice?"
Thursday, June 07, 2007
From Hugh Hewitt's website
(click on top link for the actual audio)
Trent Lott's floor remarks in the Senate this morning were not certainly designed to asssure Republicans that their concerns on border security and illegal immigrants from countries with jihadist networks were being addressed in a serious fashion. There is also an unfortunate, and probably unintentional tone of condescension which just doesn't play with the voters that GOP senators seeking re-election need to help them in that effort. The backdrop to the current debate is not only the immigration bill, but also six years of Democratic obstruction and the loss of a 55-45 seat majority, a loss that is at least in part --I believe in large part-- owed to the non-confrontational approach of Senate Republicans to that obstruction, and to the pervasive air of indifference to key conservative goals from judicial nominations, to John Bolton, earmarks and absurd spending, and of course the war. What Senator Lott is voicing in a strong echo of those years is a belief in an institution that many conservatives have lost faith in because Democratic ruthlessness in the use of the filibuster. Now that the GOP has only the filibuster with which to work, the leadership is not replicating the tactics of the Democrats when the Denmocrats werte in opposition, but is in fact seen to be caving on a major issue. Having been hamstrung for most of the past four years, it is simply galling to hear the Republican Whip promise Harry Reid a vote in the spirit of getting something done.
Senator Lott:
If anybody in America likes where we are with illegal immigration and legal immigration, if they think what we've got now is good or tolerable, fair or responsible, then fine. Let's try and kill this bill. Kill it with amendments. Kill it with the debate. Vote it down. I don't think that is respobnsible. This is one of the biggest issues facing this country and the question is do we have the courage, tenacity and the ability to get anything done anymore. If we can't do this, we ought to vote to dissolve the Congress and go home and wait for the next election...
Can we do anything anymore? I don't like a lot of these amendments. I don't like a lot of what is in the bill. I was in and out of the meetigs, but I was not one of the people that worked in the so-called Grand Bargain. Some people are acting now like it was a sinister operation. I don't believe so. Everybody knew there was an effort underway. Republicans were involved. Democrats were involved. The Adminstration was involved. Conservatives, liberals, agriculture, everybody. Now we are going to pick it to death. I just don't think this is responsible. I am getting calls, but I would say to my constituents, "Do you ahve no faith in me after 35 years? That I'm just going to buy a pig in a poke here? Or be for something that's bad?..."
Last year I voted against what we came up with because I didn't think it got better. It got worse. But we have an obligation to try and we should not get all in a twit because we made one mistake or we don't get the one we wanted. Look I voted for amendments that passed and amendments that failed. I voted for bills Bush...get over all of that. This is a big issue. This is the United States Senate, the great deliberative body. Are we going to belie that description, or are we going to step up to this challenge and try and get it done right? We should vote down cloture now.. Cloture shouldn't have been filed. You can't ram the Senate. You can't ram the minority around here. This won't work. All it does is make people get madder and it takes longer...
So we're going to have a vote on cloture and we're going to defeat cloture becaue more amendments are legitimately pending. But I'm serving notice that I'm going to be a part of trying to help to find a way to get to a conclusion, to a vote. Vote it up. Vote it down. But to try and kill it with all these amendments, you know, that are being thrown up here for the purpose of killing it to me is not an appropriate way to proceed....
This is time where we are going to see whether we are a United States Senate anymore. Are we men or mice? Are we going to slither away from this issue and hope for some epiphany to happen? No. Let's, let's let's legislate. Let's vote. I think the majority leader has a right to expect at some point we end it. Try and cover as many objections with as many amendments as we can. But at some point we have got to get this done....
Senator Kennedy, I appreciate the legislative leadership you have been providing. I know it is not easy, you know, and your own colleagues and those of us over here have been beating you up. I mean, your a nice poster child. Thank you very much for what you do. But I'll tell you one thing I have learned the hard way. When it comes to legislating, when you are dealing with Senator Kennedy, you had better bring your lunch, because you are going to get educated, you are going to learn a lot, and you are going to get a result. Hopefully it is going to be a good one. Good luck, senator from Massachusetts. I yield the floor.
Sen. Kennedy:
And the senator too. I thank my friend from Mississippi, and I commend him for a constructive and a positive attitude.
I continue to urge readers and listeners to contact Republican Leader McConnell, Repoublican Whip Lott and NRSC Chair Ensign via the Hill switchboard at 202-225-3121 to urge the bill be fixed to mandate full and immediate construction of the fence prior to the grant of probationary benefits, a robust expansion of the Border Patrol and other federal agencies being tasked with the adminsitration of the background check and employment verification systems, and a separate treatment of illegal immigrants from countries of special interest in the war which would confer no rights to employment or travel until a positive showing of loyalty is made.
Senator Lott would gather greater support for the idea of trying to fix the legislation if he would, in consultation with the caucus, set some minimum reforms without which cloture would not be agreed to. But his remarks today suggest just the opposite is unfolding: a charade intended to present the appearance of reform of the compromise leading to a gentle but no less final jam down.
I expect the cloture vote that looms to pass given Senator Lott's remarks, and when it does, the Senate GOP is going to see blowback that it will not recover from in time for '08. Political insanity of the first order, orchestrated by leadership that seems not to have grasped that it is just as easy to go from 49 to 39 as it was from 55 to 49.
Funny you should ask, Trent, ol' buddy, ol' pal...
Harry Reid has Trent Lott’s testicles in a jar on his desk. He also has Lott’s spine in his coat closet.
The Adminstration was involved. Conservatives, liberals, agriculture, everybody - even the racist La Raza.
Betcha Reid couldn’t get Lott’s Aqua-Net though.
Monkeymen all in business suits.
Like we didn’t see this coming in the headline. LOL
Next time Trentie can bring his pom poms and leotards and show us just what real men are made of.
Skweek, skweek. He’s such a dweeb.
A lot of folks are giving Trent credit for being a spineless wuss and , while I can’t totally disagree, I’m a little curious if it ain’t the God almighty dollar that has this weasel in such a fervent and earnest uproar against killing the bill.
IMO Trent Lott has never struck me as being particularly smart. The guy lacks any kind of political moxy. It’s no surprise that he would be given a leadership position among the GOP’s senators.
He ought to clear out of leadership,...yet again.
"If you think I am a spineless wuss, then how do you explain
that the GOP has put up with anything I or my Democrats want."
I can honestly say here that there is not a single political office other than President, that has someone holding it, that I voted for.
Is he a leader? I wouldn’t follow him to lunch even if he was buying.
Q: "Are we men or mice?"
A: "Maybe gerbils?"
Trent Lott is a total sellout to all Mississipians (I know; as I was born there). He is a gutless, balless, weasal. Ya’ll know what we do to weasals (or other vermin) in the ‘Sip’??? Let your minds wonder. Too bad this bastard cannot be impeached or removed due to ‘incompetence’
Dear Senator Lott, I don't know what has happened to the Republican Party lately, but you all have seemed to lost your way and are acting more like the socialist Democrats than Conservative Republicans.
How can you, in good conscience, support this Immigration "Reform" Bill?
I find it troubling on several counts.
The first count is that a MAJORITY OF AMERICANS (and even more of your constituents) OPPOSE this TRAVESTY.
The second count is that Senator Conyers seems to have it right when he calls it the "Leave No Felon Behind" Bill.
How can you, or any of your peers, reward millions of illegal aliens for doing something that would land legal citizens in jail? How can you further do it at the expense of the legal tax payers of America?
Have you lost your mind? Unless you are going to advocate that those of us, who live within the laws of this great Nation, that we too can start getting rewards for breaking the laws that you and your misguided compadres seem to think so little of, I would really appreciate it if you would start doing what you were elected for - represent us, not a horde of illegal lawbreakers, and support the Constitution and the Laws of the Land that have made us a great Nation. To do otherwise is to thumb your nose at the rest of us and to willingly subvert this great Land. Sincerely My Name Went Here
Rat is more like it.
Just your run of the mill RATpublican. Blackbird.
That is profound. Well thought out. And fits me too.
No Trent. We have NO faith whatsoever in you, your colleiges, or in fact anyone in government any more.
We are NOT an uneducated horde that you have to "take care" of, or reign over.
We are Americans.
Free men and free women, who will not be ruled by you and your cronies.
You think that by giving amnesty to tens of millions of new subjects who don't know what freedom is, that you'll get a pliable majority to keep you and your class in power forever without having to worry about those pesky voters who can think for themselves.
We're not going to stand for it.
I'm just about done with the 3rd box.
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