Breaking News: Bush formally distanced himself from Trent Lott moments ago?

CNN.com ^ | Dec. 12th, 2002 | cnn.com

[End The Hypocrisy]

Says CNN.com: "President Bush says recent controversial comments by incoming Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott "do not reflect the spirit of our country."

[End The Hypocrisy]

Who should be the next Senate Majority Leader, and why? When will (s)he take office?

[End The Hypocrisy]

Here's the URL:

http://www.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/12/12/lott.comment/index.html

[livius]

I certainly HOPE he distanced himself. Go Kay Bailey!

[NorCoGOP]

Former Vice President Al Gore, a Democrat, has labeled the comments "racist."

Pot, to kettle: "You're black." (Byrd ad, family ties...we won't forget that, Al)

[Nephi]

I heard last night (Kristol) that Mitch McConnell is next in line. That would be great!!

[VRWC_minion]

Bush calls Lott comments 'offensive'

Well-known conservative William Bennett chastises senator

Thursday, December 12, 2002 Posted: 1:08 PM EST (1808 GMT)

	Lott's comments have led two Democratic senators to call for him to give up his leadership post.

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	VIDEO Incoming Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott has again apologized and disavowed comments he made that some critics took as an endorsement of segregation. CNN's Jonathan Karl reports (December 12)
	RELATED • Lott backed tax break for school that banned interracial dating  • CNN's 'Larry King Live'

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush sharply rebuked incoming Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott for comments that some have called racist, saying any suggestion that segregation was acceptable is "offensive and it is wrong."

Bush's comments, delivered to an audience of charities in Philadelphia, came one day after Lott, a Mississippi Republican, said he would not give up his leadership post, despite the furor over his remarks.

"Recent comments by Sen. Lott do not reflect the spirit of our country," Bush said. "He has apologized and rightly so. Every day that our nation was segregated was a day our nation was unfaithful to our founding ideals."

The president did not call for Lott to resign, but other conservative say Lott must offer a fuller explanation of his comments, despite his apology.

"On their face, the recent comments of Sen. Trent Lott are offensive, repugnant and inimical to what the Republican Party stands for," said William Bennett, a noted conservative author and education secretary during the Reagan administration.

Bennett suggested that Lott's explanations about what he meant when he praised segregationist candidate Strom Thurmond's 1948 presidential campaign have been inadequate.

"If Senator Lott can provide a satisfactory explanation for his statement, this entire episode should be forgotten," Bennett said in a statement released Thursday. "If he cannot, he needs to step down as the Senate majority leader."

Bennett's statement suggests that Lott has failed to quell the controversy over his comments, which other conservatives complain have opened the GOP to charges of racial bigotry. Former Vice President Al Gore, a Democrat, has labeled the comments "racist."

Two Democratic senators -- John Kerry of Massachusetts and Russ Feingold of Wisconsin -- have called on Lott to resign his leadership post, but there has been no such call from any GOP senator. Several, in fact, have risen to Lott's defense, saying his apology should put the matter to rest.

Lott, a Mississippi Republican, made the comments last week at a 100th birthday party for the retiring Thurmond -- a party that often resembled a roast of the South Carolina Republican.

Lott noted that in Thurmond's 1948 presidential campaign, whose centerpiece was opposition to integration, Mississippi was one of four Thurmond carried.

"We're proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years either," Lott said.

That line initially drew little fire, but the criticism grew this week and intensified with a report of a comment he made at a campaign rally more than two decades ago.

In 1980 when he was a congressman, Lott spoke at a campaign rally for Ronald Reagan in Jackson, Mississippi. His comments followed a speech by Thurmond, who praised the platform that would soon put Reagan in the White House.

"You know, if we had elected this man 30 years ago, we wouldn't be in the mess we are today," Lott was quoted as saying of Thurmond in a November 3, 1980, article in The Clarion-Ledger, a Jackson newspaper.

Lott granted two interviews Wednesday during which he apologized repeatedly for the more recent comment, calling it "terrible." In neither case, Lott insisted, did he mean to endorse Thurmond's since-discarded segregationist views. Instead, Lott said, he meant to praise Thurmond's stance on defense, law enforcement and economic development.

"This was a mistake of the head or of the mouth, not of the heart," he said in a radio interview of his comments, reprising a line first used in 1984 by civil rights activist Jesse Jackson, who was criticized at the time for describing New York City as "Hymietown," a comment many took as anti-Semitic. Jackson has blasted Lott for his recent comment.

He said the sentiment he's heard expressed by his colleagues is more like, "'Hey, what's going on here?' He's apologized and he has said the things he needed to say and yet now it's being spoken about by Al Gore and by John Kerry."

Kerry -- who is exploring a possible 2004 bid for the White House -- became the first senator to call on Lott to resign his leadership post with a statement Wednesday. Feingold did the same Thursday.

"The comments made by Sen. Lott were indefensible and they did not reflect well on him or the Senate ... I agree with Sen. Kerry that Sen. Lott should step down as majority leader in light of these remarks," Feingold said in a statement.

The Wall Street Journal and the Family Research Council, a conservative group, have also criticized Lott for his comments, saying he has hurt Republican efforts to reach out to minorities.

Lott told King he hoped he could be judged in the full context of his career, which he said has included support of historically black colleges and universities.

"I do have a long record of trying to involve African-Americans and supporting our historical black colleges and universities -- Jackson State University, Alcorn University -- making sure that we had an active intern program to bring African-Americans into the state," he said.

[Catspaw]

I just saw the rerun of that part of the speech. WHOA!

[End The Hypocrisy]

The saga continues...

[scooby321]

Bill Frist he made the GOP a Majority

[Belial]

Rove has cut Trent off.

[SunStar]

Posted Here: Bush calls Lott comments 'offensive'

[End The Hypocrisy]

If George Allen (Va.) gets upset that he's apparently not next in line, maybe he'll realize how shameful his pro-pork policies for NASA-Langley have been. Rather than use his space subcommittee chairpersonship to push space tax incentives through (or even to co-sponsor tax bills already in the Senate) he kissed up to subsequently discredited and ousted NASA Administrator Dan Goldin, trying to boost NASA Langley's budget. Even Virginians were taken aback, not to mention space entrepreneurs.

[AppyPappy]

Maybe if Lott resigns from the Senate, Bush will be satisfied.

[baseballmom]

WOW what a speech. Ashley Banfield MSNBC said it was the best speech she has heard from the President in a while. Because when a person gives a speech it is always delivered so well when the person is passionate about his subject. He said about Lott (partly, I can't rememember it all)... "'Recent remarks by Senator Lott do not reflect the spirit of our country. He has apologized, and rightly so". ..... there was more about the party he represents (the Republicans) was founded on the basis of equal rights for all our citizens. Great speech. Go W.

[TLBSHOW]

LETS SEE, HUMMM BLACKS SUPPORT LOTT BUT THE PRESIDENT NOW DOESN'T? AFTER HE DID SUPPORT LOTT. YEP THE RATS STRIKE AGAIN!

[End The Hypocrisy]

>>>Rove has cut Trent off.<<<


That is serious, indeed. But will he resign like Gingrich and Livingston did? If so, we could be that much closer to losing control of the Senate because the Mississippi governor is a 'rat.

[xzins]

Sen Bill Frist of Tennessee is our best and brightest. He is an MD. He spearheaded the recent Senate campaign to elect Republicans and he was wildly successful seeing that the Republicans now own the Senate. He's articulate, bright, photogenic, organized, and capable.

He should be at the head of the list.

[Peach]

Although I personally can't stand Lott, until the press holds Dems to the same standards, I cannot get upset about his comments. Below is my letter sent to major news outlets today:While not a fan of Trent Lott, I feel compelled to respond to the selective outrage regarding his comments at Strom Thurmond’s 100th birthday. On May 5, 1993, the Washington Post quoted former President Clinton’s comments at an 88th birthday ceremony for former Arkansas Senator William Fulbright where Clinton bestowed the Presidential Medal of Freedom on the man he described as a “visionary humanitarian, a steadfast supporter of the values of education, and my mentor."

Of course, the man Clinton was praising, who he called his "mentor," was a rabid segregationist. In 1956, Fulbright was one of 19 senators who issued a statement entitled the "Southern Manifesto." This document condemned the 1954 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education. Its signers stated, among other things, that "We commend the motives of those States which have declared the intention to resist forced integration by any lawful means."

Fulbright later voted against the 1964 Civil Rights Act. He voted against the 1965 Voting Rights Act. And he did so because he was a segregationist and believed in separating the races — in schools and other public places.

More recently, in October 2002, Clinton traveled to Arkansas to dedicate a 7 foot bronze statute to Fulbright, and still nothing from the press admonishing Clinton for honoring a racist.

I'm not making excuses for Trent Lott. He should have apologized for his insensitive comments, and he did. Nor am I making excuses for Strom Thurmond's past. I'm questioning the hypocrisy of selective moral outrage by the Left.

[dfwgator]

Expect Lott to step down tommorrow afternoon.

[Belial]

Lott can take one for the team, no doubt.