Of course, by even asking such questions, you're giving in to the ratty-rat rats. Pretty compelling, no?
Posted on 12/15/2002 10:33:55 PM PST by kattracks
WASHINGTON -- Sen. Trent Lott, reeling from poor strategic handling of an unanticipated crisis, on Thursday afternoon sustained a potentially mortal cut from George W. Bush. Lott's inner circle was stunned, not by the president's harsh criticism, but by what was not said. He did not "put a cap" on the feeding frenzy, failing to commend Lott for service to country and party.
That failure constituted a conscious decision by President Bush. He was determined to avoid a debate over whether Lott should resign as Senate leader. By saying nothing good about Lott, Bush was feeding the furor. The president's aides are well aware of this, but contend they can do nothing about it. Consequently, Lott's leadership remains in jeopardy.
This is a classic case of Republicans eating their own. Democrats gather around disgraced colleagues, most famously Bill Clinton, but also Sen. Robert Byrd, the Senate's senior Democrat. Unlike Lott, Byrd used overtly racist language, but got away with it. It was typically Republican that the president did not telephone his Senate leader until he had spoken to a predominantly black audience in Philadelphia one week after Lott's infamous remarks. Jack Kemp, Lott's longtime political ally, assailed him without warning. These attacks seemed prompted by criticism of Lott rather than what Lott said.
After Bush's speech, a national GOP political operative said Lott had one week to stop the bleeding. "Less than that," one of the senator's aides told me. Once the president spoke, Lott decided to hold his Pascagoula, Miss., press conference Friday night, in which he pleaded for "forbearance and forgiveness." Although stunned by Kemp's comments, Lott took his old friend's advice to meet soon with blacks.
At first, prominent Republicans did not see Lott in serious trouble with his declaration at Thurmond's 100th birthday celebration that the country would have been better off had he been elected president on the 1948 segregationist ticket. When Democratic attacks began, Lott was advised by Republican counselors the storm would soon blow over.
Lott did not see the peril because of what he really meant. While Thurmond is a geriatric miracle, it has been a long time since anybody engaged him in serious political discussion. Typically, Thurmond would rave about the beauty of Lott's wife, Tricia, and Lott would caution him not to "steal her."
Another set piece dialogue had Lott -- tongue-in-cheek -- wishing that Thurmond had been elected in 1948. The birthday party comments were previewed dozens of times by Lott in private encounters with Thurmond. The birthday audience's applause suggests it saw Lott was just kidding the centenarian. Turning a private joke into a public joke, however, produced a train wreck.
The Congressional Black Caucus and the Rev. Jesse Jackson instantly seized on Lott's remarks to play the race card. Prominent Democrats were slow on the pickup. Senate Democratic Leader Thomas Daschle talked to Lott Monday morning, Dec. 9, and said "I accept" Lott's explanation, adding: "There are a lot of times when he and I go to the microphone and would like to say things we meant to say differently." That afternoon, a Black Caucus member who had worked with Lott -- Eleanor Holmes Norton, the District of Columbia delegate -- said on MSNBC: "I've never seen any scintilla of racism in him."
That night on CNN, Jackson called Daschle "weak," and Daschle two days later demanded "a fuller explanation and apology" from Lott. Further scrutiny of Lott yielded the unsurprising revelation that he opposed racial integration as an Ole Miss fraternity boy in 1962. That overlooks the Deep South's remarkable transformation. While nearly all white politicians were segregationists then, none is today -- including Trent Lott.
Lott was late in recognizing the feeding frenzy. His incremental responses were insufficient, aggravated by phoning radio and television programs instead of appearing on camera.
Conservative activists and publications have joined the demand that Lott resign. Democrats played the race card, and conservatives responded on cue. It is now up to the Senate Republican Conference whether the Black Caucus and the news media shall pick the Senate Republican leader. George W. Bush is saying he has no dog in this fight.
©2002 Creators Syndicate, Inc.
How do you like it when the rabid anti-immigration guys accuse you of wanting rampant illegal immigration or even question your own status based on your screen name?
I haven't liked Lott for a very long time. To give the man his due, he DID push through, with yoman effort and speed, President Bush's tax cuts and quite a few other great things. If he were truly as ineffectual ( forget, for now, the Impeachment trial farce in the Senate ! ), he wouldn't / couldn't have done those things.
It's long past time, that you and the other political naifs, on FR, calling for Lott's head on a platter, to face REALITY as it is and not as you imagine; after having been force fed a load of garbage and swallowing it with orgasmic delight. Like being a dupe, do you ?
So now that you have forced him to publically decry this, he is guilty by apology.
How cute!
I'm sick of the double standard when no one on the left has ever apologized for anything they have said about race(which is a hell of a lot worse than anything Trent Lott said). Let's just label him a racist and throw him to the dogs. That's not right.
They know attacking Bush hasn't been working very well so they have to have a different boogeyman to scare folks into voting Democrat. Hastert is too bland and Cheney and Ashcroft are too removed from the day-to-day of politics. So the only logical meanie to beat up on is Trent Lott.
The LAST thing they want is for Trent Lott to go away. Who would they have around to demonize? Tom DeLay, second banana in the House? That's not a compelling target.
Other than the CBC, you'll notice the elected Dems have shut up about Lott after realizing their destruction machine was working too well. They only wanted to soften him up. He's too useful for them right where he is to see him quit.
The real question is why some Republicans feel inclined to keep this man in a position for which he is so obviously ill-suited. Can we possibly get somebody to take his place who won't drop his shorts every time the Democrats pout about something being unfair? Can we possibly get somebody in there who treats the Democrats the way the Democrats treat us? Sounds like McConnell's ready for the job. judging from his "censure" threat...
Riiiiight. So we should be like the 'Rats? Should we also have embraced Nixon after Watergate? Had him running the Republican party in a major state? Let him dictate the dispersal of party campaign funds? Installed his personal shill as RNC chairman? Paid him top dollar lecture fees? Fawned over him as an all around great Republican?
If Republicans had behaved like that it would have cost us dearly (as it has the Clintonized 'Rats, even if not as dearly, yet, as it should have). We would have paid much more severly for Watergate than we did. It is likely that Reagan would have never had the congressional majority he did in the first two years of his first term. That could have meant his tax cuts, deregulation and rearmament programs would never have passed.
Against their hopes the liberal media has strenghtened the party by holding us to a higher standard. We should certainly embrace that higher standard in this case.
Even if Lott had not proven himself stupid and out-of-touch, how has he earned the right to keep his leadership position unchallenged (facilitated by the chicanery of moving up the vote last month)? Is it by shirking his constitutional duty and agreeing to a sham impeachment trial in '99? Is it by bending over to the 'Rats and allowing them to share control of a Republican majority Senate in '00? Is it by letting Little Tommy Dasshole run parliamentary rigns around him the last two years?
I will say I'm not for forcing Lott to resign, but I'm sure looking forward to his being voted out of the leadership in January. In the mean time he should get no cover.
I love it. It gives me the opportunity to reveal my identity..... and them for the racist paranoid mental cases they really are. It's funny as hell.
Where have they been when THEIR party made worse remarks?
And then the rest of his ties to segregation and racists. It's not pretty, no matter how much lipstick you put on that pig.
Don't you get it? This is all really just the creation of some bored left wing kooks...there is nothing wrong at all with Lott or anything he's said. Incredible!
Of course, by even asking such questions, you're giving in to the ratty-rat rats. Pretty compelling, no?
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