Why Lott should resign as majority leader (vanity)

12/10/02 | me

[ProudGOP]

Lott is not a racist.

However, I despise him more than I do the Democrats. He didn't lead when he was given the responsibility to and because of that, he wasted the GOPs best opportunity in years to make meaningful reforms.

I will never defend him. This incident, both the initial comment and his subsequent mishandling of the negative reaction, could only happen to a stupid man. It is fitting because that is the kind of leader he was.

[GilesB]

Stop this stupidity! What the Dixiecrats were about was State's Rights and conservative government. Their platform has been twisted into the single "They were for segregation" little sound-byte that has been spewing forth incessently. What is being attempted on Lott has succeeded on the Dixiecrats.

Narrowing the focus of what they stood for to one controversial specific of their platform, spun by those that hated them, is the same idiocy that is screaming "Racist" at Trent Lott now!

You all are acting like Demoweenie media types!

[Jhoffa_]

We will have to not agree here.

I think if we set that precedent then they will race bait us till the end of time.

I also think the very people who's wrath we are trying to avoid already hates us anyway, so it's too late.

[xlib]

Yea, afterall we got all of 9% of the black vote in 2000. You are right, we need to change our strategy.

If we'd gotten 12%, we could have avoided the Florida debacle. If we could consistently get 20%, by convincing enough blacks that (a) republicans aren't racists and (b) school choice, individual retirement accounts, medical savings accounts etc are an immediate and long-term GOOD THING for minorities and the poor, we'd be in control for the next 50 years, and, who knows, somewhere along the line a republican might actually get around to SHRINKING government instead of just growing it slower than the dems.

[LizJ]

I agree with you completely. I could care less about the democrats and what they are doing. I care about the damage this is doing to the Republican party. Trent Lott has set back any progress President Bush has made in convincing people that Republicans are not racist (and I do think he made progress.)

It is unfair that the media treats R's and D's differently, and that D's get a free pass on these issues, but life is not fair. Isn't that what we tell those who complain about their lot in life. We have to deal with the reality of the situation.

I don't want Lott to resign as Maj. Leader because Jackson and Sharpton want him to. I want him to do it because he is hurting the Republicans. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day. If I happen to have the same opinion as they do right now, it isn't because I am being PC, it is because I am really angry at his stupidity. Is this the person who should be leading the Senate?

[goodnesswins]

OK...all...so let's take guesses.....on what will actually happen....will Lott resign or won't he? (within the next week or so)

I have a feeling Lott will be stepping down as Senate Maj. Leader soon....he's like a weight on the Republicans right now....a dead weight. (I think what he said is being taken totally out of context....but you know those Dems....they'll continue to bleed it until it's dead.)

[ontos-on]

"Aaaaaah! So that's how you operate. I don't read anyone saying that "segregation couldn't have been the principal issue of the Dixiecrat campaign..." I came the closest to saying it - when I say it couldn't have been the ONLY plank of their platform. Are you trying to quote me???? If you do that, you'd better get it right, Jack! I said what I said, assuming you were a reasonable, honorable person...so far you are proving me wrong. Put words in Lott's mouth, put words in my mouth...for all I know now, you're putting words in the Dixicrat platform!

You really are funny and you have the honor of being my last post of the night. You are the one playing false word games. Answer this: Do you agree or not that the 1948 Dixiecrat platform had as its principal [menas "chief" or "foremost"] plank the upholding of Jim Crow laws through out the south [what were jim crow laws, I am sure you are asking now? They were laws thorughout the south that said that if you were "colored" you couldn''t do this or do that and you would go to this school and not that school where the non-colored folks went. Got it. Strom Thurmond was the Ross Perot of his day and his third party had a chief focus: resisting challenges to such Jim Crow laws--governnmentally enforced segregation of the races. Now, when a politician in 2002 goes all the way back to 1948 and says: gee, I am proud my state voted for the dixiecrats and ol strom and the country would have been better off going in Strom's direction -- the segregationist way, then that 2002 politician thus espouses his belief that segregation would have been preferable. If you do not get that, then there's nothing further I can do for you. "Your own words point out the frail twig of your argument...Trent Lott was a kid when Thurmond ran for president (1948). The only Thurmond Trent Lott ever knew was the one you admire. Trent Lott was praising Thurmond not the Dixiecrats. "

THIS IS THE BEST. MY OWN WORDS, eh. Yeah, some of us are required to actually read about things that happened before we were born. I guess your argument is that Trent Lott and maybe somebody else you know could never be accused of that, JACK. Later.

[xlib]

My guess? someone, Nichols maybe, or Frist, will step up to challenge Lott. If the challenger can get 20 or so votes on his own, Rove will quietly side with him, and Lott will withdraw. More of a fantasy than a prediction, but it could happen!

[Defiant]

Good post.

[GilesB]

The Dixiecrats were about State's Rights....Why don't YOU read up on them a bit???? The Jim Crow laws were caught up in that whole melieu - but that is what dishonest and narrow-minded folks chose to hang their hats on. Kind of like saying that because you don't think the Federal Government should be involved in local education that you're trying to "starve the children". The Dixiecrats weren't "for Jim Crow Laws" per se...they were AGAINST the federal government coming in a bullying states into rigid acceptance of the Fed's idea of right and wrong.

You are twisting words to fit your agenda. You claim knowledge of intent that is unknowable. You are shading historical fact into a simple black and white line. In short - you are wrong! And you are dishonest in being wrong!

I am still waiting for your acknowledgement and apology for blatantly misstating my words to mean nearly the opposite of what I said.

[aruanan]

What Lott said is that the country would have been better off if the civil rights and integration never happened.

Right. Lott didn't say this. There's more than abundant evidence didn't mean it. It is the racist mentality of people like Jesse Jackson that put this spin on what Lott said. Such a spin is so psychologically pathological that it's simply foolish to expect Lott to have considered it and said nothing for fear that someone could think that way. One may as well say that someone shouldn't say "Merry Christmas" because some folks like Osama bin Ladin would take this as meaning that all Muslims should be rounded up and rendered together with swine carcasses. He certainly shouldn't have apologized for someone like Sharpton or Jackson claiming to have been offended. He should have used their alleged pique as a teaching moment to show just what they are doing and why. If that didn't work, then he could have followed the example of Cedric the Entertainer in Barbershop and told JJ and AS to go eff themselves.

[ontos-on]

Look, guy, you are wrong about this, but I respect your tenacity. You are confusing being against government bullying and the kind of government bullying that says to blacks that they cant do this or that concerning public areas, inclusing schools. Wouldn't you agree that that was government bullying? The dixiecrats were not agianst government bullying. They just wanted states to have the right to make rules about voting and schools and public transportation and endless other things, so that the colored would be kept apart. Now I am not for the government forcing people to associate with each other. But I do not think we can say it is good to make laws like that in the USA. Don't you agree with me about that?

[L.N. Smithee]

I'm no racist but the PC crap has got to stop. Lott was never in the Klan like Byrd was and if Blacks can put up with Byrd they sure as hell can put up with Lott.

Yeah, that's a good way to welcome blacks into the GOP! "You put up with an ex-Klansman, so you should put up with a guy who said a segregationist should have been President!"

[John Lenin]

I'm not a big fan of Lott but to overlook Byrd and crucify Lott I'm going to have to stand on principle. If Lott goes so should Byrd. How's that for being fair ?

[RichardW]

He's got to go.

[GilesB]

So, as long as the government bullies about something we agree with, it's OK. And if somebody resists government bullying on principal, but ONE of the things the government is bullying about is a good thing - then they are bad??

Horse hocky! Yep, lot's of people got their backs up because of the issue of segregation...but the PRINCIPAL was States Rights.

I disagree with your premise. I believe the states were wrong to have Jim Crow laws -I believe the Fed was wrong to imposed against them

[ontos-on]

The US Constitution is there to protect people when states trampple on their constitutional rights. If a state passed a law saying its citizens could not possess guns, wouldn't it be appropriate for the federal govt to enforce those citizens' constituional rights?

[L.N. Smithee]

Absolutely. It says he's no coward.

When you're a cipher, you can afford not to care what people think of you. People who can be de-elected have to care.

Besides, if Pat weren't a coward, he would run for local office instead of President. But he won't do that because he knows he will get thrashed.

[L.N. Smithee]

I'm not a big fan of Lott but to overlook Byrd and crucify Lott I'm going to have to stand on principle. If Lott goes so should Byrd. How's that for being fair ?

Exactly what is your principle? That a racist shouldn't lead a party in the Senate? Fine! Lott's done as leader. But conservatives don't have any control over Byrd. Byrd will only go if the Demos demote him. Wouldn't it look worse for the Demos if they refuse to can their racist Senate leader?

Like I said: This is one of those moments when people have to decide what the heck it is they want -- to show that their standards are higher, or to feebly say, "If they can get away with it, we should be able to also."

[Southern Federalist]

In 1948 "States Rights" meant one thing: the right of the states to enforce racial segregation. If you really believe that Strom was worried about the Department of Agriculture intruding on state cotton planting regulations or something, you are delusive.

As cited in Robert George's NRO column today, here is what was printed on the sample ballot for the Dixiecrats in Mississippi:

"A vote for Truman electors is a direct order to our Congressmen and Senators from Mississippi to vote for passage of Truman's so-called civil rights program in the next Congress. This means the vicious…anti-poll tax, anti-lynching and anti-segregation proposals will become the law of the land and our way of life in the South will be gone forever."

If you can find me documentation that "states' rights" had any other content in the 1948 Dixiecrat Campaign besides the poll tax, lynching, and segregation, please provide it.

It might be worth taking a look at the civil rights plank in the '48 regular Democratic platform:

The Democratic Party is responsible for the great civil rights gains made in recent years in eliminating unfair and illegal discrimination based on race, creed or color.

The Democratic Party commits itself to continuing its efforts to eradicate all racial, religious and economic discrimination.

We again state our belief that racial and religious minorities must have the right to live, the right to work, the right to vote, the full and equal protection of the laws, on a basis of equality with all citizens as guaranteed by the Constitution.

We highly commend President Harry S. Truman for his courageous stand on the issue of civil rights.

We call upon the Congress to support our President in guaranteeing these basic and fundamental American Principles: (1) the right of full and equal political participation; (2) the right to equal opportunity of employment; (3) the right of security of person; (4) and the right of equal treatment in the service and defense of our nation.

These are all basically equal protection issues, not equal outcome issues. The issue of public accomodations is not even mentioned. As Clint Bolick has pointed out, from the 1860's to the beginning of the 1960's "equal opportunity of employment" as a civil rights goal meant overturning state regulations that artifically barred or hindered blacks from entering certain occupations; it did not mean racial quotas.

Besides, "state's rights" is not a conservative cause. Conservatives are concerned with the rights of human beings, not the rights of the state. "States' rights" is a phrase that has been abused for decades to mean the right of the state to take away individual freedom from people with the wrong skin color or parentage. That is what "states' rights" certainly meant in Strom's campaign in 1948. An enemy of human freedom is an enemy of human freedom, and that is what Strom was in '48. He outgrew it, and he should be commended for that, not for his earlier advocacy of tyranny.

The old Southern Democrats were the biggest statists around. From the point of view of liberty, a state-government statist is no better than a federal-government statist. Sometimes it is the proper function of the Federal government to restrain state-level statism in order to ensure American citizens the equal protection of the laws.