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Try a little mental exercise!

Pretend that you were at the birthday party and try to find a way to compliment the 100 year old fart without the possibility of someone making a issue about it!

Easy, I've already done it...
The only way to for Trent Lott to address Thurmond's '48 campaign would have been to chart how far the retiring senior Senator from South Carolina has traveled in the last 54 years, and to use him as a metaphor to further illustrate how far the South and America have come. Had he done this, Lott could have simultaneously honored the Centenarian Senator and reiterated that Republicans, like the South and like America, have learned the errors of racism and segregation, and have long since embarked on a better path.
POSTED HERE

I one swoop I've acknowledged Thrumond's Presidential bid, and its defincies, an a fashion that honors Strom's change of heart against segregation, and the South's and America's as well. Rather than pay tribute to the Strom Thurmond of 1948, I've honored the remarkable centenarian he is today.
Had Lott done this, he'd still be Majority Leader next year, instead of having his foolish mug plastered on the covers of Time and Newsweek next week.

Pls add: That-

In 2001, while Lott unable to let go of his past hatreds cast the only vote against the confirmation of Judge Roger Gregory, the first African American judge ever seated on the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Strom Thurmond having renounced his past by his actions - voted for Gregory and got a Pres W BUSH REPUBLICAN CONSERVATIVE Judicial Appointee on the bench.

Note- it's no accident that the word Black does not precede CONSERVATIVE judicial Appointee.

Chracter Matters

I agree that the scenario you came up with, would have been much better than what he did say.

The fact is, it was a light hearted party for the old man, and not the floor of the Senate. The critical appraisal of the changes in the south would have had no place at a birthday event.

This thing has gotten way too much attention for what it was not.

It was not a endorsement of segregation. A past reality that has been or should be all but forgotten.

Segregation has not been a political issue since the 60s. Lott simply forgot that someone might dredge it up as a issue. That is all there is to it!