Posted on 01/01/2003 8:43:17 AM PST by TLBSHOW
So Much More Than Lott
So, already by Christmas the Republicans took their newly revealed "racist" Trent Lott and chopped him off like a hood ornament and left him folded up in the glove compartment like a paper napkin full of forgotten fruitcake.
Nice crisis resolution, huh? Neat image management, right?
Not so fast.
One problem. Trent Lott is NOT a racist.
Nobody believes Lott is a racist. His enemies don't believe that. His friends don't believe that. And nobody believes Trent Lott believes America would have been better off if Strom Thurmond had been elected president in 1948.
What everybody DOES believe is that Lott maladroitly gave his enemies the right to say, childhood-game fashion, "You SAID it and – ha ha – we can prove it!" Lott's true feelings – and actions – regarding racial issues fell off the bottom on the relevancy charts.
The Republican Party just turned and ran from what they feared would be dreadful political trouble down the road. That fear turned the quality of intra-party justice from King Solomon to King Kong.
Am I the only one troubled by this Republican unconditional surrender to an obviously phony charge?
Can anybody name the last Democrat tossed by his teammates into the crater of a live volcano no matter how racist, anti-Semitic, anti-American or clinically insane a comment he or she uttered?
Please don't misunderstand; I don't hold that Democratic loyalty to their rogues and fools as a role model. There simply wouldn't BE a Democratic Party if they jettisoned their own according to every political correctness breeze, real or artificial, the way the Republicans did. So let's stick to Republicans and Trent Lott.
In sticking to Trent Lott, let me quickly point out that I'm not talking about Trent Lott; rather, I'm talking about so much MORE than Trent Lott.
You hear Republicans ratifying their firing squad by saying, "I never thought much of him as a leader anyhow." Not even a nice try, folks. That doesn't in the slightest excuse the way you handled things.
"By the fifth or sixth apology he'd abandoned every principle that makes me a Republican in the first place," goes the refrain; and that's just as irrelevant as the justification preceding.
The key question, rather, is, What does the Trent Lott affair now say about the Republican Party? I suggest it says something that was better left as a vague suspicion or, better yet, never thought of at all.
It says: "These are my principles; and if you don't like them, fear not. I have others." It says, "These are our leaders, and we won't surrender them – unless you attack." Instead of a political army guided by courage and conviction, we now see the Republicans as a nudist in the middle of a barbed-wire fence.
Republican political fragrance finishes first. Trent Lott's innocence finishes last.
Delete, please, any notion that my feelings owe to some good-ol'-boy affinity with the Old South, and double-click on the fact that, at the age when Trent Lott was figuring out ways to keep his national fraternity lily-white, I and my hearty band of white Southern activists were (successfully!) rallying the student body of the University of North Carolina to overthrow the university administration's policy of making our first four black students sit in the Jim Crow section of Kenan Stadium instead of sitting with the rest of us students.
That's important to ME but, likewise, irrelevant to the issue at hand.
Dogs aren't the only ones who smell fear. We all do. The beautiful woman smells the fear of the nervous nerd asking for a date. The boss smells the fear of the insecure worker asking for a raise. And the voter smells the fear of a political party – even one controlling all three branches of government – that so quickly sacrifices a leader who did NOT mis-think, who did NOT mis-act, but who merely mis-SPOKE.
Trent Lott's birthday party remark about Sen. Thurmond was breathtakingly brain-dead.
(It was not unprecedented. President Gerald Ford said in debate to Jimmy Carter in 1976 that the Soviet Union did not exercise domination in Eastern Europe. And he no more believed that even as he was saying it than Lott believed America should have elected Strom Thurmond. Trent Lott's mysterious brain failure only cost him the party leadership in the Senate. Ford's probably cost him the presidency!)
If you should ask me, "Why, then, do they say things they don't believe?" you prove to me you've never competed in the public arena without a script.
Hear and heed, now, Republicans. All your friends and all your foes now know where your buttons are and exactly how high and how quickly you will jump when they're pushed.
Here's how the Republicans SHOULD have handled it.
Lott himself should have instantly announced that he would have preferred Republican Governor Tom Dewey win the election of 1948; next choice, Democratic President Harry Truman; and in no way and in no wise would he have favored Dixiecrat candidate Strom Thurmond. End of statement; but, admittedly, not end of story.
I would then have leaked that a "steaming" President Bush had abruptly canceled his meeting with the Prime Minister of Macedonia or Paraguay for a closed-door session alone with Trent Lott. Let lower-level aides then leak that the sound of White House breaking furniture reached but did not exceed the decibel level of a routine Clinton marriage quarrel in that meeting.
Let the nation know that the president in no uncertain dimension let Trent Lott know where the bear sat in the buckwheat and let the no-comments begin with Trent Lott exiting that meeting.
When the Democrats inevitably closed in for a blood-lunch, let some high-but-not-top-level Republican official tell them: "It's all over and done with as far as we're concerned. And, by the way, we have a great idea for the Democrats.
"We all have shortcomings. Let THEM take care of THEIR Jesse Jackson's 'Hymie-town,' Al Sharpton's 'diamond merchants' (Jewish businessmen) intruding into Harlem, the gracious racist Sen. Byrd's white-nigger-black-nigger soliloquy, Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney's 'Bush knew in advance about the Israeli-planned-9/11 attack' and Sen. Patty Murray's 'Bin Laden is more popular than we are because he builds and we bomb.'
"We, for our part, will make clear who we think should and should not have won the election of 1948."
The "big fear" of Republicans was stated often and bluntly while Lott was busy apologizing. "In the next election, unless Lott is drawn, quartered and fed to the donkeys, every Republican candidate in 2004 will face TV commercials beginning with Trent Lott's endorsement of Strom Thurmond followed by footage of Dixiecrat Thurmond in 1948 blatantly appealing for segregation."
As a usual-but-not-always Republican voter, I say bring it on. Such an absurd backward reach in 2004 would never rekindle what would then have become a minor upscuddle way back in 2002. I insist that either the Democrats in 2004 would never have used it OR it would have blown up like a grenade in their faces.
I never made it all the way up to be a scientist. But in grammar school I loved watching a fire die when the oxygen was cut off. I would have loved to see this fire die the same way.
Republicans, particularly conservatives, have an occupational hazard. Lots of people do. Those who work at computers hours on end get carpal tunnel syndrome. Football players retire with bashed-up knees.
Conservatives, for their part, get drawn like seafaring victims of the mythical Lorelei onto the treacherous rocks by the power of liberal seduction. "I am a conservative," the syndrome goes. "Therefore, when I commit a liberal or an anti-conservative act, the liberals will love me."
There are, indeed, many voters who welcome the Republican annihilation of Trent Lott. BUT THOSE ARE VOTERS WHO WOULD NEVER HAVE VOTED FOR TRENT LOTT OR ANY OTHER REPUBLICAN ANYHOW!
Those voters the Republicans intended to woo by sacrificing Trent Lott are precisely the voters who say to the Democratic Party, "No matter what you do that I dislike, I shall always be FOR you." And to the Republican Party they say, "And no matter what you do that I LIKE, I shall always be AGAINST you."
So, GOP, you called no attention to your brotherly proclivities. You called attention only to your cowardice.
In Gore Vidal's hit play "The Best Man," the protagonist, aching head in both aching hands, says, "I don't mind being a bastard. But why am I such an INEPT bastard?"
Vidal is far from my political lodestar, but he came across with a good line.
It's not that Republicans are cowards.
It's that they're such INEPT cowards.
It says that UNLIKE the RATs, who had Byrd, a RACIST former KKK GRAND KLEAGLE OFFICER (and CURRENT PRO-TEM of the Senate), LEADING THEIR Party, Republicans won't tolerate even a HINT of STUPID racist-sounding remarks from the LEADER of OUR Party.
And since Lott is now "just" a Senator from Mississippi, if the VOTERS of Mississippi continue to VOTE for Lott to REPRESENT THEM, then THEY have that choice and it is NOT up to the Republican Party to NEGATE THEIR VOTE.
Our CURRENT LEADER---Frist---is an HISTORICALLY PROVEN NON-RACIST.
It also says that Republicans STAND for RIGHT and RATS STAND for WRONG.
It also says that Republicans are READY to MOVE FORWARD on getting the PEOPLE's business done and that the RATS just want to obstruct and whine about things that THEY have not gotten right in their OWN house (i.e. Senate).
Hell I wanted empty Lott out of there long before he made just another stupid foot in mouth statement.
Cynicom, it is EXACTLY the OPPOSITE of what you fear. The Republicans FINALLY showed some SPINE and got RID of a STUPID, IDIOTIC, INCOMPETENT, INEFFECTIVE RINO PANSY! And the RATS are SORRY now that they LOST Lott.
Have you noticed how the story went on for OVER TWO WEEKS---UNTIL Lott was forced out? Now, Lott isn't even mentioned, much less discussed, in the media and/or talk shows.
The only ones obsessed with this are the few die-hard Lott apologists on these boards, who are beginning to sound like the DemoRats whining about the 2000 election.
Truly sad.
Let me see. Not only did you forget to show me where my comment was "prejudiced", but you couldn't even manage to spell it right.
These "Lott/Dixiecrat apologist" arguments just get better by the minute.
Torie is your ally on Lott.
Thanks anyway, but I prefer to let Torie speak for Torie.
If this is your "case", then it's no wonder your side lost and Lott had to step down.
Let me educate you on a nice little piece of history;
"I wanna tell you, ladies and gentlemen, that there's not enough troops in the army to force the southern people to break down segregation and admit the nigger race into our theatres into our swimming pools into our homes and into our churches."---Strom Thurmond, presidential candidate, 1948
"I wanna say this about my state. When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We're proud of him. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years either." Senator Trent Lott, Dec 2002
Remember these questions Jorge? They are the simple questions that you decided you couldn't answer, honestly or otherwise.
I take it from your posts that you think Lott is a segregationist.
That being the case, shouldn't you be standing on a corner somewhere demanding he resign from the senate?
I don't think Lott is a segregationist but if I did I would be on the phone asking him to get the hell out of my party.
But if he was a segregationist, why would he go on national TV and advertise it?
I'm glad he 's gone after his embrace of Affirmative Action across the board on BET but I didn't see anything at admirable in the republicans who jumped on board the run over Lott bus because they saw a political opportunity.
So be honest Jorge, when did you learn about Dixiecrats?
Let me see. Not only did you forget to show me where my comment was "prejudiced", but you couldn't even manage to spell it right.These "Lott/Dixiecrat apologist" arguments just get better by the minute.
That is your repsonse of substance? Why do you ignore my post #161 addressed to you and instead insult me in some insipid way?
Here are two clues for you Jorge. You called Torie in the above post a Lott/Dixiecrat. You called me in now two posts "a Lott/Dixecrat apologist".
As I told you in a previous post, I am a yankee who hates Lott. You prejudge -- your judgement is not objective.
I will post #161 again. Will you ignore it again?
The full context of what Lott said -- "Well thank you, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you my good friend and my predecessor, my hero, Bob Dole, for that introduction, that very brief introduction I might add [Laughter] But for Senator Strom Thurmond's family and friends and admirers all, it's a great pleasure for me to be here with you today, and I know that you're enjoying every minute of this. And I knew that the previous remarks would be just as they were. I mean, after all, Bob Dole received the Republican nomination and dang near was elected President of the United States telling Strom Thurmond jokes. [Laughter] If he'd just gotten himself some new material there toward the end he would have done it. [Laughter] I want to say this about my state. When Strom Thurmond ran for President we voted for him. [Laughter] We're proud of it. [More laughter] And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years, either. "
I will now proceed to break down each Lott comment and tell you what I think Lott's intention was based on the full context. I will then wait for you to do the same.....
Bear in mind, all the previous speakers to Lott, were trying to be self-effacing and funny. This includes the dead-pan speaking Dole.
First Lott roasts the long winded Dole -- "...that very brief introduction I might add" [Laughter]
Then Lott roasts the previous speakers and he roasts Dole and Thurmond -- "it's a great pleasure for me to be here with you today, and I know that you're enjoying every minute of this. And I knew that the previous remarks would be just as they were. I mean, after all, Bob Dole received the Republican nomination and dang near was elected President of the United States telling Strom Thurmond jokes." [Laughter]
Then he roasts Dole again -- "If he'd just gotten himself some new material there toward the end he would have done it." [Laughter]
Notice how he refers to the word "material" as in commedy material, which was the full context of what the speakers at this birthday roast were doing.
Then Lott roasts his home state of Mississippi and he roasts Thurmond, both twice -- "I want to say this about my state. When Strom Thurmond ran for President we voted for him." [Laughter] "We're proud of it". [More laughter]
And the final joke -- "And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years, either."
Why don't you address the above, statement by statement, in the full context without insult or will you resort to insults again?
When did you learn about the Dixiecrats jwalsh07?
Huh? Huh? Are you "historically" challanged? LOL
Did you know at the second Lott uttered those words that he was endorsing segregation de facto or did you have to be educated first on what platform Thurmond ran on and for which party?
I didn't even hear "those words" "the second" "Lott uttered" them, let alone make any kind of judgement the same second they were stated.
Your posts are becoming incoherant.
Remember these questions Jorge? They are the simple questions that you decided you couldn't answer, honestly or otherwise.
They are stupid questions designed to divert attention from the fact that you lost this debate a long time ago...and now are resorting to desperately childish claims that maybe you knew what the Dixiecrat platform was before I or somebody else did. How infantile.
I can honestly say I didn't know anything about the Dixiecrat party until Lott made it infamous.
So what?
Do you actually think the Dixiecrat party became segregationist at the precise moment I learned about it?
Of course you're so smart, you've ended up on the losing side of this issue, Lott is gone as SML, and you are now reduced to trying gain points by saying you knew what a Dixiecrat was before I did.
Good for you. LOL
I take it from your posts that you think Lott is a segregationist.
I don't have to make a personal judgement about what is in this man's heart.
All I have to do is let Lott's statements speak for themselves.
And obviously the majority of Americans, and Republicans clearly agree with me.
That being the case, shouldn't you be standing on a corner somewhere demanding he resign from the senate?
I don't think Lott is a segregationist but if I did I would be on the phone asking him to get the hell out of my party.
Right. You sound more like somebody we would see on a New York subway platform dressed in black with ashen skin ranting about the end of the world.
Poor jwalsh07.
Sad jwalsh07.
Poor sad jwalsh07.
That is your repsonse of substance?
What is "repsonse"?
You're not capable of rational discussion.
You won't address my post #161 as the record clearly shows. Instead you hide behind insults like a coward.
You don't sound very happy.
In fact it seems now that Lott has stepped down as SML your mission in life has become to let us all know how terribly unhappy you are about it.
I'm also an honest guy so in all honesty I'll have to tell you I think your posts are lacking.
You're not capable of rational discussion.
What a mean thing to say. You are a meanie.
(....and I'll decide if I think you are being honest with me or not)
The fact remains, from the beginning of this...I said Lott should step down as SML, and that regardless of the arguments on both sides...I predicted that Lott would ultimately be replaced.
And I was proven right.
You claim that I hide behind insults and in the same sentence insult me by calling me a "coward".
Can you spell "hypocrisy"?
You claim that I hide behind insults and in the same sentence insult me by calling me a "coward". Can you spell "hypocrisy"?
You started with the insults Jorge and now you continue with them instead of addressing the context of the Lott remarks as stated in my post #161. You are a coward.
And those who insist on dismissing his comments as harmless or "meaningless" can therefore be interpretted as Lott/Dixiecrat apologists in my opinion.
How could you possibly have known any of this. Like the rest of America you had no idead what the Dixiecrat Party was or what platform Thurmond ran on.
You were eventually told what to infer from these remarks and that's what you did.
But you were not content to infer that Lott was a segregationist after being told that's what he meant. You had to go a step further and impugn anybody that dared defend Lott as segregationists themselves.
There's a word for that Jorge, it's called racebaiting.
Hey Jorge, why don't you learn how to spell Thurmond? Aren't you the hypocrite?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.