TheAgitator.com
Trent Lott’s Lame Limp
Wednesday, December 11th, 2002I just heard Sean Hannity’s interview with Lott. In typically slick, southern gentlemanly charm, Lott says his error was “a mistake of the head and not of the heart.” He says that when he said that if Thurmond had been elected in ’48, “we wouldn’t have all these problems,” he was referring to “defense issues” and “economic development.”
Horseshit. Thurmond ran on retaining segregation. That’s the entire reason the Dixiecrats came into being. A nice little Thurmond quotable: “All the laws of Washington and all the bayonets of the Army cannot force the Negro into our homes, our schools, our churches.”
(Check out this video of Thurmond’s nomination at a Dixiecrat convention.)
Even more lame was Lott’s assertion that he “votes for federal funding for historically black colleges” every time he gets the opportunity, that he’s had “black interns” and “made top black appointments.” Well gee, I guess that makes everything hunky-dory. Black people love him.
I’ve been pleasantly surprised at the right’s reaction to Trent Lott’s wistfull reflections on segregation. Almost right down the line, conservatives, neoconservatives, Christian rightwardlies, country clubbers and mainstream Republicans have condemned Lott’s remarks, and condemned Lott’s failure to adequately retract them. And an impressive number have even called for his ouster. Most have stopped short of saying Lott actually longs for the days of segregation (and after reading this and this, TheAgitator.com’s official position is in fact: “Trent Lott longs for the days of segregation”), but rather that Lott should go because he’s bad PR, and has been a most unspectacular majority leader.
So in the presence of all this condemnation, who will speak up for Lott?
Why, the paleolibertarians, of course! Ever eager to balance that precarious line between defending racists and espousing racism (and occassionally teetering over it), leave it to the Lew Rockwell crowd take up the “keep Trent Lott” banner. Predictable.
I’m at heart a contrarian. I think there’s much to be admired about bucking conventional wisdom. But sometimes, just sometimes, the LA Times, the Washington Post, Jonah Goldberg, Paul Krugman, Andrew Sullivan, David Frum, Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton can all — at the same time — be right.
This is one of those times. Lott’s had too many run-ins with bigotry to be the mouthpiece for a mainstream political party. It’s time the Republicans put Lott and his driver in a Ford F150, and gave him a shove in the direction of the 14th Street Bridge — gateway back to Mississippi.
If not, expect a lot of ads like this one come 2004.
Hey, who made the F-150 the official truck of outdated segregationists?
Ouch, Radley. Ouch.
It’s interesting to note that everyone believes that Trent Lott is in favor of Sen Thurmond’s segregastionist ideals of 1948 when even Strom doesn’t hold those ideals anymore. Can’t we just realize that Sen Lott was trying to pay homage to a man who spent his life serving the people of America and not to the shameful past of America? No, Trent Lott should not be disposed as Republican majority leader because of his poor use of words; rather, he should step down because he is a poor excuse of a leader.
I don’t really care what Lott said, he has the right to say whatever he wants and if the people of his Mississippi want to vote for him again let them. Lord knows there are enough complete morons in congress that have no business running their own refrigerator much less the country and people still vote for them.
What really gets me here is the fact that the Republicans actually are denouncing him. That is pretty stand up to do the right thing like that. But compare that to Democrats, no matter what happens they always rally around their man. How many Democrats called for Condit to resign? How many Democrats renounced Clinton for lying under oath?
“He says that when he said that if Thurmond had been elected in ’48, ‘we wouldn’t have all these problems,’”
Lott is right. We’d probably have a whole different set of problems if in 1948 Thurmond had been able to convince half our country that he should be President.
I have to agree with dc. What’s with the stereotype of the F-150? They’re very poplular out here in southern california, and god knows there are NO racist out here! (sarcasm intended)
Leave, Trent. Just Leave.
Who cares what Trent meant? He’s still done tremendous damage to his party. What’s more, he sucks on TV, he’s a weak leader, and he never sticks up for conservative or libertarian principles. He should follow the example of Bob Livingston and have the grace to step down.
No tears here if he steps down. There are 500 other reasons he should not be the Majority Leader. I think the left is going to be sorry they started this little blowup; the new leader may not roll over for them.
Mr Lott’s comments were unexcusable. I don’t care what excuses he tries to have plastered across CNN and Fox News continuous banners. The way he said what he did was most disturbing. Just looking at him up there showed how angry his words were. He just seemed like he was lashing out. I agree that there are some morons in congress, but this guy takes the cake. And if you’re the biggest moron….just be a man and step down.
If we must demand Lott’s resignation, then to be consistent we had better demand the resignation of Maxine Waters, for her “No Justice, No Peace” statement during the Rodney King mess.
In fact, we had better demand the resignation of many, many Democrats, for the REAL damage they have done to minorities in this nation through the policies they have managed to implement — far more than anything Lott has managed to do!
You can see right through the righteous indignation like it was mosquito netting … people on both sides of the aisle are making a mountain out of a molehill to advance their political agendas, especially the losing party in the last election.
From an independent conservative …
You have said, linking to what I wrote,
“[s]o in the presence of all this condemnation, who will speak up for
Lott?
Why, the paleolibertarians, of course! Ever eager to balance that
precarious line between defending racists and espousing racism (and
occassionally teetering over it), leave it to the Lew Rockwell crowd
take up the “keep Trent Lott” banner. Predictable.”
I don’t know how one reading your comments can avoid the implication
that my article is an example of Lew Rockwell columnists teetering over
the line and espousing racism. Additionally, you claim that I
have “taken up the ‘keep Trent Lott’ banner.” However, I have said
nothing of the sort.
I’m a little confused as to why you’ve chosen to charactize me
as “espoucing racism,” or even defending racism. All I did in that
little article on lewrockwell.com was compare the rhetorical
similarities between Al Sharpton, Jonah Goldberg, et al.’s responses to
the debacle. I wasn’t sticking up for Lott or whatever he intended to
mean, though I do think the whole thing has been blown a bit out of
proportion (thus my sarcastic comment, “The Horror!”; I’m unsure how
anyone could interpret those two words that as an endorsement of
racism). If you want to call me a racist (I am not), you ought to have
something to back up that very heavily-loaded slur. Lott’s comments
are questionable, and may cause his demise (which is fine with me); I
just didn’t think they merited some of the over-the-top repsonses in
the Jeremiad that ensued. Can reasonable people disagree about that
without calling one or the other a racist? The jump from my piece to
endorsement and defense of Lott or racism seems farther than logic will
take you.
For the record, I think state-sponsored racial segregation is postively
evil, and private racial segregation only has the fact that it isn’t
sponsored by the state to make it slightly (barely) less evil–but it
is still evil. If, somehow, what I wrote necessarily contradicts those
positions, let me know. You may claim that Lew Rockwell, the man or
his website’s contributors, disagrees, but that isn’t true, nor is it
relevant to the very broad brush with which you have painted me.
You see JR, “racist” is the easy method of tarring-and-feathering there is. You don’t have to have any evidence that the guy you’re calling a racist is actually a racist. You don’t have to present even the smallest shred of evidence.
BOOM! You are a racist. It must be so.
Rodney’s comment is gutless, spineless, and cowardly.
Does anyone know where I can view the video of Thurmond’s birthday celebration where Lott made the comments? I’d love to see it for myself.
BlaBla –
If you’re going to shower me with love, at least get my name right.
It’s “Radley.”
Yours,
Rodney Balko
Sorry about that Radley,
I’ll fix it for you:
Radley’s comment is gutless, spineless, and cowardly.
For those of you who would like to see Lott making the comment, go to http://www.cspan.com and enter “Lott” into the “search video archives” engine near the bottom of the home page.
Right now it’s the second from the last on the list (Strom Thurmond’s 100th birthday tribute, Dec. 5.) Lott comes after Dole, about 1/2 way through the hourlong clip.
I encourage all of you to see it for yourselves rather than to take other people’s word for what it looked like he meant.
I, for one, still believe that he is a racist and is pro-segregation, based on his record and his history of making such comments. But I must admit that when I finally saw it, it was much less dramatic than I had imagined from the media reports.
Gary Condit Who???
Democrats are just glad that the slime light isn’t on them at the moment. Denounce Bill Clinton? Never! Denounce a murderous Gary Condit? noooo! or perhaps a Chapaquitic Congressman Ted Kennedy?
But nooo, Lott speaks up and compliments a historical congressman and has his words twisted by liberal press and he’s the antichrist… great double standards demos! Cast the first stone, i dare ya
Even if Lott is a racist, do you really believe that he would be stupid enough to actually say that black people are the problem all these years? In this climate? No way – He has been in the game way to long to screw up like that, and you have to believe he is a mindless idiot to come to that conclusion. For this reason, I don’t think he was reffering to black people in his comments at Strom’s party. In fact, I have to wonder about the leanings of individuals who hear the words “problems all these years” and immediately think of black people. What does it say about thier mindsets? Maybe they themselves think blacks are the problem? Trent Lott didn’t say or mean what people inferred from his generic comments, and this is nothing more than shameless political manuever. If you want more plastic politicians who measure everything that they say according to how it effects thier political careers, and not according to what they think and believe, you are all on the right track. Just keep it up and eventually everything you hear from politicians will be carefully crafted bullshit designed to keep thier opponents from mis-directing a gullible public. Stop falling for the retarded rantings of demagogues now, or else you will get nothing but that. Stop being manipulated, these people are using your knee-jerk reactions to thier own advantage and laughing at you behind your backs.