It was one sentence… to begin with. And then he started appearing in just about every public venue that would take him, offering tepid “explainations” of his comment, without any real apology (as Super Gnat pointed out earlier). That combination of a horrible thing said, followed by every appearance of not really seeing anything wrong with what he said, combined to piss off a whole host of people who might otherwise have been inclined to forgive and forget if he’d apologized.
But he didn’t. He said something terrible, then continued to more or less say he was justified in saying it.
The public face of the Senate majority should better represent the Sentate’s position on public policy, and Lott wasn’t doing that. It’s too damn bad that he does seem to represent the majority of voting Mississippians, though.
Well, people did boo the man when he showed up at Sen. Wellstone’s memorial service–evidence that there were some people out there expressing disapproval of him before “the sentence”.
It’s because of the liberal media of course! Quick, put on your tinfoil hat or the liberal media will out you too!
Lott dug his own grave, he can lie in it. As Magelin pointed out, there are a good number of people just waiting for Byrd to drop the other shoe and he’ll be on his kiester too. In the meantime you seem to have a beef with the people who elected Byrd, not the Democratic party as a whole. Try to stay focused.
The problem I have is why do we have representatives of the American people who presently, or in the past, have harbored and verbalized bigoted ideals.
If I was a black man or woman, I would be disgusted that we as a people, here in the 21st Century allow and even to a large degree condone these people. WTF?
Is the whole system so out of whack and out of touch with the commen man that it is completely out of our hands and we are helpless against it?
Or more likely, in my opinion, with all of our rhetoric about equality, we have a large percentage of our population who silently agree with these people.
Is it impossible to elect honorable, truthful, sincere people these days? I know quite a few very straightforward, real people who in my opinion would do a wonderful job of representing us. Unfortunately it seems, that with the system of power brokers, who seem to be the only ones able to crack into the national election scene have pleased the right people, been born in the right families, or have the support of large corporations? I am talking Republican and Democrat alike.
Sorry if I am rambling. I am just disgusted. These days all I see is finger pointing and shirking of individual responsibility and accountability. Where are the real politicians, representing the real people, on real issues?
Byrd is a member of the party which has been the political vehicle for social progress which has resulted in significant gains for minorities, women, and even gays in the United States in the past half century.
Trent Lott, on the other hand, is a member of the party which has become the political home of unreconstructed racists and reactionaries of all stripes. This is not a fact that the Republican Party wants widely known in the states outside of the old Confederacy.
Lott’s sin is not that he is a racist or that he will lose votes of African-Americans; but that he has exposed this dirty little secret and that moderate white voters outside the old Confederacy will be horrified by the specter of the Klan behind the “new” face of the Republican Party.
He was litteraly yelling about how lott was lynched and how Bush hung he out to dry and betrayed him, and that lott did nothing wrong.
The news guy started pointing out all the stupid things that Lott has said/done over the years, including voting against affirmative action, and he started yelling about how evil afirmative action is blah blah blah…I got a good laugh out of the whole thing.
So. A poster on a board says something that convinces you to never vote Democrat. Nevermind that the poster is just some anonymous cybercreation. He/she says something that “convinces” you to not vote for a Democratic candidate?
And you think that “Republicans are putzes for the most part” but you evidently will vote for them over a Democrat?
Based on the post of some cyber poster?
When people start arguing, the loudest voices are the ones that get heard. I hear them, I hear what they say, and I am unimpressed.
If they are in any way representative of the Democratic Party as a whole I don’t think I’ll ever be able to vote Democrat.
And you know what? I married one of the anonymous cyber posters here, so that argument doesn’t hold water with me. These are real people, with real opinions. I just happen to disagree greatly with them. I’m sure they are sincere in their beliefs, but instead of being straightforward with those opinions, they hide behind rhetoric, and I’m forced to ask for proof.
I vote my wallet, I vote my family, and I vote what I would like my country to be. In the case of Bush, I’m not very happy with the results of that vote. For the most part, though, the Republicans represent my views better than the Democrats, even though I’m a registered independent.
As such, I defend the Republicans against unsubstantiated claims like the above from Ace.