Thursday, August 25, 2005
A Lott to Swallow
Last night on the Daily Show, Jon Stewart’s guest was the Honorable Trent Lott, the junior senator from the great state of Mississippi. One of the reasons Mississippi retains its third world status is because of the leadership of men like Trent Lott. I wasn’t going to watch because one of the reasons I left Mississippi was to get away from men like him. So of course I moved to the progressive state of Texas (which goes to prove just how stupid I am).
Trent was there to promote a book he’s just written about his career in politics. I remember the title of the book but I’m not going to help him advertise it here. I have to give it to Trent; he was able to keep his basic racist attitudes to himself. He came off as somewhat moderate in comparison to some of his Republican colleagues in the Senate. That says a lot about his Republican colleagues in the Senate. Since he was in the enemy camp, New York City sitting opposite Jon Stewart, Trent pointed out how he worked well with President Clinton. Something tells me he doesn’t brag about that when he’s at his local Klan, err, I mean political rally in Yazoo City. Jon joked about Pat “Corleone” Robertson and Trent basically distanced himself from Pat. He even spoke about how he tried to find a way to lessen the division over judicial nominations in the Senate and was attacked by some members of the Christian right. Trent was really playing the part of respected elder statesman.
Trent even joked about the “incident” at Strom Thurman’s 100th birthday party. Jon didn’t remind the audience what the “incident” was but I’ll be glad to for those who don’t know or remember. At the birthday party, Trent Lott who had just become the majority leader in the senate said, “I want to say this about my state: When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We’re proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn’t have had all these problems over all these years either.” In 1948 Strom Thurmond was the presidential nominee of the Dixiecrat Party and ran under the banner of segregation of the races. Trent explained his statement as his way to make an old man happy. That’s what strippers are for Trent. Trent left the Daily Show unscathed; I guess his next stop is The Randi Rhodes Show.
Trent was there to promote a book he’s just written about his career in politics. I remember the title of the book but I’m not going to help him advertise it here. I have to give it to Trent; he was able to keep his basic racist attitudes to himself. He came off as somewhat moderate in comparison to some of his Republican colleagues in the Senate. That says a lot about his Republican colleagues in the Senate. Since he was in the enemy camp, New York City sitting opposite Jon Stewart, Trent pointed out how he worked well with President Clinton. Something tells me he doesn’t brag about that when he’s at his local Klan, err, I mean political rally in Yazoo City. Jon joked about Pat “Corleone” Robertson and Trent basically distanced himself from Pat. He even spoke about how he tried to find a way to lessen the division over judicial nominations in the Senate and was attacked by some members of the Christian right. Trent was really playing the part of respected elder statesman.
Trent even joked about the “incident” at Strom Thurman’s 100th birthday party. Jon didn’t remind the audience what the “incident” was but I’ll be glad to for those who don’t know or remember. At the birthday party, Trent Lott who had just become the majority leader in the senate said, “I want to say this about my state: When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We’re proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn’t have had all these problems over all these years either.” In 1948 Strom Thurmond was the presidential nominee of the Dixiecrat Party and ran under the banner of segregation of the races. Trent explained his statement as his way to make an old man happy. That’s what strippers are for Trent. Trent left the Daily Show unscathed; I guess his next stop is The Randi Rhodes Show.
