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Don Feder Gets Trenchant On The Lott Affair
Don Feder Com ^ | 12/22/02 | Don Feder

Posted on 12/24/2002 1:09:54 AM PST by goldstategop

TRENCHANT (I HOPE) COMMENTS ON THE LOTT AFFAIR By Don Feder December 22, 2002

At the outset, please note the following:

1) I am no fan of Trent Lott. As Senate Majority Leader, Lott was an unprincipled pragmatist. So much so, that when he first became majority leader, DC conservatives produced buttons proclaiming: “Lott For Sale, Will Build to Specifications.” At the height of the current manufactured crisis, the Mississippi invertebrate went of Black Entertainment Television to plead that he now supports affirmative action (racial quotas) “across board.” That declaration was more profoundly racist than anything the Senator said at Strom Thurmond’s birthday party. In many ways, Lott does indeed represent everything that’s wrong with the Republican Party – lack of purpose, lack of courage, at times, even lack of consciousness – though not in the way his critics charged.

2) Segregation was evil. To tell a man that he can’t use a public restroom or that he has to sit in the back of a bus, -- to bar his admission to a public school or university -- on the basis of skin color is loathsome.

3) Had I voted in the 1948 election, it would not have been for Thurmond – or Thomas Dewey, for that matter. I would have supported Harry Truman, one of the few Democratic presidents I admire (along with Andrew Jackson). If not for Give ‘Em Hell Harry, we might have lost the Cold War at the outset. Truman also integrated the armed forces, another courageous move.

Enough disclosure. Lott’s resignation highlights a profound double-standard regarding racism. I doubt Lott’s opponents really believe his dumb remark reflects ingrained, or even visceral, racism, or a desire to return to the era of Jim Crow. But America now has a racial sensitivity Gestapo that pulls out its truncheons at the slightest sign of hostility – real or imagined -- toward people of color.

Of course, the reverse is not the case. Black grudge-bearers are free to condemn whites as a race, to say virtually anything about them, however vile and unjust, and to support policies (quotas, reparations) that are manifestly racist – designed to punish people for an accident of birth. And Democrats are free to race-bait to their hearts’ content, a tactic almost as reprehensible as racism itself.

You think Trent Lott’s awful?

You know what Lott didn’t do? He didn’t refer to New York City as Hymie-Town and complain that Jews are always “whining about the Holocaust.” He didn’t call Judaism a gutter religion. He didn’t spark a race riot in Crown Heights that led to the death of a young man or organize the picket of a white-owned business that resulted in the deaths of five (all minorities). He didn’t write a poem about Jews blowing up the World Trade Center.

He didn’t try to justify the thugs who burned down a large part of South Central LA in 1992 by calling their crimes “a spontaneous reaction to a lot of injustice and a lot of alienation and frustration.” Oh, and he didn’t suggest that George Bush had foreknowledge of Sept 11, but did nothing to prevent it so his business friends could profit from a war on terrorism.

In case you’re curious, those laurels go to Jesse Jackson, Louis Farakhan, Al Sharpton, New Jersey Poet Laureate Amiri Baraka (the artist formerly known as LeRoi Jones), Congress-creature Maxine Waters and soon-to-be-former Congress-cretin Cynthia McKinney. But don’t hold your breath waiting for any of them to be taken to the woodshed.

An unspoken assumption of our culture is that it’s racist (or insensitive, at the very least) to criticize a black person. Thus if I observe that Jackson is an opportunistic jerk – a person of limited intelligence and low morals – in the establishment’s eyes, my views must be shaped by racial animosity. (The more unscrupulous black leaders invariably exploit this assumption.) Thus it would seem that prominent blacks suffering from foot-in-mouth disease are to be the exception to Martin Luther King’s dictum that Americans should be judged by “the content of their character, not the color of their skin.”

Democrats passionately embrace the accountability double standard. Republicans meekly acquiesce.

When it was disclosed last year that the Reverend Jackson had fathered a child out-of-wedlock and used his influence to engage in corporate shakedowns, President Bush called the race hustler par excellence to commiserate. In the 2000 election, Hillary Rodham Clinton and Al Gore each made a pilgrimage to Sharpton’s Harlem headquarters to kiss his ring.

Black-on-white crimes are roughly ten times as prevalent as white-on-black offenses. How many of the former are hate crimes is anyone’s guess. Surely the anti-white racism that pervades our culture (the idea that whites as a race are responsible for black suffering) -- encouraged by the liberal elite and black race-baiters – plays a part in these crimes.

The Democratic Party, the media and groups like the NAACP are avid proponents of racial quotas in education and hiring. Cut through the rhetoric and murky reasoning in defense of these vile programs and it’s clear that they penalize or reward solely on the basis of race. What’s worse – to praise a form of racism long dead (if in fact that’s what Lott did), or to support a virulent strain of racism that’s alive and kicking?

For admissions to the University of Michigan, whose affirmative action program will soon be before the Supreme Court, race (minority status) counts for more than a perfect SAT score combined with an excellent essay. To tell a man or woman that they won’t get in to an elite school – even though they’re bright, studious and creative – because they also happen to be white (or Asian) is a species of racism every bit as ugly as get-to-the-back-of-the-bus or whites-only restrooms.

Although still just a sick notion (whereas affirmative action is a sick reality), reparations is racism writ large. It seeks to hold today’s (largely white) taxpayers responsible for the racial sins of the past. It’s a giant rip-off scheme, favored primarily by the least responsible black leaders – who believe they’ll be the ones to divvy the loot – and the loopier white liberals (which, come to think of it, might be a redundancy).

Race-baiting is almost as bad as racism. At this the Democrats excel. It is for them mother’s milk.

You may recall that during the 1998 election, the Missouri Democratic party ran ads which said, in effect, if Republicans win, more black churches will go up in flames. (Newsflash: “Newt Gingrich was seen fleeing the scene of a burning black church, a can of kerosene in hand.”)

Former felon-in-chief, William Jefferson Clinton (who actually believes he was born a poor black child) used the Lott fiasco to pontificate that Republicans are the second coming of the White Citizens Councils.

In the last election, Republican gains in the South were due to racist appeals to white voters, Clinton opined. “How do they think they got a majority in the South, anyway? I think what they (Republicans) are really upset about is that he (Lott) made public their strategy.”

This from a leader of the party that has it’s own unspoken strategy – to do whatever it takes to monopolize the black vote, including terrifying black voters with lurid visions of Republicans seeking to disenfranchise them, reestablish segregated lunch counters, and send them back to the plantations in chains. Simultaneously, Democrats strenuously oppose those measures that have the best chance of ameliorating the condition of urban blacks – including education vouchers.

Soon-to-be Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle and House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi have intimated that it’s now up to congressional Republicans to prove that they aren’t a bunch of cross-burners by supporting affirmative action, a general expansion of welfare programs and DC statehood -- in other words, to embrace racism to prove that they aren’t racists.

And so, as we rejoice in the political demise of the villainous Lott, we can all congratulate ourselves on this historic victory over racism. Meanwhile the most prevalent racism in America – camouflaged as compassion, justice or sensitivity -- is either tolerated or celebrated. Ah, well.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Editorial; Front Page News; Philosophy; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: affirmativeaction; billclinton; conservatism; democrats; gop; harrytruman; jessejackson; liberalism; pc; racecard; trentlott
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To: Chancellor Palpatine
It went to more white people, because there are MORE white people. Haven't you learned? Giving people stuff, for whatever reason, never works. They just become dependent. That's why SOCIALISM ALWAYS FAILS.

Seriously again, WHY ARE YOU HERE?

41 posted on 12/24/2002 7:32:10 AM PST by Republic of Texas
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To: Republic of Texas
Why am I here? To be a burr under your saddle of smug complacency.
42 posted on 12/24/2002 7:33:29 AM PST by Chancellor Palpatine
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To: Republic of Texas; mhking
You need to back the hell up. You're saying here that this transfer of wealth went directly from whites to blacks. That's a damned lie.

Don't bring that weak crap to the house.

Birth of Tha SYNDICATE, the philosophical heir to William Lloyd Garrison.
101 things that the Mozilla browser can do that Internet Explorer cannot.

43 posted on 12/24/2002 7:34:16 AM PST by rdb3
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To: mhking
I'm not talking about reparations for slavery - I'm talking about the conditions pre-1964 - a completely different critter.
44 posted on 12/24/2002 7:34:47 AM PST by Chancellor Palpatine
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To: rdb3
No, I'm saying that a transfer of wealth, never helps either party. But yes, when the war on poverty was started, part of the motivation, was to rectify problems of the past. I didn't come up with that idea, because I was 2 yrs old then. It is obvious now, that that approach NEVER WORKS. Take your racial guilt somewhere else, you're barking up the wrong tree here.
45 posted on 12/24/2002 7:37:49 AM PST by Republic of Texas
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To: Chancellor Palpatine
You're comparing segregated lunch counters to the extermination of six million Jews?

And, by the way, isn't it amazing how Jews managed to make it through Holocausts, pogroms, segregation and discrimination (Jews were segregated and discriminated against repeatedly in Europe for centuries), and still succeeded on their own?

If you travel to Europe, do you see Jews living on welfare with half a dozen illegitimate kids? Do you see them roaming the streets in gangs? Do you see them failing on college entrance exams, and demanding affirmative action programs in which they are given extra points for having ancestors who suffered through inquisitions and holocausts?

No, you see Jews making it on their own merit. They went through hell, but weren't broken by it. They got up, brushed the dust off, went to work, and became successful. I think that's one of the reasons so many so-called black leaders (Jackson, Sharpton, Cynthia McKinney, etc.) hate Jews so much. Jews prove that even the most horrendous abuses can be overcome if you work hard.

In contrast, the so-called black leadership in America has encouraged blacks to become a dependent class.
46 posted on 12/24/2002 7:38:35 AM PST by puroresu
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To: Republic of Texas
And I'll add - a true conservative takes responsibility for his actions and recognizes when his living forebears were wrong. If he wants to honor his older family and social traditions going back generations, he acknowledges the bad with the good, and doesn't sugar coat it.
47 posted on 12/24/2002 7:39:42 AM PST by Chancellor Palpatine
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To: Chancellor Palpatine
No, I mean, what do YOU get out of it? You're obviously a socialist. Why come here and get trounced everyday?
48 posted on 12/24/2002 7:39:49 AM PST by Republic of Texas
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To: Republic of Texas; Theodore R.; belmont_mark
Truman's reputation as a tough guy was sealed the day he ordered the atomic bomb dropped. Nothing will ever change that.

Yes, Truman did a fine job of killing a couple thousand innocent Japanese civilians by atomic means and thus joined Stalin, Mao, and various Italian mafia dons in earning a well-deserved reputation as a "tough guy." However, his policies in regards to the Communist threat were nothing short of disasterous. The loss of 600,000 of our Free Chinese allies to the Communist hordes was the result of Truman's treacherous sabotage of Chiang Kai Shek's Free Chinese Nationalists.
49 posted on 12/24/2002 7:41:18 AM PST by rightwing2
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To: Republic of Texas
Racial guilt? Puh-leeze!

If you would have stated it like you did here, there wouldn't have been such an objection.

No chasers here. 120-proof.

Ya heard?

Birth of Tha SYNDICATE, the philosophical heir to William Lloyd Garrison.
101 things that the Mozilla browser can do that Internet Explorer cannot.

50 posted on 12/24/2002 7:41:53 AM PST by rdb3
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To: Chancellor Palpatine
Where did I say that Jim Crow Laws weren't wrong? I just said the solution that was tried failed. Miserably and publically.
51 posted on 12/24/2002 7:41:53 AM PST by Republic of Texas
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To: goldstategop

Yes, I often wondered how anyone could sign on and defend vigorously the BOR during those times..

It flies directly in the face of our Constitution and we weren't truly honoring our Constitution (hell, we weren't even accepting it's words at face value) until these practices were brought to an end.

I couldn't be proud of our document under such circumstances. I don't know how anyone could.

Trenty, otoh.. that was a nothing more than a political lynching. And I think everyone knows it on some level.

52 posted on 12/24/2002 7:42:45 AM PST by Jhoffa_
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To: rightwing2
I wasn't commenting on Truman's policies, only on how he is viewed by history. Notice the incredibly large and obvious difference between the two.
53 posted on 12/24/2002 7:43:08 AM PST by Republic of Texas
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To: Republic of Texas
Me a socialist? ROFLMAO.

Sorry, pal, you're so very wrong.

54 posted on 12/24/2002 7:45:43 AM PST by Chancellor Palpatine
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To: goldstategop

BWAHAHHA!!

I can't believe someone said this.

I bet they had these assholes all through history.. I can just hear them now: "Oh, shut up and stop crying for your dead kid.. You're always whining about the Herod thing. Geeez.."

I don't even know how to reason with people like this.

55 posted on 12/24/2002 7:46:06 AM PST by Jhoffa_
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To: rdb3
Boiled down, all I am saying is that SOCIALISM ALWAYS FAILS. Regardless of which form it takes. It perverts the giver, and enslaves the taker.
56 posted on 12/24/2002 7:46:06 AM PST by Republic of Texas
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To: Republic of Texas
So paying your just debts to identifiable, systematically excluded people is socialist?
57 posted on 12/24/2002 7:47:44 AM PST by Chancellor Palpatine
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To: Chancellor Palpatine
Forcibly taking money from one group and giving it to another, is socialism. You support that. It never works. That's why slavery failed as well. It's immoral in every form. Why support solutions that have failed every time they are tried?
58 posted on 12/24/2002 7:48:23 AM PST by Republic of Texas
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To: driftless; Theodore R.
Your conjecturing is specious. No one wanted troops in China right after WWII. Thurmond would have been a disaster in more ways than one. Do you think HE would have integrated the armed forces? Truman was one of the few excellent Dem presidents.

On the contrary, my indictment of Truman is well-supported by historical fact. Kindly read "America's Retreat from Victory" by renowned anti-Communist Joseph McCarthy. Further, there was no need for US troops in China after WWII except as military advisors/liaisons. Of course, I know that Thurmond was unacceptable as the segregationist he was. I'm just saying that he would have pursued a far better foreign policy than the disasterous Democrat President Truman. JFK, for all his faults, was a far better foreign policy President than Truman. He built up our nuclear triad and maintained US nuclear superiority over the Soviets.
59 posted on 12/24/2002 7:50:21 AM PST by rightwing2
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To: Chancellor Palpatine
Giving them equal opprtunity is the only answer. Making them dependent is cruel. And as you pointed out, there are more white people on welfare, so dependence is not based on race. It just doesn't work.
60 posted on 12/24/2002 7:50:46 AM PST by Republic of Texas
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