Posted on 03/13/2003 8:40:58 PM PST by kattracks
Ex-Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., said Wednesday that the media's reaction to anti-Semitic comments by Virginia Congressman Jim Moran is relatively mild compared to the firestorm that greeted his own comments last December praising Sen. Strom Thurmond's 1948 Dixiecrat presidential run.
"Clearly, there is a double standard," Lott told nationally syndicated radio host Sean Hannity. "It was observed this very morning at my breakfast table that my remarks were interpreted to mean one thing but that Moran's remarks were clear in what he said."
Last week Rep. Moran told a Reston, Va., audience, "If it were not for the strong support of the Jewish community for this war with Iraq we would not be doing this." He has since apologized, but his fellow Democrats have declined to condemn his behavior, let alone suggest that he should be sanctioned.
Lott suggested that his own remarks about Thurmond were exaggerated by his critics, explaining, "What was ascribed to me, how it was defined by people - not what I said - did not reflect how I really feel or what my career in Congress over 30 years has reflected."
The Mississippi Republican said there was a good deal of politics behind the reaction to his remarks.
"The whole issue was stirred by some people for partisan reasons. It became a media obsession," he told Hannity. "It got to the point where I thought my leadership position was being undermined."
Asked if he thought Moran needed to resign his seat, Lott said, "the people of Northern Virginia will make that decision when he's up for re-election."
Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
Media Bias
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