Strom Thurmond was an unapologetic segregationist. He unsuccessfully ran for President once, but for some reason South Carolina saw his talents as a Politician to be sufficiently satisfactory to put him in office as their Governor for 4 years, and in the US
Senate for
48 years (both as a Democrat AND a Republican)…this, DESPITE his views on race. He never withdrew those positions, nor did he apologize for them, although he is said to have ‘moderated his tone over time.’
Strom Thurmond, segregationist or not, was also a staunch believer in the
10th amendment to the US Constitution (my personal
favorite): “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people” and it was his stand on State’s rights that gained him much favor in South Carolina and around the political world.
“[We] want that federal government to keep their filthy hands off the rights of the states.”
Racist or not, he was who he had always been-open, honest, and forthright… and most importantly… these traits never cost him his job.
So when Trent Lott
suggested that “we wouldn’t be in the mess we are today” back in 2002 had Thurmond been elected President 54 years earlier, the Democrats were quick to tie the segregationist element of Thurmond around Lott’s neck (rather than the State’s rights element) and summarily had Lott tarred, feathered, effigied, and FIRED from his leadership position in the US Senate. Note to class-NEVER did Lott affirm his support of segregation, and NEVER were we asked to consider Thurmond’s embrace of the 10th amendment. We were just told Thurmond’s segregationist ideology HAD to be what Lott was talking about and that he must, therefore, be run outta Dodge.
How, then, does Harry Reid get to keep his job when he sees the quality of African Americans
according to their skin tone and linguistic prowess? The answer shouldn’t be looked for in
Michael Steele’s paid-to-be-mad rants, nor in Republican
wails against double standards. The answer needs to found in the
opinion of the people he represents where it should be…not with the media, the elites and the professional pundits. It’s not hard to see that Reid, just as with
Bill Clinton, sees African Americans as political tools and foregone voting bloc conclusions. Let THEM express themselves in the voting booths. Let the rest of us just sit back and watch.
Democrats clearly see African Americans as coffee-fetching errand boys and linguistically challenged “children” that need to be ‘taken care of’…and only so black as the color of their skin as opposed to the content of their character. Reid needs to keep his job long enough to be fired by those very same people…the ones we care most about-the AMERICAN Voter (African and otherwise).
Apologies notwithstanding, however many of them the Democrats make…Americans have a much longer memory than does our media cycle and the Politicians’ lives that desperately cling to it.
