Well, it's now a full-fledged pile-on for the GOP's poster child for racism. And well deserved. Sen. Trent Lott's remarks that a Thurmond victory on the 1948 election would have spared the nation "all these troubles" is so contrary to reality that it makes the head spin. Just what troubles does Mr. Lott refer to? Lynchings? Cross-burnings? Assassinations in driveways and motels? Marches met with dogs and bullets? Riots in the cities? Sure, none of these would have happened after the administration of President Thurmond.

There's enough blatant hypocrisy on display to allow blogging for a month. The media, which initially ignored the story, is now hot on the scent of another scalp. They are anxious to show their even-handedness by attacking a conservative figure. Unfortunately, this episode will be used by the same old right-wing commentators as evidence of the media's "liberal bias" and then to portray Mr. Lott as the unfortunate victim of an unfair and overblown media "feeding frenzy." Meanwhile, the attacks on Mr. Gore for his mostly imagined failings and "flip-flops" will continue unabated and presented as somehow fair and equal to the excoriation of Mr. Lott for his very real bigotry.

As Joe Conanson observed in Salon:

"Al Gore proved his moral courage. He didn't hesitate to say that he opposed Trent Lott's racist speech, that Lott had to withdraw those remarks, and that if Lott failed to do so, the Senate should censure the Republican leader. Having endured so many venomous attacks from a press that is openly biased against him and would surely relish another chance to sting him, Gore spoke out fearlessly. It is also a triumph for him over his tormentors in the press. With some honorable exceptions, they waited too long to speak up against Lott's nostalgia for the barbarism of his political forebears.

Ultimately, whether Lott resigns or not, he will be the designated racist. The retirement of Strom Thurmond and Lott's potential withdrawal from a visible position will be touted as evidence that the Republican party has dealt with the issue and, as part of a "healing process for all Americans," will embrace a more "inclusive" agenda. Don't believe it. The ritual seppoku of Mr. Lott should be a warning for blacks and other minorities to resist the blandishments of the GOP.

The fact is, and it's supported by the historical record, that Mr. Lott is a segregationist and a bigot, and just in tune with his party. See Trent Lott's Greatest Hits (from Newsweek/MSNBC). Many bloggers, especially Atrios, are all over this aspect of the story.

The Republican Party, since its deal with the devil in embracing the "Southern Strategy" has no claim as the "Party of Lincoln." White Southern men were reflexive Democrats for three generations, because of the residual effects of the Civil War and Reconstruction. The party of Lincoln was also the party of the radical republicans and the carpetbaggers. The strains between Southern male voters and the Democratic party, long a bastion of labor unions and city political machines, was evident long before the Dixiecrats walked out of the 1948 Democratic Convention. Truman's policy to support civil rights was only the last straw. The GOP courted these voters with code words and policies like "states rights" and strong defense. Active courting of these Southern, nominally-Democratic, voters was a central strategy of Nixon's campaigns. In the last 40 years, the number of Democrats who changed parties and the Republican dominance at the state level has come from an active decision by the national Republican Party to acquiesce to and ignore continued inequality, discrimination, and segregation. Further, the GOP has had an active national electoral policy to reduce voter turnout by negative advertising and to impede and obstruct minority, particularly black, voting (as is described here, here, here, and here). When the GOP received only 9% of the black vote on the last election, the reasons for such a strategy is clear.

Meanwhile, in order to continue their appeal to suburban voters and "soccer moms," there are carefully orchestrated campaigns of "moderates" who avoid mentioning any of the bedrock policies of the hard-right wing which controls the GOP, such as marginalizing minorities, more tax breaks for the wealthy, ballooning Federal deficits, and outlawing abortion. This cynical, two-faced manipulation of the electorate is widely recognized (see also) yet is not a topic of national debate. It should be.

The Democrats are no more virtuous, with plenty of hypocrisy in other fields. If anyone should resign over this imbroglio, it should be Mr. Daschle, with his lukewarm excuses for Mr. Lott. He is much more interested in maintaining what power he has in the upcoming Senate, under Majority Leader Lott, than he is in presenting a Democratic alternative. The GOP has also fallen under the same spell of power. To maintain their slim majority, there is, in essence, a coalition between Southern, conservative heirs of the Dixiecrats, the Western more-libertarian voters, and the rump of the old Northeastern GOP. All have worked together to their own advantage, and that of their cronies, and, thus, all deserve the label of bigot.

My reader has objected to my generalization to all Republicans. Those who knew of the GOP racial strategy but did nothing do stop it are as guilty. The Nurenburg defense is an admission of guilt. However, most Republicans in national office not only acquiesced but used racial tactics to secure their victories.

Take President Bush. In 1999, he had just lost the New Hampshire primary to Mr. McCain. Desperate, he turned to Karl Rove for help in the upcoming South Carolina primary. Under his tutelage,

• Mr. Bush appeared at the racist Bob Jones University professing his admiration of the principles of that institution,
• Mr. Bush gave the requisite "states rights," God, and country speeches,
• Bush loyalists working for the campaign passed out pamphlets, not marked as coming from the Bush campaign, that McCain might be mentally unstable from his captivity in Vietnam,
• others passed out pamphlets claimimg the senator had fathered a black child with a prostitute (when McCain's dark-skinned Bangladeshi daughter was actually adopted from one of Mother Theresa's orphanages),
• hired agents to appear at campaign meetings to claim that McCain’s wife was a drug addict, and
• hired "pollsters" to conduct telephone push polls to members of a South Carolina right-to-life organization and other groups asking if the black baby might influence their vote.

This was well documented in a Ron Suskind article in Esquire and is covered by Fred Clark at Slacktivist as well as Patrick Neilsen Hayden. So, who played the race card? Yet Bush gets up on TV and calls Mr. Lott immoral. Wait a minute while I find some Phenergan.