Here we go again. Neo-right elitist crybabies screeching over Trent Lott, never stopping to engage their brains before engaging their mouths and fingers. All I can say is thank Gawd there are at least 25 sensible Senators who understand they don't need all nice and noble, they need street fighters and those who know how to play the game and make things happen. We lost Delay, a master in the House, we traded off Lott for that useless Frist. Well, now at least the right man is back in the leadership. So all you naysayers on the right, shut up! In fact, shut up until after the elections in 2008 and maybe, just maybe we have a chance.
Why his colleagues brought him back from the dead.
Posted Wednesday, Nov. 15, 2006, at 5:02 PM ET
Once again in the U.S. Senate, the man with the better hair has won. Wednesday, Trent Lott beat Lamar Alexander by a single vote to become minority whip, the No. 2 spot in the Republican Senate leadership. The victory was an extraordinary comeback for the Mississippi lawmaker who four years ago was forced out as majority leader after praising former segregationist Sen. Strom Thurmond. Lott's cascade of apologies, including on BET, didn't save him then. But with time, politicians can sometimes live down boneheaded statements—which should come as good news to George Allen and John Kerry.
It's actually more than the passage of time that has saved Lott. He survives because he has the competence Allen lacks and collegiality Kerry doesn't have. Lott was in the House for 16 years and has served in the Senate for 18 more. For 10 years he was his party's official vote counter, first in the House and then the Senate, and it is a role he relishes. A former cheerleader, Lott can throw himself over his target like a heavy coat. Even when he doesn't need an answer immediately, he greets colleagues with all the arm holding, embraces, and easy laughter that suggest he'll be coming back later to ask for your vote (or your kidney).
His victory over Alexander, who has been campaigning for the job since he returned to Washington as a senator 18 months ago, suggests Lott still has an aptitude for counting noses and bringing his colleagues around to his point of view. Alexander campaigned as a healer who would reshape the Republican caucus in his image: moderate, sensible, and kind to children. He lost by only one vote, which means Republicans obviously think they need to improve their image in the wake of the disastrous Election Day. In the end, though, the senators appear to have decided that a scuffed-up master tactician is better than a sunny Tennessean with limited experience in the folkways of the Upper House
And you gotta love Lott's sense of humor. When the President called to congratulate him, he took the call answering: "Hey Mr. President, this is Lazaraus."
All in all, I'm not terribly unhappy with some of the moves that have been made over the past few months up to the present. The President called on a General with years of intelligence experience to head the CIA. He has called on one of the premier intelligence anaylysts and former CIA head to run the Defense Department. I think Martinez is an okay selection for the RNC because I understand the reasons why he is a good choice, despite my reservations of having someone in the job that already has a job that keeps him very busy as a sitting Senator. There is a good chance that the Dems. will go along with the President's comprehensive immigration package instead of blocking it because of a childish snit over not getting their own way like we just witnessed with the neo-rights.
Many conservative bloggers seem unwilling to entertain the thought that it may be reasonable to have an Hispanic Senator be a public face of the party, while politicos at the RNC do the nuts-and-bolts work. Or that the advantages of having a procedural wizard in the number two Senate minority job may outweigh a few bad headlines and a little digust two years before the next election.
I'm not saying that these thoughts are correct, necessarily. I'm saying it's amazing how smart the conservative blogophere suddenly has become compared to the Republican leadership.
UPDATE: I should add that, in some ways, the conservative blogosphere's reaction to last week's defeat is admirable. Leftists take out their frustrations not just by deeming Democratic leaders stupid but by saying the same thing about the American public, threatening to move to Canada, calling for separation from the Sun Belt, etc, etc. Conservatives largely confine themselves to overreacting to some not-so-terribly-important appointments.
Senator Trent Lott was part of the problem. He voted in favor of earmarks to his state.
Posted by: Michael Ejercito | 17 November 2006 at 05:55 PM