Whole Lott o' Love

Last night, after I returned home from the theater, I watched Introducing Dorothy Dandridge (Thank you, New York Oublic Library, for all the free movies!). In one scene, Dorothy dips her toes into the pool at a resort in Las Vegas, and the management has the pool drained and cleaned for "health reasons." Disgusting and ignorant, no? Well, not if you ask our new Senate majority leader, Trent Lott, who, at our good buddy Strom Thurmond's 100th birthday party, proclaimed that had Thurmond won the presidential election in 1948, we wouldn't have "all these problems" we have now. What a moron. Doesn't he know that any time he speaks, even if it's just to the paperboy, it will be in the news and people will be deconstructing it? True, at this point, only Al Gore and black leaders seem to care that Trent Lott fucked up and openly (perhaps accidentally) praised segregationist ideals, but that's something.

What I love is that people are still saying, "oh, that's how Strom used to be! He's changed!" Bullshit. Seriously. A man who will run for president at age 46 on a segregation platform does not change. He may not speak the same way, because it's unpopular and could get him bounced out of office, but this isn't some sappy after-school special where the racist realizes through some life-affirming event that blacks are people, too. Supporting Jim Crow on a national level isn't like your old grandaddy using the word "nigger" or not approving of your interracial marriage. Strom Thurmond is a relic, and never should have been in office this long. Yes, his ideas are those of the past, and they have no place in today's government. It's just too bad the American people had to wait until poor health forced him out of it. And I am through.