One of the hooks the "liberal media" has used to cover l'affaire Lott has been to claim that the story was pushed by conservatives and ignored by liberals. I certainly do not wish to disparage the voices of the right that have spoken out against Lott on this issue, especially Andrew Sullivan, a writer who is more often than not the focus of unremitting scorn from myself and other progressive bloggers, and whose outrage about this story has been relentless from the beginning. More relevantly, he (and to a lesser extent, Instapundit) has used the occasion to examine the dark side of conservatism, where many have used the rhetoric of small government and support for tradition as a cover for old-fashioned bigotry. Good for him; I hope that when a similar test of political character is put before me, I can pass it with as much integrity (though I doubt it).

Too bad the conventional wisdom is full of s---. Sullivan aside, most of the writing on this topic has been driven by liberal outrage. The noble Atrios was the fustest with the mostest on this issue; if you want to link to the 1948 Dixiecrat platform, or find another instance when Lott praised his Confederate forbears(such as the General referenced, above), or acted as an apologist for slavery, that's where you go, several times a day (weekends included). Almost all of the bloggers linked on this page have weighed in with their own two cents on the issue. Now that Lott is twisting slowly, slowly in the wind, they have gone on to other political targets, such as the virulent homophobia of Lott's likely replacement, Don Nickles, or the similar political associations of John Ashcroft.

On the other hand, for every conservative pundit who is calling for Lott's head, there is another who thinks the whole thing is being blown out of proportion (ie., Rush). Moreover, much of the conservative opposition to Trent Lott seems driven by personal factors, as if his mistake was one of letting the cat out of the bag, thereby embarassing the Party, not a test of political character. Well, where were they before, when Trent Lott was making numerous speeches before a white supremacist group, or extolling Strom Thurmond's '48 campaign on other occasions, or compiling one of the most regressive records on civil rights in Congress. Why didn't they express their outrage then? Lets face it: if Lott had made those same remarks two weeks ago, but did not have the previous baggage, this story would have blown over almost immediately. This is an issue now not because Trent Lott made some loose remarks paying tribute to a 100-year old man, but because of a lifetime of racist insensitivity, lived out in broad daylight. Any conservative now demanding his resignation must answer why it took so long to speak out.