Everyone who reads blogs knows that no discussion of contemporary GOP racism will take place without some idiot mentioning that Robert Byrd was a member of the Klan during the Roosevelt administration. To pre-empt this response. Yglesias makes the obvious point about why the Byrd analogy fails as a defense of Trent Lott's praise of Strom Thurmond's white supremacy and Gordon Smith's defense of Lott: the analogy would only hold if someone not only attended a birthday party for Robert Byrd but specifically cited his membership in the Klan and his filibustering the Civil Rights Act as things to be proud of. In response, some trollbot dutifully intones: "And yet you ignore former KKK member Robert Byrd." My favorite Robert Byrd tu quoque ever! In addition, this is a crucial bottom-line point: "Meanwhile, with regard to both Lott and now to Smith, it should be said that indifference to racism is, when taken to these levels, itself a form of racism. Nobody who took the interests or attitudes of black people seriously would be saying this stuff." Yes, Oregon can do a great deal better than a Senator who thinks it's horribly unfair to criticize someone for praising a single-issue white supremacist campaign and saying that its victory would have been good for the country in 2002. --Scott Lemieux
