How fitting is it that on the birth date of our country declaring "all men are created equal" that Jesse Helms has died. The man who once called the University of North Carolina "The university of Negros and communists" passed away today at the age of 86. Now I must admit I'm torn. Part of me feels for the passing of any person, but at the same time I'm quite thrilled that the son-of-a-bitch is dead. I love my state, but with Helms as our senior senator I was always a little embarrassed. He once ran against and ethnic candidate using the slogan "Vote for Helms-He's one of us", he opposed the MLK JR Day bill on the grounds that he "associated with communists" and was a philanderer, and there's of course the famous "Hands" ad which can be seen here. He was a racist and homophobic plain and simple but the worst incident of all might be this fun little story. Soon after the Senate vote on the Confederate flag insignia, Sen. Jesse Helms ran into Carol Mosely-Braun in a Capitol elevator. Helms turned to his friend, Sen. Orrin Hatch, and said, "Watch me make her cry. I'm going to make her cry. I'm going to sing 'Dixie' until she cries." He then proceeded to sing the song about "the good life" during slavery to Mosely-Braun.
I just wish Jesse wouldn't have died so soon. Something tells me he would've loved this November!
3 comments:
Unfortunately our statewide politicians haven't quite caught up to the progress of our state yet. Our local politicians are getting much better, we do have a pretty good democratic governor, and we've produced John Edwards in the last few years, so things are getting better. It's the college kids from the 60's-today that are really helping to turn this state around. I mean we've gone from electing racists for senate to electing poverty fighting sons of millworkers who get 400 dollar haircuts.
http://gawker.com/tag/speaking-ill-of-the-dead/?i=5022647&t=wildly-hateful-man-widely-hated
http://www.newsobserver.com/politics/politicians/helms/story/1135443.html
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