I’d like to tell a story. It’s fiction, because something like this could never happen in real life.
One night, Mary Matalin came home from Strom Thurmond’s birthday party in a snit. “You wouldn’t believe what that dinosaur Trent Lott said tonight! He wished Strom had won the election in 1948! The president’s been working so hard to reach out to the black people who’re the backbone of your wretched party, James honey, and he just goes and blows it! I hope nobody notices, and you know our deal — this is off the record.”
“Sure, dumpling, you know me”, says James Carville. “I won’t do nothing with this, so just get some sleep and forget about it”. As soon as Mary leaves the room, Carville calls his buddy Josh Marshall. “Josh – you ain’t gonna believe this, bubba, but I got a way we can get the Senate back. Lott stuck his foot in his mouth at Strom’s party, and if we play it right, we can turn this molehill into a mountain. If we raise enough shit, the Reeps will have to turn on him, and he’ll resign rather than set around there taking crap from that cowboy cracker Don Nickles. Mi’sippi has a Dem governor, so we pick up a seat if we can run him off. ”
Josh goes: “Damn, you’re smart, Jimmy boy. I’ll get Reynolds and all the other war bloggers all excited over it. They’re always carrying on about how liberal they really are, so they have to jump on this story to show they’re not bullshitting. They’ll see it as their chance to make history, and I know just how to flatter them boys.”
Jimmy says “Just one thing, Josh – the story can’t be tied to me. Mary will have a cow” and Josh says “your secret’s safe with me” and hangs up. He hits his blog, and fires off an e-mail to Reynolds telling him how outraged he is by all this backwardness, and he’s told a bunch of other people about it. Reynolds quickly does his part, not wanting to be out-gunned.
Fast forward to today. Nickles and a big ole gang insist on a new election for Leader. Lott counts the votes, determines he’s going to lose, and resigns not just from the leadership, but from the whole dang Senate. M’issipi’s governor appoints a Dem, the dems flip Chaffee, and once again, the Reeps lose the Senate.
But like I said, it’s a fantasy — nothing like this could ever happen in real life. Oh, yeah, Matalin resigned. Just a coincidence, I’m sure.
Another crazy theory: Lott’s remarks were calculated. He wanted Mary Landrieu to win in Lousiana, because Reeps would surely dump him if they had a two-seat majority and stood to lose nothing by his being replaced by a Dem. He made the gaffe just two days before the Louisiana runoff, black turnout was the critical factor, and sure enough, it was huge. Like I said, this is crazy – Lott’s not that smart.
Merry Christmas.
According to NBC, if Lott resigns his Senate seat before Jan. 1st, Mississippi must run a special election, which a Republican is likely to win. If he resigns after 1/1/03, the Governor will probably appoint a Democrat to take the seat until the next general election in November.