I think it has been established to anyone with a working forebrain that the Lott issue isn't about racism and bigotry, and never was. It's not about black people being offended, or Republicans being closet racists.

The objective is to cripple the Republican Party, and get the Democrats back into power. That's it.

Given that, the rank hypocrisy with which leftist bigotry is forgiven and forgotten, while bigotry, real or otherwise, from the right is pursued clear down to the glowing iron gates of Hell, is at least understandable, if not justifiable.

This is raw politics, at its rawest. Racism was completely incidental to this. Lott needed to be destroyed. If it hadn't been the remark he made, it would have been a misfiled tax reform, or a motel receipt,* or an investing misstep.

* Oh, yes, the Democrats and their press buttmonkeys would have cheerfully driven Lott to the wall for sleeping around, knowing full well that they dismissed such behavior as completely irrelevant with Clinton, and knowing that the obvious reeking hypocrisy would be seen by all, and that it still wouldn't make a difference.