Policing the Margins of the Right

Were you wondering why Republicans were so quick to denounce Trent Lott? (even David Horowitz has condemned him, for chrissakes!)

Ed Kilgore, the Policy Director of the Democratic Leadership Council, has an answer. Josh Marshall relays his comments in a TPM blog entry:

The angle some people may be missing about conservatives and Lott is that they are eager to pursue a number of things--a scaleback of affirmative action policies, private school vouchers, appointment of conservative judges with backgrounds more questionable than Lott's--that will create some concerns that the GOP is not exactly the reborn Party of Lincoln that appeared on TV screens at the 2000 convention. Given this agenda, conservatives don't want the task complicated by a Senate Leader (whom they don't like anyway) whose very name will conjure up racial dissension for the foreseeable future. For one thing, they're afraid the Bush White House will put the kibosh on controversial conservative initiatives if Lott has [to] carry the water. So don't be fooled into thinking that GOP conservatives will drop an anvil on Lott strictly because they are horrified by his words.

Far fetched? Hardly. It's all about holding on to political capital so that the Republicans can go for the gold a lil bit later on...