Trent Lott, the former U.S. senator from Mississippi who’s been accused of working behind the scenes to get Glenn Boyce the chancellorship at the University of Mississippi, did Boyce no favors when he commended him as a “good ole boy.”
Such a reference has fed into the perception — perhaps unfair — that Boyce is not really qualified to do the job, but is getting it only because of political connections.
This is not the first time Lott’s choice of words has been poor. He did himself in as Senate majority leader with a racial faux pas 17 years ago.
At a birthday party, Lott effusively praised Sen. Strom Thurmond’s 1948 Dixiecrat presidential campaign, even though the Dixiecrats’ main objective was the protection of states’ rights to legislate racial segregation.
