After President Clinton’s speech on race, Rep. Charles Canady (R., Fla.) says, “The President is right to call on the American people to work together to build one America,” but adds, “Racial preferences are inherently divisive.” Rep. J. C. Watts, (R., Okla.) however, tells Time, ” ‘Color-blind’ is a cute word, but it has no meaning now. When you look at the number of blacks in Fortune 500 management, you know we have some work to do before we can even say we’re close.” Watts had previously voiced only tactical concerns about fighting preferences. .. . On Meet the Press Jesse Jackson sort of apologizes for calling Ward Connerly a “house slave” when the U.-Cal. schools voted to end racial preferences: “[I]f I said it, I do regret it, do apologize. .. . [But] what was painful that day was not just what was said, but what was done: a real move to violate the law of opportunity and inclusion.” . . . Thomas Sowell on apologizing for slavery: “What would this apology do for blacks? Is a heightened sense of grievance an asset or a liability in the job market? In education? In human relations across racial lines?” . . . Speaking of old grudges: On Watergate’s 25th anniversary, Pat Buchanan calls it “the overthrow of an elected president by a media and political elite he had routed in a 49-state landslide.” But Sam Donaldson draws different lesson: “I think the system worked. Richard Nixon got his just deserts, I believe, going back to Helen Gahagan Douglas and Jerry Voorhis and other past Nixon campaigns”-which the Left condemned as McCarthyite.
New best friends? In Wall Street Journal interview, President Clinton defends Trent Lott from conservative critics: “I think he’s getting a little bit of a bum rap right now. And I think Gingrich is, too. And I just have to say, in this sense, he has proven, first of all, quite effective. We’ve got a budget agreement. We’ve got a Chemical Weapons Convention.” .. . Sen. Rick Santorum (R., Penn.) excoriates Republicans trying to oust Gingrich: “Two years ago I was wishing that I could be back in the House. Now I’m saying, ‘Thank God I’m not in the House.’ They’re a bunch of cowards over there.”
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