When a friend called yesterday to tell me that Jesse Helms died, I had to reach back into my dusty emotional storehouse and find some ill will for that terrible man. The hatred I once felt for him had dried up. Just like how I felt when Reagan and Falwell died, Helm's politics are just ridiculous in 2008. Just irrelevant.

Who remembers the names of men who said the earth is flat?

It's almost too easy for modern people to mock Jesse Helms and his position. In an age where the Southern plantation-owning aristocrat with a genteel manner and a vicious soul is viewed by many as an historical throwback or a caricature, it's hard for many people to imagine that such people were (and still are) real.

It would all be much more amusing if Helms hadn't made many people's lives significantly more difficult by his actions. It would all be much more amusing if there wasn't still a tendency for people to believe the way Helms did... not even to believe what Helms did, but to function in life thinking that there are two kinds of people: The kind who meet certain qualifications and might be considered human beings, and the rest, whose lives, feelings, rights, and humanity are all expendable in the name of the Preservation of the First Kind of People and their Esteemed Values and Way of Life.

Helms was once someone's adored child.

It is helpful to think of that idea when contemplating people you despise.

There is a big difference between gleefully letting your Shadenfreud Flag fly and fighting responsibly and ethically against that which is unjust and sick in our society.

It is so tempting to jump on the schadenfreud bandwagon, but doing so really does diminish us all.

It diminishes me everytime I do it.

I'm trying not to, today.

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About the South: I am a native Yankee who recently moved to eastern TN by choice. I can tell you that the Northeast has no shortage of ignorant racists and red-necks. In many ways, I am more comfortable here. Also, as one who regularly travels to various places deep within "flyover country" I am continually amazed at the people I meet there; mostly in a good way. That being said, it is abundantly clear that the South has no monopoly on assholes, and I know lots of folks that really resent (and don't deserve) being tarred with that brush.

@ AJ- I am trying to be like you. Listening to your posts reminds me of the writings of Joe (Deer Hunting with Jesus) Bageant. Have you read any of his stuff? I would love to know what you think of his world view.

Best to you, and best of luck at the Reunion. I'm sure there will be stories to tell!

NC is home to so many military bases. Sitting on the foreign relations committee he pushed through a large number of spending bills that created or enlarged the military bases, mostly in the eastern part of the state. Ft. Bragg, Camp Lejeune, Pope AFB, Seymour Johnson AFB, Cherry Point NAS, MCAS New River and the ever mysterious Harvey Point.

On July 4th 2008, the day Jesse died, I watched a clip of his rantings on the tube.The rant i mostly enjoyed was that " homo sexual's have 16 different partners a month"

The marriage of homosexuals caused the death of Jesse. He realized that the Rev.Ted Haggard, a Bush spiritual adviser was married, yet he strayed. He then thought of Mark Foley and passed.

The South is our crazy uncle in the basement..only, we just let him run the household for the last eight years.

Until we blot out this racist, homophobic, xenophobic, loyalist-monarchist taint in our body-politic, this country will never truly realize its greatness. In fact, the only times this country has been great, was when it fought furiously against everything the South stands for, and won a battle or two..but never the war.

Loyalist/monarchist? Aw, someone passed History 301 this semester! How cute!

You left out classist as well, which seems to be a lot of what these problems in this country stem from, and also why people like Helms keep getting elected- not only in the South, and not only by white folks. Ignorant comments like yours continues the us vs. them mentality that permeates both sides of American politics.

The most racist, homophobic, and xenophobic comments I've heard have come from people that grew up and populate Northern cities and suburbs. Statistics show that the most segregated cities are in the North.

Its broad sweeping statements that dismiss whole swaths of our country as sub-human that as we see through the comments, characterized Helms, and in a way, your little diatribe makes you no better then him.

I've found this to be true:

If someone CAN be kind or gracious or thoughtful, that means that in general, THEY ARE NOT.

Jesse Helms, it is said could be kind and compassionate. Those who say this are of course attempting to say that there was another side, another layer to him, that he was somehow, a more complex and nuanced human being.

Ummm, no.

There was no "nuance" to Sen. Helms. No shades to his personality. No rich textures to his character. He was a mean-sprited, hateful, bigoted old coot who believed with all his heart that America was not intended for people who are not white male heterosexuals. He not only believed that, he fought for that white supremacist ideal for 30 years in the Senate and long before he entered politics. Those here who go on about how "impolite" it is to speak ill of the dead should remember that the GOP's Senator from North Carolina would be more than impolite to anyone here posting simply because we do not fit his ideal. Were he still able to work in politics, he would be doing precisely what he had done before: making it more difficult to just live free in this country. So a pox on this faux "civility". Jesse Helms is dead, at long last. The toast that we raise to celebrate his passing is the same that we will raise when George Bush leaves the White House. Is there actually anyone here who will be "civil" about that?

Didn't think so.