Jesse Helms Is Finally Dead. Let’s Have A Cookout.
Dead at 88, and America is a little less xenophobic and hate-filled. This is all you need to know, rest-of-world:
Soon after the Senate vote on the Confederate flag insignia, Sen. Jesse Helms (R.-N.C.) ran into Mosely-Braun in a Capitol elevator. Helms turned to his friend, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R.-Utah), and said, “Watch me make her cry. I’m going to make her cry. I’m going to sing ‘Dixie’ until she cries.” He then proceeded to sing the song about the good life during slavery to Mosely-Braun (Gannett News Service, 9/2/93; Time, 8/16/93).
He was anti-abortion, virulently anti-gay, and an old racist, sexist, bastard on top of it.