
Former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-MS) took up Gov. Mark Sanford's (R-SC) Shakespearean warning today that the American people must "beware the Ides of March" when it comes to health care reform.
Sanford released a statement earlier saying that today -- March 15 -- is the day Julius Caesar was murdered, sometimes known as the Ides of March. The day is usually associated with a sense of foreboding, and Sanford warned the public to be wary of health care reform.
Trent Lott agreed today on Fox News: "Shakespeare warned us to beware the Ides of March. That's today, and I have a very ominous feeling about what's fixing to happen on health care votes."
At least, that's probably what he meant to say, though Lott's "Ides of March" sounds suspiciously like "Eyes of March" in the clip.
Judge for yourself:
ondioline
March 15, 2010 5:41 PM
We woulda been so much bettah auf if we had come tah-gethah as a nay-shun, and elected noble segregationist pioneeya John McCain Presuhdeyunt, ah say...!
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tiowally
March 15, 2010 5:44 PM
Advice Trent should've heeded: Beware the hides of March (hare) when choosing a toupee.
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tmccarthy0
March 16, 2010 9:53 AM in reply to tiowally
LOL, that is hilariously funny!
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TheOtherWA
March 15, 2010 6:00 PM
Unbelievable. There is no rock bottom for republics. They just keep sinking lower & lower.
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slb
March 15, 2010 6:15 PM
I guess you don't speak Southern, Jillian; I listened carefully to Lott and watched his mouth. He definitely said "Ides."
Lott has the Shakespeare slightly wrong. Shakespeare did not warn us, the general audience, to "Beware the Ides of March"; it was, rather, the soothsayer's warning to Caesar. And Shakespeare had borrowed the scene from Plutarch.
Actually, Republicans should probably like the Ides of March. In Roman times, it was the holiday for Mars, the god of war, and came complete with military parades. These days, the Ides of March is celebrated in Rome with a toga run, which sounds like a suitable diversion for political frat-boy types.
On the other hand, it's also the day that George Washington put down an incipient mutiny of his officers (known as "the Newburgh Conspiracy") in 1783. Beware the Ides of March, you potential mutineers.
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mophan
March 16, 2010 2:07 AM in reply to slb
"Gentlemen, you will permit me to put on my spectacles, for I have not only grown gray but almost blind in the service of my country."
compared to...
"Shakespeare warned us to beware the Ides of March. That's today, and I have a very ominous feeling about what's fixing to happen on health care votes."
One talks of the individual sacrifice made so that future generations would be blessed with the fruits of liberty they so valiantly fought for -- while the other...
Well, the other speaks of the individual greed made to preserve the obscene profits from the causes they aide.
Trust in the people, or trust in the money? One choice or the other.
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slb
March 16, 2010 4:24 PM in reply to mophan
You got it.
And it's not like Washington had any aversion to making money. He was a land speculator and a pretty shrewd businessman -- one of the wealthiest men of his time -- and one reason he supported overhauling the government in 1787 was that the government under the Articles of Confederation was not strong enough to eject squatters from his properties in the Ohio territory. But he also had a very strong sense of honor and public duty, and those were the things that came first with him. He could have ridden that Newburgh Conspiracy and made himself king of America if he had seen fit to do it. But he didn't. Because that would have been a betrayal of his duty to his country and his commitment to republican principles.
Trent Lott and the rest of that crowd would not hesitate to tear the country apart if they thought it would accrue to their benefit. They wouldn't know duty and honor if they came up to smack them in the face.
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SavannahGA
March 15, 2010 6:28 PM
Att: Repub effers down with the JC quotes. Here's one for you, out of context as the one you're liking so much is-
You blocks, you stones, you worse than senseless things.....
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BlindBat
March 15, 2010 6:57 PM
Julius Caesar, by William Shakespeare. Act 3. Scene II
BRUTUS
Be patient till the last. Romans, countrymen, I have a very ominous feeling about what's fixing to happen.
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Agateman
March 15, 2010 9:26 PM
Isn't this the same Trent Lott who bitched and moaned that he was not being treated fairly by the Insurance companies when his house was ruined by Katrina. Isn't this the same guy who found out that he was being treated just like everybody else in Mississippi who lost a house and he didn't like that fact. He's just as full of $hit as the rest of the Republicans.
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tiowally
March 15, 2010 10:21 PM in reply to Agateman
Didn't Shrub come to his rescue so he could sit on his porch?
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wial
March 16, 2010 1:34 AM
See, dear conservatives, this is the problem with scorning erudition in all its forms. You get the whole point of the Boston Tea Party bass-ackwards, to use one of your charming colloquialisms. Didn't you know the Tea Party was a *rejection* of tea and the corporate power it stood for? Didn't you know that's ultimately why liberals drink lattes -- that and because coffee stimulated conversation, and learning, and the Enlightenment out of which this great country was born, with the help of the much despised French, escaping, for a time at least, you moral laggards.
Now you appropriate Shakespeare and create a situation where you can only pray nothing ever happens to President Obama, because if it does, Gitmo will be way too good for you. More likely, rendition in several senses of the word.
Beware the Idiots of March, for you are them.
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CranialRectalLoopback
March 16, 2010 1:43 AM
What the GOPers don't realize is that their retarded* supporters don't know the damn thing about the Ides of March.
*retarded used in a strictly satirical fashion only.
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decisivemoment
March 16, 2010 1:53 AM
Trent Lott's about three things -- self promotion, self promotion and self promotion. A pity he's only capable of communicating in cliches. He gets himself in so much trouble this way.
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Rich in NJ
March 16, 2010 2:06 AM
Good Christians all. Not.
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hollywood
March 16, 2010 2:20 AM in reply to Rich in NJ
Yes Christians! Followers of Jesus Christ! Who himself would absolutely be AGAINST having corporations not sentence people (45,000) people to death every year as a prudent business decision beholden to stockholders (gods) for final judgement. Does anybody think Jeesus Effing Christ would be AGAINST providing healthcare to millions of desperate people?
Assholes.
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slb
March 16, 2010 4:31 PM in reply to hollywood
...Jesus Christ! Who himself would absolutely be AGAINST having corporations not sentence people (45,000) people to death every year...
Umm, I think you got tangled up in an implied double negative, there, unless this JC is the evil twin of the real one...
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amber
March 16, 2010 3:37 AM
Trent Lott is a gosh darn lobbyist. He raced out of his seat to make the big bucks to whore himself out for the likes of the health care industry. Lobbyists exaggerate, lie, distract–whatever it takes– to satisfy their masters. The Republicans are cornered, of course they're going to pull out what ever ridiculous crap they can. The media's fallen for almost everything else. Who's to say naive and lazy reporters won't follow the shiny thing again.
And good god, he's taking Mark Sanford's lead.
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Nancy Irving
March 16, 2010 3:56 AM
The historical parallel they would seem to be invoking is that Julius Caesar was attempting to seize absolute power, effectively ending Rome's (small r) republican form of government.
The nonsense, rife among the GOP base, about Obama's administration being somehow (though how is never specified) "unconstitutional," together with risible accusations that he will shortly seize dictatorial powers to incarcerate masses of dissidents in concentration camps, etc., are the context for the analogy.
I wonder whether the Secret Service has taken note of these Shakespearean warnings. It is not crazy to read them as direct threats on Obama's life.
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The Commenter Formerly Known as NCSteve
March 16, 2010 7:56 AM in reply to Nancy Irving
So you're saying there's another way to read them?
Considering that these are the same ones who contend that Gibbs wearing a purple bracelet (in support of a friend whose daughter is battling cancer) and a purple tie was a coded message to the yooyins and the redesign of the patch and logo for the space command during the Bush years was a coded message from Obama to the Islamofascists, Let us also not forget that John Wilkes Booth repeated the words attributed by Plutarch to Brutus after Caesar's assassination.
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Davran
March 16, 2010 10:00 AM in reply to The Commenter Formerly Known as NCSteve
I've read Shakespeare, so the implicit threat on the President's life contained in this warning was the first thing that came to mind when Lott invoked the "Ides of March."
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Alex39
March 16, 2010 9:18 AM in reply to Nancy Irving
Yon Cantor has a lean and hungry look. Melikes him not.
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slb
March 16, 2010 4:40 PM in reply to Alex39
Ooooh, very good!
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MT from CC
March 16, 2010 12:57 PM
Now I need an advanced degree in English Literature just to understand what GOP leaders are saying. More elitism from the GOP.
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Tosh
April 30, 2010 5:32 AM
See, dear conservatives, this is the problem with scorning erudition in all its forms. You get the whole point of the Boston Tea Party bass-ackwards, to use one of your charming colloquialisms. Didn't you know the Tea Party was a *rejection* of tea and the corporate power it stood for? Didn't you know that's ultimately why liberals drink lattes -- that and because coffee stimulated conversation, and learning, and the Enlightenment out of which this great country was born, with the help of the much despised French, escaping, for a time at least, you moral laggards.
Now you appropriate Shakespeare and create a situation where you can only pray nothing ever happens to President Obama, because if it does, Gitmo will be way too good for you. More likely, rendition in several senses of the word.
Beware the Idiots of March, for you are them.
kamagra m65
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