"STUNNING": Andrew Sullivan has some prescient comments about Lott's speech in this post. Read it in its entirety, it's too long for me to post here. And then scroll up to the comments from one of his readers.

Virginia Postrel writes:

I guess Lott figures if Bill Clinton can brazen out Monicagate, he can do the same. He may be right. But Trent Lott's no Clinton, segregation's no Monica, and Senate Majority Leader has no term limits. Do Republicans really want to tell voters that the only way to get Trent Lott out of the leadership is to give Senate Democrats a majority?

One big difference though: Clinton had virtually the entire DNC national apparatus to defend him (Remember Al Gore's infamous "history will show..." speech at the foot of the White House about five minutes after Clinton was impeached?). As Sullivan writes, in Lott's case, "all you've got is Sean Hannity and Pat Buchanan in your corner, and a damning silence from your colleagues, and a public denunciation from your own president".