What's he got to do? Use the n-word? Be photographed in a hood? Have the lead in a blackface play? Call Colin Powell 'boy'? Wax eloquent about the 'mammy' he had as a child? Give the key-note at a lynching?

Give us a clue. What's the standard? What's the reading on the moral barometer here? What does it take for Virginia Republicans to condemn the unadulterated, unrepentant racism of Mississippi Senator Trent Lott?

Hey, guys, let me give you an inside tip here. Don't be so knee-knocking timid about it. You've gotten a pass! The president of the United States gave you one. Well, sort of. But he is a Republican president. If he can take his shot, you can take yours.

Where is your morality? Your rage? Your indignation? Where is that thing that beats in your heart that makes you an American?

Where are you on this one, George Allen? Where are you, John Warner? Where is Cantor? You've got that junior merit badge on leadership now. When are you going to use it? You whacked Cooter pretty good. Good ol' Cooter. Where are you on this one? Show us what you're made of.

Where is the leadership in the state house and senate? Where is Bill Howell? Speak, Mr. Speaker.

Where is Winsome Sears, the African-American Delegate who was the first to frump herself up and call for Vance Wilkins' resignation? My friend Vance. You cut and ran on him.

Lay the template by which you measured Wilkins on Trent Lott and let us know what the difference is. This one should be easy for you. Oh, I see. Ya'll never did like Vance did you? What was it? The hair? Those gapped front teeth? The way, when he told you something, he meant it? What was it?

Couldn't have been the money. You took that easy enough. Those wads of cash are not that hard to swallow, are they?

Where is the attorney general? Jerry, you're running for governor. You're wooing those minority votes. Where are you on this one? Promise you this. We're going to bring it up, if you don't.

I'd ask the same rhetorical question of Gilmore, but I'm afraid he'd find a way to work in some reference to the car tax.

The thing is, though, G'mo has probably got a little score to settle with the Mississippian. Don't you guess the Pres consulted the Republican leadership before he dumped the national chairman?

Go get 'im, Jim! Now's your time. Tongue lash him a little bit. That'll get you back in the news. Be like the good old days. Hey, man, get relevant again!

Such a good Republican, too, this Trent. Got the right hair-do. Right necktie.

Well, gosh, he didn't mean it like it came out. Sure he didn't. He didn't mean it all those times he espoused those sentiments over the years. Poor thing. He was misunderstood. He didn't mean a word of what he was saying when he campaigned to keep African-Americans out of his fraternity. Bless his heart. Them kind just didn't fit in. It wouldn't look right. Folks wouldn't understand. Why, some of his best friends are probably … well, they are. Good friends. It was just a birthday party, for crying out loud.

I know! Here's what we'll do! We could sign the good senator up for one of those remedial sensitivity classes for fraternity boys down in Charlottesville!

They could all hold hands. Repent. Roll ol' Strom himself in for a little show and tell. Buddies they are, they might even croon a few bars of "Carry Me Back … "

Shucks, Lott might even decide to stay a while. Might find a home. You know he'd find some comfort level

The way things are here in Virginia, it would have to remind him of Mississippi.