Jesse Helms dies

[Superman]

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Jesse Helms, an iconic US conservative lawmaker known for hardline stands against Cuba and for UN reform, died Friday at the age of 86, a spokesman said.

John Dodd, president of the Jesse Helms Center Foundation, announced that the senator had died, but did not release the cause of death.

"America lost a great public servant and a true patriot today," said White house Deputy Press Secretary Scott Stanzel.

Helms served in the US Senate for 30 years, where he was a polarizing force as a hard-right conservative.

He was chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee where he pressed for reform of the United Nations. He also coauthored the Helms-Burton Act tightening and codifying as law US sanctions against communist Cuba.

The law, highly controversial internationally, sought to apply sanctions against non-US firms doing business in Cuba, and penalized those suspected of profiting from assets seized from US nationals after the 1959 revolution.

Helms was the first legislator from any country to address the UN Security Council.

Born in 1921 in Monroe, North Carolina, Helms was a pillar of his Republican Party when Ronald Reagan came to power and the senator was a staunch supporter of traditional tobacco and textile interests.

Health problems led him to retire in 2003.

Helms's Senate seat was picked up by Republican Elizabeth Dole, wife of long-time colleague and former Senator Bob Dole.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080704/pl_afp/uspoliticshelms;_ylt=AqNHlIpxUdTGCnwdsPWCdx6yFz4D

Good riddance.

 

[souvlaki]

Weird, I didn't even realize he was still alive. I thought he died a few years back.

 

[Mister Sinister]

http://home.att.net/~jrhsc/helms.html

Evil, evil man. Auf Wiedersehen.

 

[Kelly]

Condolences to his family.

 

[The Senator]

The world is better without him. My condolences to the family, though, on losing their evil patriarch.

 

[Superman4ever]

The world is better without him. My condolences to the family, though, on losing their evil patriarch.

 

[kane9321]

may this scumbag rot in hell

 

[Addendum]

And may the worms get ill when they feast on his carcass

 

[USMC]

A crushing blow for blind sheep everywhere.

Good riddance.

 

[DACrowe]

He died on the fourth. Like Jefferson and Adams.

Seriously, being a North Carolinian I know what this man did when he campaigned and just not his legislation but I've heard his personality. I never liked the man needless to say and disagreed with just about everything he ever said or stood for.

I am sorry for his family and it shows we are moving away from that man's politics. I'm not celebrating his loss but there aren't any tears around here either.

 

[bored]

Agreed. I won't celebrate a death, but this isn't one I'd mourn, either. The man was an open bigot.

 

[Spider-Bite]

I feel so guilty laughing at these posts. LOL. They are all true.

 

[StorminNorman]

Comparing the response from the liberal posters here to this to that of the conservative posters at the news of Teddy Kennedy's brain tumor - I must say that I have lost a great deal of respect for many posters.

The fact that a man who disagreed with you died should not be a celebrated, especially a man who is guilty only of having a different view on the world that you do.

 

[rdh007]

Comparing the response from the liberal posters here to this to that of the conservative posters at the news of Teddy Kennedy's brain tumor - I must say that I have lost a great deal of respect for many posters.

The fact that a man who disagreed with you died should not be a celebrated, especially a man who is guilty only of having a different view on the world that you do.

If you can't say anything nice,

 

[Addendum]

Just because Helms died doesn't mean he now merits respect. No racist ******* merits any.

 

[Superman]

Comparing the response from the liberal posters here to this to that of the conservative posters at the news of Teddy Kennedy's brain tumor - I must say that I have lost a great deal of respect for many posters.

The fact that a man who disagreed with you died should not be a celebrated, especially a man who is guilty only of having a different view on the world that you do.

I'll live without the respect of anyone who would defend this man.

 

[The Chairman]

Comparing the response from the liberal posters here to this to that of the conservative posters at the news of Teddy Kennedy's brain tumor - I must say that I have lost a great deal of respect for many posters.

The fact that a man who disagreed with you died should not be a celebrated, especially a man who is guilty only of having a different view on the world that you do.

While I do agree with you to an extent, they were, in the end, very different form each other.

Kennedy was a man with a great amount of personal demons brought on by the tragic circumstances of his family. I have to amdit I'm still mifffed he never was properly charged for what happend in Chappaquitic (sp?) However, as a politician, he was a great advocate for social tolerance and got many great bills passed promoting gun control and equal rights for African Americans and homosexuals. Also, despite being a "lion of th left," he was well respecte for his ability to work with the right to get the job done.

I don't know much about Helms, but from what I've read so far, he seemed to be quite a dispicable person.

 

[Tag279]

Someone loved him so I mourn their loss. Helms had some real issues. I hope that God has released him from his hate.

This is some info on his political career.

Opposition to AIDS funding

Helms was "bitterly opposed to federal financing of AIDS research and treatment".[13] Opposing the Kennedy-Hatch AIDS bill in 1988, Helms stated, "There is not one single case of AIDS in this country that cannot be traced in origin to sodomy."[14] When Ryan White died in 1990, his mother went to Congress to speak to politicians on behalf of people with AIDS. She spoke to 23 representatives: Helms refused to speak to her even when she was alone with him in an elevator.[15] Despite opposition by Helms, the Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency Care (CARE) Act passed in 1990.

1990 reelection campaign

Helms ran for reelection in a nationally publicized campaign against the former mayor of Charlotte, Harvey Gantt. Helms' aired a late-running television commercial which showed a white man's hands ripping up a rejection notice from a company that gave the job to a "less qualified minority".

The ad was criticized for perceived subliminal content; As the hands crumple the rejection notice up, for a fraction of a second the letter fades to a picture of Mr. Gantt and the hands appear to be crushing his head.

Helms once deeply offended a black colleague, Democratic Senator Carol Moseley-Braun of Illinois, by singing part of "Dixie" on a Capitol elevator.

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, 1993-09-02; Time, 1993-08-16).

Helms opposed the Martin Luther King Day bill in 1983 on grounds that King had two associates with communist ties, Stanley Levison and Jack O'Dell. [7] Helms led the Senatorial opposition to the bill and voiced disapproval of King's alleged philandering.

Helms had close ties to the rightist Salvadoran death squad leader Roberto D'Aubuisson and was considered a main sponsor of D'Aubuisson's political party, the Nationalist Republican Alliance.[8] When confronted with evidence that D'Aubuisson ran death squads that systematically murdered civilians, he replied that "[a]ll I know, is that D'Aubuisson is a free enterprise man and deeply religious."

In his 1990 victory statement, Helms mocked the major North Carolina newspapers for their unhappiness over his victory, quoting a line from "Casey at the Bat": "There's no joy in Mudville tonight. The mighty ultraliberal establishment, and the liberal politicians and editors and commentators and columnists have struck out again."

 

[StorminNorman]

While I do agree with you to an extent, they were, in the end, very different form each other.

Kennedy was a man with a great amount of personal demons brought on by the tragic circumstances of his family. I have to amdit I'm still mifffed he never was properly charged for what happend in Chappaquitic (sp?) However, as a politician, he was a great advocate for social tolerance and got many great bills passed promoting gun control and equal rights for African Americans and homosexuals. Also, despite being a "lion of th left," he was well respecte for his ability to work with the right to get the job done.

I don't know much about Helms, but from what I've read so far, he seemed to be quite a dispicable person.

Nothing Helms did compared to killing a girl.

Helms had positions that many in today's age will find reprehensible, however he was a product of his generation, his culture. If you are going to call Helms a despicable person, you better be quick to drag Washington, Jefferson, FDR, etc. with them.

 

[StorminNorman]

If you can't say anything nice,

That was my policy for Kennedy, it is not too much to ask the same for this man shortly after his death.

 

[StorminNorman]

I'll live without the respect of anyone who would defend this man.

Did I defend the man? No - simply stating that cheering his death when he committed no true evil besides holding philosophy you do not agree with is as bad as anything he did.

 

[Crowforge]

no true evil?

 

[The Chairman]

Nothing Helms did compared to killing a girl.

Helms had positions that many in today's age will find reprehensible, however he was a product of his generation, his culture. If you are going to call Helms a despicable person, you better be quick to drag Washington, Jefferson, FDR, etc. with them.

I agree that what Kennedy did was sickening, moreso than what Helms did, and it angers here that many, including the people here, are willing to forgive him for that becuase he was a good politician.

But Helms, up to the end, was apparently a man with such hatred and bitterness in him that for me, he is worthy of criticism. Even for a product of his time, opposing AIDS funding and blaming homosexuals for the virus is something I cannot overlook.

 

[Addendum]

Did I defend the man? No - simply stating that cheering his death when he committed no true evil besides holding philosophy you do not agree with is as bad as anything he did.

I've never cheered about his death. But I'm certainly not going to act like there's something to respect about him now that he's dead since I never had any for him when he was alive.

 

[StorminNorman]

I agree that what Kennedy did was sickening, moreso than what Helms did, and it angers here that many, including the people here, are willing to forgive him for that becuase he was a good politician.

But Helms, up to the end, was apparently a man with such hatred and bitterness in him that for me, he is worthy of criticism. Even for a product of his time, opposing AIDS funding and blaming homosexuals for the virus is something I cannot overlook.

Worthy of criticism yes - cheering his death? No.

What he said was ignorant, it was not evil. He did not actively harm homosexuals with his rhetoric.