Douchebag of the Week #2 (Strom Thurmond)

In honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, I thought it would be appropriate to name Strom Thurmond today's Douchebag of the Week.  Thurmond, the most vocal and vitriolic opponent of civil rights reform and one of the longest serving senators of American history, was undeniably one of the biggest douchebags of all time. 

After retiring from the military, Thurmond became the governor of South Carolina, arguably the most backward state in the Union, historically speaking.  Thurmond split from the Democratic Party after the liberal reforms of FDR and Truman, and first ran for President on a third party ticket for the States' Rights Democratic Party on a platform of preserving segregation.  One of his most famous campaign speeches includes his statement: "I wanna tell you, ladies and gentlemen, that there's not enough troops in the army to force the Southern people to break down segregation and admit the nigga race into our theaters, into our swimming pools, into our homes, and into our churches."  Idiocy, mindlessness, ignorance, and hatred ooze from every word. 

He became South Carolina's state senator for an uninterrupted 46 years, although he switched to the Republican Party during the early '60s when civil rights debate firmly established it as the conservative party.  In 1957, Thurmond set the still-unbroken record of the longest lone filibuster of American history, where he stood speaking for twenty-four hours and eighteen minutes to delay civil rights legislation.  He played a significant role in the election campaign of Richard Nixon in 1968 because of Nixon's earlier opposition to racial justice and desegregation in the South. 

Thurmond's prominent political career was centered solely on fighting civil rights legislation and desegregation.  Although he remained in the Senate until 2002, he was politically insignificant after complete Southern desegregation, beyond being the oldest member of Congress.  It was later revealed that as a young man, he had fathered a child with a teenage black house maid who worked for his family.  A figure of hatred, racism, and a disgustingly backward approach to social questions, Thurmond was appointed by the people of South Carolina to represent them without fail and with little opposition until he was one hundred years old.

More than almost anyone else in American history, Strom Thurmond embodied the true spirit of unfettered douchebaggery.  Fortunately for us all, he was defeated by reason, progress, compassion, and death.  He was the epitome of the object of Dr. King's statement, "Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity."  He is the second week's Douchebag of the Week. 

Happy Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.