Helms' Right-Wing Employee

As the usual race-baiting continues in Jesse Helms' obituaries, we also learn that Helms didn't like overly-conservative policy advisers.

Helms was for integration; he was simply against "movements." He would later hire James Meredith, who was the first black to attend the University of Mississippi -- with the assistance of federal troops. By 1989, Meredith's views had come around to those of Helms, not the other way around.

After years of reading and studying and attending law school at Columbia University, Meredith concluded that blacks had been better off when they worked for themselves and not for white liberals. ... Meredith claimed Helms fired him as domestic policy adviser after a year because he was too right-wing for Helms.

Meredith's big mouth earned him notice.

Liberals discount Helms' hiring of Meredith on the grounds that Meredith had wandered off the reservation. (Blacks are allowed to have only one set of political views.)

Oh, well. That explains the fact that Meredith has not been touted as a Role Model for blacks.