A reader objected to my praise of Senator Ernest “Fritz” Hollings for saying what we all know, that the War in Iraq is being fought for Israel.

He said Fritz was an awful man and a traitor to the South. Every point he made about how Fritz Hollings was an awful man was exactly right.

He did not even mention what was the most important point to me, that Fritz was such a blatant race traitor.

In my reply to this reader, below, I made it clear that I had hated Hollings for many years. But he did something that was desperately necessary in his open criticism of Israel.

Politics is not a competition for Mr. Nice Guy. At the center of power of the most powerful country on earth, it is played for keeps. Anybody who talks about Ole Strom or laughs at Reagan’s harmless old guy image is being fooled by images that are carefully crafted.

If you saw the raw power Ole Strom or bumbling Saturday Night Live Ronald Reagan really disposed of, you wouldn’t sleep at night. I repeat, this game is for keeps.

So if you think that bumbling old Fritz seems to have said some unguarded things about Israel, you just don’t get it. It was a heroic act and very few people will ever appreciate it.

Here is my reply to the reader who wrote me the e-mail. As I have begged people to do, he made it short, he wrote it himself, and it was to the point. If he gives me permission I will reprint it.

It was entitled “Good Riddance to Fritz”:

My reply:

I have hated Fritz since he bragged he had led the pack in demanding that Bob Jones lose its tax deductible status when it banned interracial dating. Even the National Council of Churches backed Bob Jones on that one.

That was back when Fritz was trying get liberal pats on the head. He sold South Carolina and white people out and he expected to get paid for it.

All you say is true, but give even the Devil his due. Fritz is old, but he’s not dead. He could have gotten a lot of the praise and professorships Southern traitors live for, like Beasley. He just had to shut up about Israel.

He gave up a lot by telling the truth.

I think one motivation was spite. He sold out South Carolina so he could be national candidate. They didn’t even consider him for the vice presidential nomination.

Hell hath no fury like a Southern turncoat who doesn’t get paid off.

And this year, Hollings realizes he is paying the price. He has spent decades as the junior Senator from South Carolina, and he is finally the senior senator. He could be the Elder Statesman right now. But he can’t get reelected.

You think Fritz is dead now. He doesn’t think so. He would love to spend the next six or twelve years as the senior Senator and the Elder Statesman. But now he has no future. So he is telling it like it is.

When a man does a good thing, give him credit for it.

If you think he has low motivations while you are a paragon of truth, you may be right. You may be paragon of morality, but I know damned well that I’m not.

And that is where I am coming from.

Good riddance to Fritz Hollings. But he went out with class.

I have just been watching a biography of Carol O’Connor.

You remember he was the star of “All in the Family.” He was Archie Bunker.

A lot of people don’t remember that. Every day less people do.

How about Roseanne? She was wildly popular in her day.

That day is gone.

Back then the idea of having an American “bigot” on television was a big deal. After the show caught on a popular book came out, “The Wit and Wisdom of Archie Bunker.” There were lots of bumper stickers, “Archie Bunker for President.”

Carol O’Connor was stunned by the popularity of his character. He was so sure the show would be a flop that he would not show up for the recording of the first episode unless the studio gave him a round trip ticket to his home in Italy.

After All in the Family became a hit O’Connor kept insuring people that he was nothing like Archie Bunker. Jean Stapleton and everybody else on the show kept testifying that O’Connor had not a trace of political heresy in his entire makeup. He was Irish, but he was not THAT kind of Irish.

THAT kind of Irish consisted of working class types like those in South Boston, the ones who fought racial busing. As I have bragged before, I am an Honorary Southie myself.

Roseanne was a wild hit in its day, too. Roseanne was working class on her show, but she let everybody know that she herself was a good Jewish woman without a trace of political heresy in her being.

In their day, Archie Bunker and Roseanne were a big deal. When the network finally dared air the first Archie Bunker show, they had a Political Warning first. Back then all three networks were run out of New York by the same people and nothing that offended New York Politically Correct Opinion was even considered.

Back then a balanced political debate was a discussion involving two liberal Republicans and three liberal Democrats.

No, I am not exaggerating.

In those days the only places that mattered were Hollywood and New York. The rest of America was referred to as “flyover country.”

And they meant it.

No, I am not exaggerating.

Outgoing Senator Fritz Hollings, with emphasis on the “outgoing,” said that America’s invasion of Iraq was for Israel. He said everybody in Washington knows that.

Well, I think every reasonably intelligent person knows he is telling the exact truth, but somebody else who was a Washington insider needs to say so.

As far as Capitol Hill is concerned, Bob Whitaker is not just “outgoing,” he is outgone, but I WAS big stuff.

I was small potatoes compared to Fritz Hollings when I as at my most powerful, and I am barely burnt out fritters by now, but Fritz is dead right, and he is also right that everybody up there knows it.

Fritz Hollings is showing some courage nobody will give him credit for.

When David Beasley sold out the Confederate flag and lost reelection for it, Harvard gave him the Hero of the Soviet Union, sorry I mean the John F. Kennedy Profiles in Courage Award for it. Then the John F. Kennedy Foundation gave him a job at Harvard until it came time to go back down to South Carolina and run for Senate.

If a one-term governor can get stuff like that for saying what the establishment wants said, what could a forty-year senator from South Carolina get for saying what Political Correctness wants said?

Fritz could have gotten three professorships, six Board of Directors jobs and nineteen honorary degrees for Incredible Courage if he had just kept his mouth shut.

Screw it, said Hollings, I am going to commit the worst heresy I can. I am going to jump on the Sacredest of the Sacred Cows, Israel Itself.

Let me repeat this: absolutely no one in Washington has the slightest doubt that what Hollings said is dead accurate. But nobody, and I mean NOBODY, has the guts to say it.

This is from an old political enemy: Thank you, Senator. I am honored that you are from my home state.

I would be deeply grateful if any reader would convey this from me to the Senator:

Earnest “Fritz” Hollings, I have been your opponent since I supported you for governor in 1958. But in the end, we are both patriots. In the end we are both devoted to the truth. We are both old fashioned South Carolinians who have this crazy urge to tell the truth.

Senator Ernest “Fritz” Hollings, I honor you.