It's another Senate homage gone bad.

This time it was Sen. Gordon Smith (R-OR) praising his friend and colleague, the retiring Trent Lott (R-MS), in a speech on the Senate floor, and launching into a defense of Lott's segregationist remarks from 2002, delivered as a paean to then-Sen. Strom Thurmond on the occasion of his 100th birthday.

Here's Gordon from this morning:

"I was celebrating my re-election and on vacation. I watched over international news as his words were misconstrued, words which we had heard him utter many times in his big warm-heartedness trying to make one of our colleagues, Strom Thurmond, feel good at 100 years old. We knew what he meant. But the wolfpack of the press circled around him, sensed blood in the water, and the exigencies of politics caused a great injustice..."

Video soon.

Late Update: Smith is singing a different tune than he did back in 2002.

Later Update: Watch the video.