Things That Make My Head Hurt

John Hinderaker at Power Line posted a story today reporting that Vice-President-elect Mike Pence was booed last night as he entered a New York Theater to see the play “Hamilton.” It got worse.

The article reports:

The real outrage came at the end. As Pence got up to leave, one of the “Hamilton” cast members read a deeply offensive statement attacking the Trump administration on behalf of the play’s supposedly “diverse” cast. I doubt, of course, that the cast has any diversity at all. If it includes any conservative members, they remained silent. As the actor delivered his smug, superior attack on the incoming Trump administration, most of those in the audience applauded and cheered enthusiastically:

It used to be said that when a political party suffered a crushing electoral defeat, a period of introspection was appropriate. Don’t try to tell that to today’s Democrats. They have learned nothing, and, in their arrogant presumption, they have no interest in learning anything.

So let that sink in for a minute and consider the following. Scott Johnson posted an article on Power Line today about the likely choice to head the Democratic Party, Keith Ellison. The story reports:

Here is a man who was an active local leader of the racist and anti-Semitic cult known as the Nation of Islam until some time past his first attempt at political office as a Democrat, yet who has never acknowledged, accounted or apologized for his activities and expressed beliefs on behalf of the cult. Rather, as I recounted in the Weekly Standard article “Louis Farrakhan’s first congressman” (2006), Ellison has explained them away with lies and deceptions.

In her Jerusalem Post column “The Ellison challenge,” Caroline Glick builds on my research to elaborate on the meaning of Ellison’s rise for any decent Democrat with eyes to see. Joel Mowbray has more to the same effect in his Daily Caller column on Ellison.

Donald Trump does not have a history of discrimination. One of his Florida resorts was one of the first exclusive resorts in America to allow Jewish and black people, and he fought city hall (literally) to make that happen. He also hired the first woman to be the contractor at one of his New York skyscrapers. Kellyanne Conway is the first woman to be campaign manager for a major political party in a presidential race. Trump has met with Ben Carson to talk about ObamaCare changes.There is no reason for a rational person to believe that the Trump administration will discriminate against anyone. Donald Trump’s concerns about Muslim immigration are valid. Rational people understand that we want immigrants who want to assimilate–we do not want immigrants who do not want to assimilate. That is not discrimination–that is common sense. Keith Ellison has a history of discrimination, and he is being promoted to a position of leadership in the Democratic Party. The actors’ concerns are focused in the wrong place.

At any rate, the behavior of the actors in the New York theater last night is both unacceptable and ironic. When you consider that the play was about one of the Founding Fathers, it is ironic that they used that stage to harass a duly-elected official.