Come for the Democratic schadenfreude, stick around for … more Democratic schadenfreude. Liberal firebrand Alan Dershowitz demanded the firing of Rep. Keith Ellison as deputy chair of the DNC after lying about his contacts with Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, on whom new scrutiny has been applied to his long history of anti-Semitic declarations. “He ought to be treated the way we treat David Duke,” Dershowitz demanded, adding, “If any Republican dared to meet with David Duke, that would be the end of their career. … We don’t have affirmative action when it comes to bigotry.”
Don’t hold your breath, Dersh:
Ellison has repeatedly stated that he cut off all contact with Farrakhan prior to 2006, when he began his career in electoral politics. His colleague, Rep. Andre Carson, contradicted those claims earlier this week. Peter Hasson reported for the Daily Caller that Carson said he continues to meet with Farrakhan, and so did Ellison as recently as 2015:
Democratic Indiana Rep. Andre Carson has confirmed that he took part in a private 2015 meeting with Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan and Democratic Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison.
Ellison, deputy chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC), claimed repeatedly that his relationship with Farrakhan ended well before he first ran for Congress in 2006. New reporting has shown that Ellison repeatedly attended meetings with Farrakhan while in Congress, including privately visiting Farrakhan in his Washington, D.C., hotel room in 2015.
Last Friday, Washington Post fact-checker Glenn Kessler gave Ellison four Pinocchios for his claims of severing the Farrakhan relationship:
Ellison repeatedly has danced around the question of his association with Farrakhan, including whether they have crossed paths since he publicly cut ties with the Nation of Islam in 2006. But he needs to provide a better explanation for what he was doing in Farrakhan’s hotel suite in 2016 and what they discussed. He cannot claim to have “disavowed” Farrakhan more than a decade ago while moving in the same circles and apparently having a friendly chat behind closed doors.
Carson at least acknowledged he met with Farrakhan to discuss issues related to community concerns. Ellison is trying to have it both ways, publicly distancing himself while privately doing something else. He earns Four Pinocchios for suggesting his interactions with Farrakhan ended in 2006.
Desrhowitz is correct that not only is Farrakhan the same kind of bigot as Duke, he’s actually worse — in large part because of the Democratic Party. Republicans have disowned Duke repeatedly and Duke has no influence within it; as Dershowitz says, he’s “a joke.” Not so with Farrakhan, who continues to be engaged and sought after by Democratic officeholders like Carson and Ellison.
The logical fallacy of anachronism (using today’s standards to judge yesterday’s actions) has got to be stopped…..on BOTH sides.
If it means letting Keith E and Andre C get off with nothing for hanging with the anti-Semite to get this to happen, so be it.
But it has got to stop.
The double standard of whites-can-be-racists but blacks & Hispanics cannot needs to go, too.
Are today’s youths smart enough to see these errors in their thinking?
I wonder.
As despicable as Duke and his ideology is, he doesn’t, to my knowledge, call for people to be killed based on their race or religion.
It’s been apparent for a long time that liberals do not expect their representatives to be honest, only that they employ the worst, most deplorable and underhanded tactics to further their political agenda. From a moral or legal perspective, they expect very little of them. Obviously, they don’t expect them not to be racist, either. Those are all political concepts they only use to weaponize against opponents.