Thursday my wife and I attended The American Spectator‘s annual banquet at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C. The guest of honor was Wall Street Journal opinion writer Kimberley Strassel. I was fortunate to be seated next to her during the festivities. In addition to being a brilliant and insightful columnist, she is very friendly, enthusiastic, sweet-natured and down-to-earth. She was born and raised in a small Oregon logging community, graduated from Princeton and has had a hugely successful career at the WSJ.

When I introduced myself to Kimberley, I said that I write for The American Spectator. She replied that she regularly reads and likes my articles. That left me stunned and speechless. But, as later explained to me by an old friend,  there was a reason why the Spectator bigs seated me as they did. I guess so, but I’m still humbled and amazed.

Senator Lindsey Graham (R. S.C.), the Spectator‘s Ben Stein and Spectator founder Bob Tyrell also addressed the enthusiastic gathering. All were terrific.

There was a panel discussion featuring, among others, Harvard Senior Research Psychologist Robert Epstein, a Hillary Clinton supporter, who warned of the dangers of the surveillance state that has been created by Google and Facebook, the pernicious hidden influence that they bring to bear on public opinion and undecided voters,  and the internal Google memoranda about its plans to defeat Trump in 2020 and to help the Chinese government control its subjects. (I will write more about this in later posts.) Because he has publicly warned of these matters before, he has been viciously attacked by the New York Times and other liberal media.

When I was leaving the event, I stopped to tell Dr. Epstein how much I valued his remarks and that I would champion his cause in the pages of the Spectator and my mighty blog. He said that his biggest supporters have been members of the conservative media including Glenn Beck. His organization’s url is mygoogleresearch.com which can be accessed by clicking on this link. You should check it out and watch this blog for further coverage of Dr. Epstein’s important work.

While the evening’s festivities were enjoyable, getting into the event proved to be challenging but, for those of us of a perverse mindset, equally enjoyable. When my wife and I pulled up to the Trump International Hotel, there was a howling mob of “Women’s March” protesters blocking the entrance and demanding President Trump’s removal from office. The police and hotel security had to clear a path through the protesters in order for normal people to access the hotel. Here’s a link to a Townhall article about the blockade. Embedded in the article is video of the protest. At approximately the 3:48 mark the video shows us approaching the mob and being escorted by the police through the crowd. I’m wearing a green tie and holding an umbrella over my redheaded wife.

Just before that mark, you will see a squat, disturbed woman wearing a checked flannel shirt and blowing on a whistle. As we walked through the mob, she blew the whistle in my wife’s face. Unfortunately the video didn’t capture either the assault on my wife or one of the cops shoving the “whistleblower” (get it?) so hard that she almost landed on the sidewalk.

Judging from the level of anger, shouting, tom-tomming, whistleblowing and unhinged behavior, I think the protest may have been a form of primal scream group therapy for the frustrated mob. I hope they obtained some relief from whatever really ails them. They probably think it’s Trump, but, to my aging eyes, their unhappiness seems to be far more deep-seated.

The next day, my wife and I strolled around the campus of Georgetown University, our alma mater. That’s when we came across this placard posted by Georgetown’s Student Advocacy Office.

In 1838, the Jesuits who ran Georgetown sold 272 slaves to pay off the school’s debts. Earlier this year, Georgetown students voted in favor of paying reparations to the descendants of those slaves. You can read about it here.  Last month, the university announced that it will create a $400,000 fund to benefit the descendants of those slaves. This has led to intense criticism by dissident students and their demand that the school pay $1 billion in reparations.

It seems to me that, if today’s Georgetown is to be held responsible for selling slaves almost two centuries ago, then $1 billion in reparations is woefully inadequate. How about $100 billion? Or a trillion? After all, how can you place an adequate price on such immoral and despicable behavior?

Moreover, the dissident students should meaningfully demonstrate their outrage by immediately transferring out of Georgetown to other less morally odious institutions of higher learning. And they should refuse to have any credits earned at Georgetown forwarded to their new schools. They must thoroughly cleanse themselves of any taint of their unforgivable association – however tenuous – with the long-dead slave-trading Georgetown Jesuits.

So, kids, put up or shut up. And don’t let the door hit you in the rear on your way to the moral high ground.

Of course, the outraged students should be careful not to transfer to schools that sponsor sports teams since, as South Park’s Eric Cartman makes clear, such athletic programs are nothing more than a modern form of slavery.

So that was our trip to Washington. We had a fine time, but it sure was nice to leave Washington behind and come back home to America.