COMMENTARY | Charles Barron, a member of the New York City Council who is running for the United States Congress, has achieved a major political miracle. He has become the first African American to be endorsed by David Duke, according to the Daily Caller.
David Duke, as the Anti Defamation League reminds us, is a racist, and anti-Semite, and a white supremacist who has been affiliated with a number of hate groups, including the Ku Klux Klan. How is it, then, that Councilman Barron, a black man, has attracted his support?
While the New York Times regards Barron's views as "unconventional," what came out of Barron's mouth in an interview with the Daily Beast invokes a few other adjectives -- such as insane and extreme. Barron is a great fan of Robert Mugabe, who has made a wilderness of the country of Zimbabwe, the late Moammar Gadhafi, a dispenser of terrorism who was killed by his own people, and the ranting and dying dictator of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez. He hates America and white people as well.
It turns out that Duke and Barron have a number of things -- which is to say hates -- in common. Barron is virulently anti-Israel. Duke, who is an anti-Semite, doesn't think much of Israel either. Only in America can a black extremist and a white extremist can find such common ground. Who says the racial divide cannot be bridged?
Barron, at least, is aware of the pitfalls of an African American being endorsed by a former Klansman. The New York Daily News reports that Barron has said that the Duke endorsement of his campaign was "foolishness." His opponent in the primary contest, state Assemblyman Hakim Jeffries, is not so disposed to dismiss Duke's interjection of himself into the race. He has denounced Duke and has urged Barron to do likewise.
One is of two minds about the prospects of Barron being sent to Washington. On the one hand, one has to deplore the elevation of an extremist to the United States Congress. But on the other hand, the prospect of Barron's floor speeches is like catnip for people who write opinion for a living. And the fact that he makes other Democrats squirm is a real plus.
