Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) tried to speak at the University of Maryland at the end of last month on the topic of “Democracy, Autocracy and the Threat to Reason in the 21st Century.” He was not permitted to get into the text of his speech, however. Raskin is one of the foolish Hamas-enabling, having-their-cake-and-eating-it-too Democrats who wants to make Israel stop its existentially necessary war effort to end the “violence and pervasive suffering in Gaza” and “provide for a massive surge in humanitarian aid”—to the region the U.S. is supposedly supporting the Israeli attacks on. Brilliant!…but I digress.

“Progress in history requires not just reasoning, which is certainly necessary, but it’s not sufficient, because it also requires the addition of the pro-social emotions, as the psychologists call it, of solidarity, empathy, love and the political virtues of justice and equality and freedom,” Raskin began. Then pro-Palestine protesters began shouting at Raskin, accusing him of being “complicit in genocide.” You know: morons. Student morons.

The progressive congressman pleaded with the pro-Hamas mob to have a dialogue with him rather than “heckling,” and that tactic worked as well as it always does. Raskin stopped his speech, pivoting to a spontaneous question and answer format, but the protesters’ chants and jeers made that approach impossible too.

University of Maryland President Darryll Pines (seen grinning above) stepped in and declared the event over as Raskin was effectively silenced. Pines then issued a disgraceful statement to the media, representing the shouting down of a member of Congress as a good thing, either because he was terrified of criticizing the far left on his campus, or because he’s an unethical fool. I suspect the latter.

“He came here to speak about where our democracy is going in our country,” Pines told the Capital News Service, referring to Raskin. “What you saw play out actually was democracy and free speech and academic freedom. From our perspective as a university, these are the difficult conversations that we should be having.”

Pines should be fired, He should be forced to partner with deposed Harvard President Claudine Gay running a Dairy Queen or something. (I know, I know, she’s still teaching plagiarism or something at Harvard for a million bucks or so. Artistic license.)

Rep. Raskin proved that at least he’s not wrong about everything by telling reporters, “I’m not really opposed to heckling, but it seems like heckling today is all about drowning out the speaker, and that’s totally antithetical to the spirit of free expression.”

Of course it is.

As I’ve mentioned here before, my son Grant passed on a free ride to college provided by his grandparents because he felt there were better uses of his time and their money. That was ten years ago, and his decision looks more practical, prescient and wise with each passing month. Nobody should pay a cent to be maleducated or to have a family member maleducated by any institution led by false scholars who literally advocate the opposite of what is true. Shutting down speech isn’t freedom of speech, and may I add, “Duh!”

University of Maryland President Darryll Pines is a spineless incompetent.