ROGER KIMBALL: A Better Guide than Elite Opinion Is Public Revulsion at It.

One of the most bizarre and disturbing aspects of this mob frenzy was the participation of many conservative figures and institutions in the ritual denunciations. Most of the truly egregious posts and tweets have since been removed, an understandable response but one that in my view comes close to being an abnegation of responsibility. I doubt, as some commentators have pointed out, that removing the offending material will achieve the absolution they now seek. The damage is done and is not undone by concealing the weapons that inflicted it.

In part, this side of the episode reflects the universality of that “passion for moral self-righteousness” I mentioned in my original thoughts about the episode. But it also bespeaks a disturbing phenomenon on the right, one that Mark Steyn has anatomized with his customary insight.

There is, Steyn noted, a “strange need of the right to virtue-signal to their detractors—as in the stampede of congressional Republicans to distance themselves from their colleague Steve King over an infelicitous interview with The New York Times.” Just so. And here is the kicker: “Democrats never do this; Louis Farrakhan and his Nation of Islam declare that the Jews are pushing defective marijuana on black men in order to turn them gay—which would appear to be a prima facie slur on at least four Democrat constituencies: blacks, gays, Jews and potheads. Yet Clinton, Obama et al speak not a word against Calypso Louie.”

Also:

A middle-aged Indian beating a drum and chanting wildly has no greater presumption of moral dignity than a white, Trump-supporting boy who participates in a pro-life march. But that is precisely what the imperatives of political correctness demand we acknowledge.

The public—though not, for the most part, the academic elite—has reacted with condign disgust at the treatment of the boys from Covington Catholic. It knows that Nathan Phillips is no more “native American” than Nick Sandmann: both were born here and have equal title to American natality. And it senses that the culprit is the political correctness that has distorted our common life and even our ability to speak the truth about sensitive issues. If there is a silver lining in this disturbing episode, it is that public revulsion at this episode may, just possibly, spark a reconsideration of our ill-advised and demeaning adherence to the tenets of political correctness.

We can hope.